Shades of Blue (2025) by Antoni Orlof
Saturday, August 30, 2025, 2:30 pm
CROSSROADS 2025 – program 3
the earth as if it were a dream
Premonitions, farewells, glimpses of hope. From the San Francisco Bay to the Antopodes and points in between comes a program of alchemical, environmental evocations; visions of ecological dystopia; fantasies of escape; reveries of solitude and an exploration of the sonorities of the sea.
SCREENING:
In The Maritime Frequencies (2025) by Greta Snider (US); digital video, color, sound, 16 minutes. Archipelago of Earthen Bones—To Bunya (2024) by Malena Szlam (Chile); digital video, color, sound, 20 minutes. Organized Forgetting (2025) by J.M. Martínez (US); digital video, black & white, sound, 7 minutes. A Patriot of These Woods (2024/2025) by Karel Doing (UK); 16mm screed as digital video, color, sound, 9 minutes. Shades of Blue (2025) by Antoni Orlof (Poland); 16mm screened as digital video, color, silent, 13 minutes. TRT: 66 minutes
PROGRAM TICKETS: $12 General/$10 Cinematheque Members, Gray Area Members & students (with ID)
FESTIVAL PASSES: $85 General/$70 Cinematheque Members, Gray Area Members & students (with ID)
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CROSSROADS 2025
In The Maritime Frequencies (2025) by Greta Snider
“We’ll remember the earth as if it were a dream.” This film is an exploration of the coastal landscapes of San Francisco, using darkroom developers made from the solutions of our times—bay water, hand sanitizer and “safe” detergent—in a conversation about how we internalize our climate emergency, letting mortalities large and small emerge only when the night puts our guard down. Inspired by the San Francisco Bay, dreams and novelist Octavia Butler’s vision of a future California. Featuring Bill Basquin, Ivy Jeanne, Juan Aguirre, Annalise Velasquez, Valerie Soe, Mark Klatte and Mayuran Tiruchelvam. (Greta Snider)
Archipelago of Earthen Bones—To Bunya (2024) by Malena Szlam
This film is part of a film constellation stretching across the Pacific, from Chile to Australia. Szlam trains her camera on far-flung volcanic landscapes, by turns barren and verdant. The dazzling in-camera multiple exposures of the film evoke the layered histories of Mount Beerwah to the titular Bunya Mountains, tracing a path along the central eastern ranges of Australia, which were illuminated in the afterglow of Hunga-Ha’apai eruption. The film’s environmental evocations are further deepened by field recordings and sonified atmospheres from Lawrence English. Filmed across the lands of the Turrbal, Yuggera, Jinibara, Gubbi Gubbi, Wakka Wakka, Jarowair, Barrumgum, Quandamooka and Butchulla Peoples in Australia. We acknowledge them as the Traditional Custodians and Knowledge Keepers of these lands. (TIFF Wavelengths) bay area premiere
Organized Forgetting (2025) by J.M. Martínez
Oscillating between positive and negative 16mm black-and-white film is a sensorial attunement to the layered mysteries of oceanic zones. Abstracted studies and sonic traces of communicating species dwelling in the intertidal and midnight zones of the Pacific Ocean. Biosonar clicks of whales and vocalizations of seals are interrupted by the sounds of tanker engines, radar pings from commercial ships and the growing chorus of ocean mining. In the depths, the mammal with the largest brain tries to communicate through the noise of our dominion. What does it mean to listen, to intrude and to belong? (J.M. Martínez) world premiere
A Patriot of These Woods (2024) by Karel Doing
A Patriot of These Woods is a film that is inspired by the novel The Baron in the Trees (1957) by Italo Calvino. Calvino’s book tells the adventures of a boy who climbs up a tree to spend the rest of his life inhabiting an arboreal kingdom. (Karel Doing) bay area premiere
Shades of Blue (2025) by Antoni Orlof
Taking a moment to look back, longing. These images, the cutouts of life. A quiet absence comes in with the light. Only my inabilities and a glimpse of hope remain. (Antoni Orlof) north american premiere
Greta Snider (US) is a San Francisco filmmaker who works with recycled/reclaimed materials and experiments with nonfiction film. She teaches Cinema at San Francisco State.
Malena Szlam (Chile) is a Chilean artist based in Montreal/Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang. Her work explores embodied perception and the affective dimensions of analogue film processes. Attentive to the geopolitics of natural phenomena, her recent projects focus on geology, earth science and volcanology. Her films have been exhibited at TIFF, MoMA, New Directors/New Films, Media City Film Festival, MIFF, FICValdivia, Jeonju IFF, Cinéma du Réel, 25FPS and IFFR. Recent group exhibitions include Energy Fields: Vibrations of the Pacific at Fulcrum Arts, femmes volcans forêts torrents at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, and The Moon: From Inner Worlds to Outer Space at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark.
J.M. Martínez (US) is an artist based in the Santa Cruz Mountains of California, working with film, video, sound and sculpture. His works highlight art forms found in nature and the interconnected relationships of species within an evolving landscape.
Karel Doing (UK) is an independent artist, filmmaker and researcher whose practice investigates the relationship between culture and nature by means of analogue and organic process, experiment and co-creation.
Antoni Orlof (Poland), born in 2002, is a filmmaker based in Warsaw. His artistic practice explores poetic and narrative possibilities of images, as well as editing structures, and their ability to create meaning. Driven by a fascination with time, memory and symbols, his work delves into themes of transience and personal experiences.