Jon Jost

Jon Jost
Jon Jost
Born	May 16, 1943 (age 81); Chicago, Illinois, United States
Occupation	Filmmaker

Jon Stephen Jost (born 16 May 1943) is an American independent filmmaker from Chicago.^[1]

Born in Chicago to a military family, Jost grew up in Georgia, Kansas, Japan, Italy, Germany and Virginia. He began making films in January 1963 after being expelled from college.

In 1965 he was imprisoned by US authorities for 2 years and 3 months for refusing to cooperate with the Selective Service System.^[2] On his release, he engaged in anti-war activities primarily by working for the draft resistance, Chicago Mobilization, and helped found the Chicago branch of Newsreel, the New Left Film production and distribution group.^[2]

Career

A self-taught filmmaker, Jost made his first full-length film in 1974. He has made forty long-form films focused on a wide range of American issues. Jost's work has been screened at major film festivals around the world. The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, screened a complete retrospective of his work from January 18 to February 19, 1991. This program was repeated at the UCLA Film Archive, Los Angeles, (March–April), and partially repeated at the American Film Institute Film Theater at the J.F. Kennedy Center, Washington, DC, (February), the Kabuki Theater in San Francisco under the sponsorship of the Film Arts Foundation and San Francisco Film Society, (March–April), and the Harvard Film Archive, Boston, (April). In October, 1991, the Viennale, in Vienna, Austria, in the context of a broader festival, screened a complete retrospective of Jost's films. It was also screened in January–February 1992 at the Arsenal Kino, Berlin.

In 1994 the Bergamo Film Meeting, Italy, organised a complete retrospective of all features and short films, and published a book and catalog on Mr. Jost and his work. A traveling retrospective was done in the Netherlands by the Filmtheater Desmet in fall 1994; and in December 1994 a complete retrospective was done at the Cinemateca in Bologna, Italy, and in Feb 1995 it was repeated at the Film Museo Nazionale, in Torino. Full retrospectives were mounted in 1996 at the Cinemateca Portuguese and Filmoteca Espanol. In 2011 the Jerusalem Cinematheque did an 11 film partial retrospective, also shown in Haifa and Tel Aviv.

Since 1996 he has worked almost exclusively in digital video (DV & HD), completing twenty-six features and many short films in electronic formats. Two of his most widely known films are All the Vermeers in New York^[1] (1990) and The Bed You Sleep In (1993). His 1977 feature, Last Chants for a Slow Dance is listed in the book 1001 Films You Must See Before You Die.

Jost also works in photography and painting, and writes and plays country western songs.

Personal life

After living and teaching in Seoul for 4 years, Jost resigned as a "Distinguished Professor" from Yonsei University, in June 2011, and resumed full-time filmmaking. Jost is presently living in Butte, Montana (2020).

Filmography

Feature length films

Speaking Directly (1973)
Angel City (1976)
Last Chants for a Slow Dance (1977)
Chameleon (16 to 35 mm) (1978)
Stagefright (1981)
Slow Moves (1983)
Bell Diamond (1986)
Plain Talk & Common Sense (1987)
Rembrandt Laughing (1988)
Sure Fire (super16 to 35 mm) (1990)
All the Vermeers in New York (35 mm) (1990)
Frameup (35 mm) (1993)
The Bed You Sleep In (35 mm) (1993)
Uno a me, uno a te e uno a Raffaele (35 mm) (1994)
London Brief (DV) (1997)
Nas Correntes de Luz da Ria Formosa (DV) (1999)
6 Easy Pieces (DV) (2000)
Roma - un ritratto improvvisario (DV) (2000)
Muri romani (DV) (2000)
Oui Non (DV) (2002)
Vergessensfuge (DV) (2004)
Homecoming (DV) (2004)
Chhattisgarh Sketches (DV) (2004)
Passages (DV) (2004)
La Lunga Ombra (DV) (2005)
Over Here (DV) (2007)
Parable (DV) (2008)
Rant (DV) (2008)
Swimming in Nebraska (DV) (2010)
Imagens de uma cidade perdida (DV) 2011
Dissonance (DV/HD) 2011
Trinity (DV/HD) 2011
The Narcissus Flowers of Katsura-shima (HD) 2012
Coming to Terms (HD) 2013
Canyon (HD) 2013
Bowman Lake (HD) 2014
They Had It Coming (HD) 2015
Blue Strait (HD) 2015
Again & Again (HD) (with Marcella Di Palo) 2012-2018
Muri Romani II (HD) 2018
Pequenos Milagres (HD) 2019
Tourists (HD) 2020
Deadendz, 68 min, 2012-2023
Casa do silencio (HD) 2024

Short films

Portrait, 1963
Repetition, 1963
Chalma, 1964
Sunday, 1964
City, 1964
We Didn't Go to Unique's, 1965
Judith, 1965
Leah, 1967
Traps, 1967
13 Fragments & 3 Narratives from Life, 1968
Susannah's Film, 1969
Flower, 1970
Canyon, 1970
Fall Creek, 1970
A Man Is More Than The Sum of His Parts/A Woman Is, 1971
Primaries/A Turning Point in Lunatic China/1, 2, 3 Four, 1971
X2: Two Dances by Nancy Karp, 1980
Beauty Sells Best, 1978
Godard 80, 1980
Water Song #1, 1998
Adrift, 2001
Til Edvard, 2001
Vera x 3, 2001
Dharma Does As Dharma Do, 2001
Water Song #2, 2001
Fugue, 2002
FUNKIES - 10 Electronic Paintings, 2003
Tanti Auguri, 2002
A Walk Through Waseda Garden, 2004
A View of Mount Baker from Port Angeles, Wa. [For Hokusai], 2004
San Lorenzo, 2006, 12 mins, Italy
Mr Right, 2009, 30 mins, Seoul S Korea
AMTRAK, 2009, 27 mins, USA
Canyon, 2013, 24 mins, USA (short version)
Stand, 2016, 30 mins, USA
Landscape for Watanabe Shiko, 13 mins USA 2017
Requiem, 13:30, USA 2018
On the Strait, 6:40, USA 2020
Walking the Dogs, 1.40, USA 2020
Spectral Passage, 6:30, USA 2020
Luminous Landscape, 6:40, USA 2020
July 4, 3:10, USA 2020
And a butterfly, 2:50, USA 2020
I have a friend who hates windchimes, 1:05 USA 2020
Red Frame, 4:03, USA 2020
Veils, 10:30, USA 2020
Brambles, 4:45, USA 2020
The Field, (A Dance),2:38 USA 2020
The Symphony, 2:02, USA 2020
Punta Secca, 9:05, ITALY 2020
My Life as a Midge, 6:28, USA 2020

References

^ ^a ^b Clark, John (October 1, 2006). "Survival Tips for the Aging Independent Filmmaker". The New York Times.
^ ^a ^b Jost, Jon; Aaron Gerow; Abé Mark Nornes; Fujiwara Toshifumi (March 10, 1999). "An Interview with Jon Jost". Documentary Box (12). Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. ISSN 1340-9824.

External links

Official website
Jon Jost at IMDb
Interview with Jon Jost - Documentary Box (Interviewers: Aaron Gerow, Abé Mark Nornes, and Fujiwara Toshifumi)
Jon Jost: The Early Films (1963-1983)

[NYT-1] Clark, John (October 1, 2006). "Survival Tips for the Aging Independent Filmmaker". The New York Times.

[DocBox-2] Jost, Jon; Aaron Gerow; Abé Mark Nornes; Fujiwara Toshifumi (March 10, 1999). "An Interview with Jon Jost". Documentary Box (12). Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. ISSN 1340-9824.

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