Joel Wanek

Movies

Phase Space
Director
Sun Song
Director
A poetic journey from the darkness of dawn into the brightness of the midday sun in the American South. Filmed over the course of six months on one bus route in Durham, North Carolina, this film is a celebration of light and a meditation on leaving.
still/here
Director of Photography
In this austere and sorrowful portrait of his hometown, St. Louis, Harris sets his black-and-white camera loose to wander through the city’s decaying north side neighborhoods, an area populated almost exclusively by working class and working poor African Americans. Gliding down empty streets, across the facades of once-elegant homes, entering condemned buildings, the camera makes a detached but ultimately damning portrait of civic neglect and apathy. Poignantly, human beings are rarely encountered; their presence haunts the soundtrack of eerie footsteps, an unanswered telephone, and sparse voiceover commentary from found sources. 16mm. (Jim Trainor)