Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis (2007)
April 11, 2007Release Date
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis (2007)
April 11, 2007Release Date
Plot.
Where to Watch.
Cast & Crew.
Jack Smith
Self (archive footage)
Nayland Blake
Self
Ira Cohen
Self
Tony Conrad
Self
Richard Foreman
Self
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Self
Ivan Galietti
Self
Helen Geets
Self
Robert Heide
Self
Henry Hills
Self
Allen Ginsberg
Self
Gary Indiana
Self
Ken Jacobs
Self
George Kuchar
Self
Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt
Self
Sylvere Lotringer
Self
Agosto Machado
Self
Judith Malina
Self
John Matturri
Self
Taylor Mead
Self
Jonas Mekas
Self
Mario Montez
Self
Billy Name
Self
William Niederkorn
Self
Uzi Parnes
Self
Lawrence Rinder
Self
Ari M. Roussimoff
Self
Andrew Sarris
Self
Jerry Tartaglia
Self
Ronald Tavel
Self
Ela Troyano
Self
Andy Warhol
Self (archive footage)
John Waters
Self
Robert Wilson
Self
Holly Woodlawn
Self
Mary Woronov
Self
Nick Zedd
Self
John Zorn
Self
Mary Jordan
Director / Writer / Producer / Cinematography
Stephen Kessler
Executive Producer
Ross Morgan
Executive Producer
Kenneth Peralta
Executive Producer
Matt Morandi
Music
Richard H. Prince
Executive Producer
Richie Nieto
Sound Re-Recording Mixer
Alessandra Zeka
Line Producer
Thurston Moore
Music
J.M. Silverman
Camera Operator
Media.
Details.
This Movie Is About.
Wiki.
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis is a documentary film that premiered in the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival. It is a collection of interviews and clips by and about the artist Jack Smith. It was directed by Mary Jordan and produced by Tongue Press Productions.
The film was given a limited release in New York movie theaters beginning on April 11, 2007.
Jordan is a Canadian-born filmmaker known for her documentary shorts resulting from extended visits to Africa and Southeast Asia. David Ebony, whose review of the film appeared in Art in America, had met Smith in the late 70s soon after moving to New York and at that time "attempted to assist him with a number of 'slide-show performances.'" Ebony's review, following the documentary, covers some of the difficult exhibition history of Flaming Creatures (1963), Smith's best known film, and difficult collaborations with Jonas Mekas and Andy Warhol and others. Voiceovers from Smith, culled from some 14 hours of interviews with various critics and friends, supplemented the archival visual materials, footage and extensive interviews with filmmaker John Waters, Smith's sister Mary Sue Slater, playwright Richard Foreman, Smith and Warhol star Mario Montez, writer Gary Indiana, and musician John Zorn, among others. Ebony concludes that the film "manages to evoke the quirky and often cantankerous personality of its subject without ever making him seem merely a disgruntled artist and social misfit, as some may think him. ... I feel that Jordan's multifaceted and impassioned portrait rings true. Smith, in fact, comes off in the film as an ingenious art-world Cassandra, more relevant today than ever."
Wesley Morris, whose review appeared in the Boston Globe, was impressed that Jordan "manages to conjure Smith's story while also telling a story about art in America", concluding that Smith was "a pioneer of the sort of event that just doesn't seem possible in an age when counterculture feels like mass culture and very little art is shocking".