Barbara Rubin and the Exploding NY Underground

May. 02,2018

Rating：

7.2

Genre：

Documentary

Keywords：

Underground Film

Trailer Synopsis Cast

The 29-minute experimental film Christmas on Earth caused a sensation when it first screened in New York City in 1964. Its orgy scenes, double projections and overlapping images shattered artistic conventions and announced a powerful new voice in the city's underground film scene. All the more remarkable, that vision belonged to a teenager, 18-year-old Barbara Rubin. A Zelig of the '60s, she introduced Andy Warhol to the Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan to Kabbalah and bewitched Allen Ginsberg. The same unbridled creativity that inspired her to make films when women simply didn't, saw her breach yet another male domain, Orthodox Judaism, before her mysterious death at 35. Lifelong friend Jonas Mekas saved all her letters, creating a rich archive that filmmaker Chuck Smith carefully sculpts into this fascinating portrait of a nearly forgotten artist. An avante-garde maverick, a rebel in a man's world, Barbara Rubin regains her rightful place in film history.

Jonas Mekas as

Amy Taubin as

Barbara Rubin as Self (archive footage)

Similar titles

A Life on the Farm

A strange story from Somerset, England about a filmmaking farmer and the inspiring legacy of his long-lost home movies.

See Detail

A Life on the Farm 2023

This Is Not a Dream

The video revolution of the 1970s offered unprecedented access to the moving image for artists and performers. This Is Not a Dream explores the legacies of this revolution and its continued impact on contemporary art and performance. Charting a path across four decades of avant-garde experiment and radical escapism, This Is Not a Dream traces the influences of Andy Warhol, John Waters and Jack Smith to the perverted frontiers of YouTube and Chatroulette, taking in subverted talk shows and soap operas, streetwalker fashions and glittery magic penises along the way.

See Detail

This Is Not a Dream 2012

Nightslave

Enter the bizarre world of Thraxton Hall, where Jarvis, Lord of the Manor, indulges in his wildest, darkest fantasies! Part torture chamber, part Turkish bath, part homicidal nightmare, this ramshackle monstrosity is actually his imaginary creation, his escape from a dead-end existence, fueled by his passion for silent horror films. But maybe his fantasies are real… this passive video geek turns out to be a bit more then we bargained for! And to this crazy mix a beautiful, buxom blond, scantily clad in black lace and garter belt, who is terrorizes by Jarvis, and Nightslave explodes into reality with terrifying results. A black comedy with an edge, this is one-of-a-kind thriller takes you on a sexy horror ride you don’t want to miss.

See Detail

Nightslave 1988

Vapors

Mr. Jaffee is a curious but closeted married man, who decides to take a walk on the wild side one night over to the local bath house located in Times Square, New York. When he is a approached by Thomas, a swinging regular who takes an interest in Mr. Jaffe as the new face "on the scene", a deep discussion about marriage, connection and loss begins to unexpectedly unfold. The two become emotionally intimate in a very short time, with no sexual contact of any sort, while everyone around them are screwing like rabbits.

See Detail

Vapors 1965

Multiple Maniacs

The Cavalcade of Perversion, a traveling freak show, acts as a front for Divine, who is out for blood after discovering her lover's affair.

See Detail

Multiple Maniacs 1970

Primal Bodies

This fragmented body… usually manifests itself in dreams when the movement of the analysis encounters a certain level of aggressive disintegration in the individual.it then appears in the form of disjointed limbs, growing wings and taking up arms for intestinal persecutions.

See Detail

Primal Bodies 2022