Lone Gunman kicks off radical video festival

By Tracy Sorensen

SYDNEY — How can a psychotic hit man redeem himself? Knocking off Pauline Hanson might be a good start.

Lone Gunman Theory is a fast, reckless, feature-length no-budget video which follows the exploits of a lone nihilist with a big gun. As you'd expect, a lot gets mown down, blown up and cut down to size. It's all done with great energy, black humour and a perfect soundtrack.

Writer-director Bob Short, an ex-punk rocker turned video artiste, describes the style as "Tarantino meets Lynch on amphetamines".

Lone Gunman Theory kicks off Actively Radical Television's first video festival at 8pm on November 21 at the Newtown Neighbourhood Centre. The festival venue then moves to the ARTV studio at 10 Norton Street, Leichhardt, for two days of radical videos from all over the world.

There will be videos about Indonesia, Bougainville and the West Bank, as well as about issues closer to home like freeway developments, workers' health and '90s feminism.

Saturday night's highlight, East Side Story, is a fascinating documentary about musicals and movie-making in Eastern Europe before 1989. Can socialist realism be fun? Should a 20-something economist be engaging in anything as un-worker-like as ballet in her spare time?

Definitely stuff you won't see anywhere else! For a program or more information, telephone ART on 9568 2485.

From GLW issue 298