PANAMERICANA - A SERIES ON THE ROAD MOVIE INITIARED BY THE HOGESCHOOL SINT-LUKAS BRUSSELS

The road movie is a cinema of encounters and possibilities. The architecture of the story is inferior to the life of the moment, to the duration of the journey and to the film. With this emancipation also comes the disenchantment, the disappointment. The powerful associations between the screen and the view out the front of the car, between viewer and chauffeur or passenger, between filmstrip and ‘the road’, seem like as many messages from the (distant) past. What is the status of the road movie today, at a time in which the car is no longer the symbol of freedom and independence, but rather of traffic deaths, bankruptcies and unemployment, not to mention expensive petrol? What is the role of the road movie now that the world can also be seen at the click of a mouse? Argos proffers a series of public presentations on the contemporary position of the road movie.

The evenings are allied to ‘Panamericana’, a Master’s studio at St. Lukas College in Brussels initiated by Herman Asselberghs, Ronnie Ramirez and Rob Rombout. The lecture series focuses on diverse aspects of the documentary road movie and invites filmmakers, critics and theoreticians, including Michel Khleifi and Maurice Lemoine, to take part.
In addition to this, during the month of March the shows at the Ecran d’Art are dedicated to two important historical examples of the genre. The themed programme ‘Couples on the road’ presents the work of Jim McBride and Su Friedrich.

04.03.09 – 20:30
Lecture: Michel Khleifi - Road Block Movies
Michael Khleifi’s films and documentaries put Palestinian cinema on the map. His approximation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is particularly human and universal; he plays on topics such as exile, memory and community. In his lecture Khleifi talks about cinema and immobility, enclosure and territory – terms that are seemingly contrary to the framework of terms generally developed around the road movie concept.

11.03.09 – 20:30
Lecture: Maurice Lemoine - Media Bolivariana
As a journalist, engaged traveller, and chief editor of Le Monde Diplomatique, Mauric Lemoine has for years publicised political situations in South- and Middle-America. His attention is mainly on the issue of democratisation in countries such as Venezuela, and on the position the media take in that part of the world in relation to that process. In his lecture Lemoine sketches the current situation in Bolivia, thereby zooming-in on the ambitions and the thinking of Hugo Chavez – the president of Venezuela since 1999.