Ozu's Passing Fancy

Nearly 80 years after the release of Passing Fancy, composer Lori Goldston’s new score adds contemporary texture to the classic Japanese silent film. Tonight’s screening will feature Goldston and other musicians in a live performance.

Lori Goldston, cello; Phil Gelb, shakuhachi (bamboo flute); Greg Campbell, drum set, percussion and horn

With a sophisticated visual style and understanding of fragile human relationships, Ozu seamlessly weaves rib-tickling comedy and weighty family drama in this humorous and heartfelt study of a close, if fraught, father-son relationship.

Cellist and composer Lori Goldston’s live film scores draw on years of wide ranging musical experiences and preoccupations, including work with Nirvana, David Byrne, Earth, Ellen Fullman, Mirah, Laura Veirs, the Wedding Present and Cat Power, and with traditional Japanese, Turkish, Brazilian, Chinese and experimental orchestras and chamber groups. Her sound is full, subtle and meticulously rendered, moving easily across a wild spectrum of influences, including psychedelia, folk and early music.

“Lori Goldston’s affection for the film allowed her to become its full collaborator; her music constituted a kind of physical enactment of listening. She began in silence—absorbing the moment and the film—and then her sound emerged, shifting and responding to what she took in.”
Matthew Stadler, Artforum

Special thanks to James Bond of Full Aperture Systems, and the University of Chicago Music Department.

(Yasujiro Ozu , Japan, 1933, 35mm, b/w, silent, 100 min)

Reservations strongly recommended for this event.