A World Crafted out of Conspiracy and Cabals

Packard is an absolute outsider both to the art and the film world. After struggling for years to complete films out of his own pocket, he received a large inheritance when a relative died, which he spent on Reflections of Evil (2002), a long treatise on contemporary American paranoia. His work is DIY and accepts no limits. He belongs to the wild fauna of Los Angeles and his films are located somewhere between arthouse cinema and video art.

Packard remains relatively obscure to the public. He is known for his pessimistic view of the movie business, often commenting on how directors have no control of their work and that artistic vision in Hollywood is always sacrificed for profit. He also claims that creativity in film largely vanished after the end of the 1970s.

A strong affiliation to the work of John Waters and the brothers George and Mike Kuchar can be found in Packard’s work. The Kuchar brothers were pioneers in the American underground film scene of the 1960s, being part of the same scene as artist Andy Warhol and filmmaker Stan Brakhage. Their work is campy, low budget and is full of over-the-top satire. While Waters and these other makers, distance themselves from the ‘mainstream’, Packard looks for that mainstream, albeit in a completely idiosyncratic way. Having pop culture, consumerism and the blockbuster as his starting point.

At the finissage on Saturday afternoon, 9 March, Theodoor Steen will give a presentation ‘Theo Talks Trash’ and the film Doggiewoggiez! Poochiewoochiez! by Everything is Terrible will be screened.

Theodoor Steen is a film journalist and programmer with extensive knowledge of Trash Cinema. Until recently he was programmer for Breda B-, Underground and Trash Filmfestival (BUT, for experts). At this moment he writes for Cine.nl and Schokkend Nieuws and is mainly interested in how image language can be used to convey messages. In his lecture he will show how this also is the case for Trash-culture.