Peter Emanuel Goldman

[titanium]

1. Recommended by Duncan Hines (1965)
2 Pestilent City (1965)
3 Night Crawlers (1965)
4 Echoes of Silence (1965 / 1967)
5 The Sensualist (1966)
6 Wheel of Ashes (1971) aka Roue de cendres (France)
7 NBC in Lebanon: A Study of Media Misrepresentation (1983)

Re:voir website announced Echoes of silence and Wheel of ashes as forthcoming on dvd for later this year. This is a huge news, as Echoes of silence is probably one of the most beautiful film ever made about loneliness in the city. With Wheel of ashes, Goldman tried to remake with Paris what he had achieved with New York, though the spiritual journey of the character played by Pierre Clementi appears to be not as convincing as the neverending wandering of Miguel Chacour in NYC was. Maybe the reason is Goldman is at his best when he’s not trying to deliver any message : in “Echoes”, each sequence is like a sketch simply describing a situation : having drink in a bar, trying to pick up a girl in a museum, making up, going home being sexually frustrated… It is the addition of these situations that finally draw a story, some feelings that completely catch the audience. Whereas, for instance, in Pestilent city the incredible talent of Goldman as a camera operator only try to prove one shot after another that NYC is a city full of dirt, poverty and despair. The intent was here before the film was made.

I’m kind of surprised that Goldman’s work almost never have been mentioned in this forum. Perhaps it’s not easy to classified : though shot in “underground” conditions, they’re not exactly experimental films, except maybe for Night crawlers, which is exactly the last four minutes of Pestilent city and shows NYC inhabitants in negative, giving the impression that they are animals crawling. Also, Goldman’s turn to the Israel cause seems to have been a radical one. I never have the chance to see NBC in Lebanon: A Study of Media Misrepresentation, but maybe the novel Goldman published recently, Echoes on a crying floor give some keys to understand his own journey. The plot seems to involved wandering characters in Paris and New York that finally meet by chance in Israel.

But the biggest gap in his filmography might be The Sensualist. It’s apparently a sexploitation film, but the plot tagline “from Greenwich village cafes to wild secret parties” might not turn out to be so different from the thin narrative of Echoes.

Did any of you have the opportunity to see this one? Will it ever resurface? (Something Weird video ???)

It would clear whether Goldman was a great filmmaker barred in his carrier, or the man of only one masterpiece.

[leo goldsmith]

This is great news -- is there a link? I can't seem to find anything about it on their website.

[titanium]

Hi Leo,

the links wanted :

Catalogue
Nitrato lírico
Re: Peter Emmanuel Goldman

(Chodorov is the boss of "Re:voir)

So nobody has a clue for the Sensualist ?

Must not let it remain a doomed one, as The day the clown cried is...