Corax
Luke 5:16
I have very fond memories of The Shooting Gallery.
For those that don't remember, TSG was a show on Channel 4 late-night in the early to mid 90s, that showed shorts by independent film makers. These were my teenage years. My life had thus far been split between identikit provincial suburbs and the rural East. If you asked me what the best thing about 'film' or 'cinema' was as a form of art, I would have looked briefly puzzled and then said something about Ghostbusters.
Stumbling across TSG, after having really quietly cracked the tab on one of my dad's John Smiths (he'll never notice, surely?), I was blown away by the surreal visions that were splashed across the screen. The little CRT in the corner became a gateway into a dozen universes of lunatic hallucinations and visceral emotion. I loved it. I couldn't tell you anything coherent about the shorts I saw as a kid on TSG, only that they left an impression. I can vividly picture a man being chased by a huge wasp, blood slowly dripping from a mirror, a young woman huddled on a balcony, but I can't recall the context or the plots at all. I know that they were damn good though.
I've googled The Shooting Gallery periodically ever since I became properly connected to the net, hoping that C4 had decided to offer them up on DVD, or that some lone hero had recorded the lot and was now torrenting them. No such luck.
But today, my search turned up a new result. It said:
Last on Channel 4 Tue 12 Mar, 1.05am
Not a rerun it seems, but a relaunch of the platform. In some ways I'm disappointed with that, as I'd love to see the originals again. Still, if they've retained the philosophy of the original showcase, it can only be a good thing.
Anyone been watching?
For those that don't remember, TSG was a show on Channel 4 late-night in the early to mid 90s, that showed shorts by independent film makers. These were my teenage years. My life had thus far been split between identikit provincial suburbs and the rural East. If you asked me what the best thing about 'film' or 'cinema' was as a form of art, I would have looked briefly puzzled and then said something about Ghostbusters.
Stumbling across TSG, after having really quietly cracked the tab on one of my dad's John Smiths (he'll never notice, surely?), I was blown away by the surreal visions that were splashed across the screen. The little CRT in the corner became a gateway into a dozen universes of lunatic hallucinations and visceral emotion. I loved it. I couldn't tell you anything coherent about the shorts I saw as a kid on TSG, only that they left an impression. I can vividly picture a man being chased by a huge wasp, blood slowly dripping from a mirror, a young woman huddled on a balcony, but I can't recall the context or the plots at all. I know that they were damn good though.
I've googled The Shooting Gallery periodically ever since I became properly connected to the net, hoping that C4 had decided to offer them up on DVD, or that some lone hero had recorded the lot and was now torrenting them. No such luck.
But today, my search turned up a new result. It said:
Last on Channel 4 Tue 12 Mar, 1.05am
Not a rerun it seems, but a relaunch of the platform. In some ways I'm disappointed with that, as I'd love to see the originals again. Still, if they've retained the philosophy of the original showcase, it can only be a good thing.
Anyone been watching?
