Christopher O'Neill is a filmmaker who specialises in video essays, trailers and experimental cinema. He's also the cinema programmer of the Triskel Arts Centre in Cork, Ireland.
Raquel Times Ten features 53 seconds of silent footage with actor Raquel Nave which has been duplicated from one VHS recording to another, and that copied to another VHS cassette, and that to another VHS cassette... in total, this sequence is presented ten times and with each duplication the image and the soundtrack quality deteriorate until Raquel's facial features are a wave of analogue distortion.
Chris O’Neill continues his series of found footage inquiries into the haunting power of the cinematic image with I Wake Up Screaming. Images from a little-seen and underrated masterpiece of 1970s genre cinema are twisted and distorted into an unrecognisable new vision. This assault on the senses is heightened by an intense soundtrack from Texas-based rock ‘n’ roller Gabbie Bam Bam.
Slow motion imagery of a female face is duplicated and superimposed over itself. One of these image tracks plays in reverse; the sound of a female voice recalling the first time that she saw her lover is played over and over again, overlapping multiple times until it becomes a wall of intense sound; and the music score is an ambient electronic drone that glides along with the visuals and the dialogue. All of these elements come together to create a film that is a meditation on memory.
In 2003 Chris O'Neill spent a period of time in New York City where he shot several films on black and white 16mm film stock. One of these pieces was a silent narrative piece. 15 years later, O'Neill went back to this footage and created an entirely different film using out-takes. The conventions of the narrative are discarded as the images are re-edited into style inspired by the 'cut up' technique pioneered by author and filmmaker William S. Burroughs.
In 2003 Chris O'Neill spent a period of time in New York City where he shot several films on black and white 16mm film stock. One of these pieces was never completed. 15 years later, O'Neill went back to this unused footage and created an entirely different film using out-takes. The conventions of the narrative are discarded and the images - a mixture of a female face in close-up and tails and heads of film reels - become an exploration of the materiality of film.
Sister Mary or Mary the Junkie is an experimental 'found footage' short film. By re-filming imagery from a 35mm theatrical print of a narrative feature, the frame is adapted and reframed, to present a very different kind of film by focussing solely on one single supporting character. The soundtrack of the original movie has been removed and replaced with an eerie soundscape and dialogue taken from an interview with the actor who appears in this footage. The title 'Sister Mary or Mary the Junkie' is based on a quotation spoken by the character in the original feature film.
