The colorful, quirky style that is associated with the members of the West Coast experimental film scene has long been defined by the foundational work of Bruce Baillie, Robert Nelson, and Pat O’Neill. Despite being every bit as critical to that scene’s origins and their subversions of New Age aesthetics, the small body of work that Will Hindle (1929-87) left behind has frequently resulted in many of his 11 films being far more discussed than seen.

Spectacle is proud to bring its own variation on the second-ever complete Will Hindle retrospective, functioning as both the first in New York City and the first opportunity to watch all 11 of his films in chronological order. This retrospective encompasses nearly 30 years of filmmaking, with all his films shown on 16mm prints and several being presented via the sole distributable prints in good condition.

“One of the most important new voices in both queer and avant-garde cinema, Haddad’s work can alternate between languid and truly abrasive rhythms, often inhabiting a POV that feels truly dangerous in a filmmaking landscape for young directors so encouraging of “niceness”.” – Ethan Vestby, Bleeding Edge

Of course weirdo art film languishes on the periphery of conventional film, but why has one James Otis, clearly brilliant yet oddly invisible, languished on the periphery of weirdo art film? Some fault lies in the stars, some in Otis himself, the confessed worst promoter of his own work. Contradictions emerge almost immediately with Otis, a polymath educated in math, sculpture, computer science, film studies and artistic practices he calls “gesturing” and “finger twiddling.” He’s a lucid dreamer of the mundane, a timeless anachronism, and a skeptic of certainty. Otis displayed remarkable perceptual abilities at an early age. Concerned about the seven-year-old’s description of binocular vision, his parents took him to a doctor who prescribed a series of eye exercises—exercises that only heightened his acuity. At the age of 19, too aware of his reliance on vision, he blindfolded himself for 9 days.