The Resounding Life of a Maguey

China, 1997. An unhappy marriage, a love affair and a child who holds all the secrets.

A bride walks on the desert. She takes off her bridal ornaments and turns into a harlot. A multitude of people crawl on their bellies, become sick and soon die. A volcano erupts. White ashes of lahar cover the earth. The bride remembers her betrothal and repents--symbolically paving the way for the resurrection of her people. A final bridal march into a new heaven and earth takes place.

"As a painter carries a sketchbook and practices drawing, I carried a Super 8 camera and shot frame by frame, as an everyday exercise to make animations of lines and shapes found in the public space. The entire film was edited in camera and hand-processed afterwards." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

"The second film in the series, showing my study especially in apparent shapes – a shape that cannot be seen in a single frame but only through a series of consecutive frames when projected. It was edited in camera and hand-processed afterwards." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

"The third film in the series, which starts with a sequence of paired images: a focused image and a blurred image of the same subject, which was caused by a diagonal camera movement. Later, it shows an experiment to produce an apparent depth by rotating an apparent shape. It was edited in camera and hand-processed afterwards." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

"The fourth film in the series, for which I focused on colors and shapes. It was shot on Kodachrome, all edited in camera, and processed at Dwayne’s Photo." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

"This is the last film in the series. I shot at the site of Marin Headlands County in California when I was an artist in residence at the Headlands Center for the Art. The footage shows the nature in the area, as well as the historic buildings originally built for the US Army, including batteries and the Nike Missile Site. It was all edited in camera and hand-processed afterwards." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

"A study in visual rhythm with images of architecture in Manhattan, New York, using the technique I did for the first sequence in Sketch Film #3. All edited in-camera and hand-processed afterwards. This film was commissioned by Echo Park Film Center for the celebration of its 12th anniversary." (Tomonari Nishikawa)

Kaveh is an LGBT sculptor. He lives in Iran and lives in isolation because of his sexual orientation. He has a lover named Farhad. Their relationship is not very good. It is Kaveh who is not happy with this relationship, he lives in his workshop because of the repression of LGBTs in Iran. He is making a statue when he suddenly realizes that this statue is talking to him. The words of the statue are not clear and are more like chatter. He breaks up his relationship with Farhad like his previous relationships, because something more than sex requires a relationship. He enjoys being alone more, but now he realizes that Farhad has destroyed the only statue they made together. The whispering sound of the statue increases and every moment Kaveh's mental state is more disturbed, to the point that he works day and night to build that statue. The statue is completed as if the statue is the lost lover of Kaveh. By completing the statue of Kaveh, he becomes a statue.

Augusta tries everything in order to make herself look beautiful.

In a forest clearing, as she runs away from an invisible menace, a little girl meets a strange-looking child.

Music by Austin Cesear, 16mm film by Paul Clipson.