SYNOPSIS

The « apron lady », gathering then organizing a few unusual objects found on the spot, pondering upon their meanings, thinking about materiality, about her own condition, under the vast sky hanging over her; the « orange man », carrying a trombone, bringing confuse sounds out of it, wandering amidst the fields which solely define the horizon, conscious of the quaintness and vacuity of his situation...

STATEMENT

Prime Nebraska constitutes the D.I.Y., low-tech genesis of my filmmaking practice. Following a flash of inspiration that came during a Nebraskan countryside walk, the shooting of the project took the form of a single take, 15-minute sequence shot, simultaneously captured with two devices: a vertically handheld SD point-and-shoot digital camera, and a fixed Hi8 analog camcorder. Footage from the Hi8 camcorder was then outputted to a cathode-ray tube television set and reshot with the SD camera. Material from both sources were laid out in split-screen during the editing process. The short film’s existentialist approach falls within the tradition of the Theatre of the Absurd. The nondescript open space, the costumes and the scarce props all aim to emphasize the purposelessness of the characters, as well as their inability to communicate with one another; they are awkward drifters in a bare universe, in search of an elusive meaningfulness.

TECHNICAL SUMMARY

2008—2012 • Experimental short film • 12:47 • SD video + Hi8 •

Color + black and white • 2.08:1 • French + English

CREDITS

Screenwriting, directing, photography, editing, sound design, original music, production:

Marco Joubert

Interpretation: Kurt Peterson and Rana Schmitz

Costumes: Marco Joubert and Rana Schmitz

Original sound capture: Kurt Peterson

VIEWING LINK

Watch Prime Nebraska on Vimeo

OTHER LINK

Kurt D Peterson's website