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FILM & MORE:
The film maker
The
writer
The actress
The
speaker
Alpine objects
« What I like about making movies
is telling stories for different senses – what I don’t
like about it is that it requires so much planning and forethought.
Or as Karl Valentin would have said: 'Making movies is quite
nice, but it needs a whole lot of work.'» Christina
Zurbrügg
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«HALF-TIME»
A film by zurbrügg & hudecek
Nominated for the Rose
d'Or 2009
Multicoloured, multilayered, adventurous – a very personal
view of two neighbouring countries:
Switzerland and Austria.
The singer and film-maker Christina Zurbrügg has spent
half her life in Switzerland, the other half in Austria. She
now has arrived in the middle of life. HALF TIME, that is. Reason
enough to lightheartedly ponder about one’s life –
and about life itself.
The words she most often heard in Austria were: “Oh, your
name is Zurbrügg like the ski-racer…”
About the most important export from Switzerland to Austria:
The Habsburg family that was driven away by the Swiss people.
And furthermore: the Swiss collection of relics and a little
lexicon for everyday use about “Weggli” and “Semmel”,
“Herrgöttli” and “Pfiff”, “Wienerli”
and “Berner Würstel”.
With: Christina Zurbrügg, Lisa Fischer, Thomas Fischer,
Franz Hohler,
Oscar Knapp, Richard Weihs
Trailer here
Directed by: Christina Zurbrügg & Michael
Hudecek
Script und music: Christina Zurbrügg
Cinematographer: Christian
Haake, Michele Pellegrino
Editor: Michael Hudecek
Production Company: GAMSfilm in coproduction with ORF and SF,
supported by FERNSEHFONDS AUSTRIA, sponsored by RIVELLA
Head of production: Johannes Fiala. Production assistant: Max
Berger, Joe Berger. Assisting director: Axel Hoffmann. Lighting:
Paul Schön. Settings: Laura Weiss. Sound: Wolfgang Mohaupt,
Odo Grötschnig. Make up: Carmen Schneider. Grafics &
Animation: Thomas Treu. Special Fashion: Leo Oswald.
Austria-Switzerland 2008, German/Schwyzerdütsch, Colour/b&w,
16:9, 61 minutes DigiBeta
Please
order here
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«STAYING / LEAVING»
a film by zurbrügg & hudecek
Awarded with the "Golden Dragon" - Switzerland 2007
A little village in the Swiss Alps: Kiental. This village served
Friedrich Dürrenmatt as inspiration for his play “The
Visit”. In the fifties the mysterious unknown camera man
Landtwing filmed there. Christina Zurbrügg – singer,
writer and film maker – was born there and Dürrenmatt
quite often sat in the baking-house with her grandfather. Many
years later she is entrusted with the film reels. She travels
to her home village and with poetry and humour tells us about
memories and reality, past and present. A found footage remix.
Directed by: Christina Zurbrügg & Michael Hudecek
Script and music: Christina Zurbrügg
Cinematographer: Hannes Julie Drapal / Herr Landtwing
Editor: Michael Hudecek
Quotes: Friedrich Dürrenmatt
Production company: GAMSfilm 2006 in coproduction with 3sat,
ORF and SF, supported by Filmfonds Wien and Amt für Kultur
Kanton Bern
60 minutes, colour, 4:3, 16mm/DV/DigiBeta
Please
order here
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| IWork in progress:
«LIFE PORTRAITS»
About Viennese musicians and other masters of the art of living
Two films by zurbrügg & hudecek
with Kurt Schaffer and Kurt Girk
We are quite familiar with Viennese music of the 19th century,
from the turn of the century up to the second world war. But
only little information has been secured about the post war
generation that grew up with American jazz and traditional music.
A jig-saw puzzle of personal memories and experiences –
unique and irretrievable examples of Vienna’s cultural
history. A picture of a vanishing culture of life.
Director: Christina Zurbrügg & Michael Hudecek
Camera: Bernhard Pötscher
Editor: Michael Hudecek
Production: GAMSfilm 2004
Supported by Kulturamt der Stadt Wien
2 x 25 Minuten, Colour/b&w, DV/DigiBeta
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«IN OUT» - Move the World
A film with Birgit Heyn
Dancing, meditating, fighting, moving joyfully through everyday
life, through your dreams...
A film journey to the middle – to the centre, a slow dance,
a love story, a musical experience. The Viennese pharmacist
and Ayurveda-specialist Birgit Heyn travels to places in Europe
and Asia that have grown important to her and shows six different
forms of Tai Chi. Fascination of slow motion in the fast moving
world of today.
Directed by: Christina Zurbrügg
Photography: Bernhard Pötscher
Editor: Michael Hudecek
Script / idea: Birgit Heyn
Lyrics: Heinz R. Unger
Music: zurbrügg & hudecek (Soundtrack CD: tai chill)
Production: Birgit Heyn and GAMSfilm 2002
with: Birgit Heyn, Heinz R. Unger, Abraham Soenarso, Eva Pilz,
Uli Linauer, Elisabeth Maly
48 minutes, colour, german/english, 16:9, DV/DigiBeta
Please order here
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«The 99 most important inventions
of mankind»
A film by zurbrügg & hudecek
Since humans have inhabited this planet, they have used the
creative power of their minds to shape their lives and their
environment. Miles and miles of cerebral coils presented to
us these 99 beneficial inventions.
Presentation on November 23, 2000 at the opening of the exhibition
«Inventions we don’t need either» of the Nonseum
at the Palais Palffy
Script, Directors, Photography, Editing, Actors:
Michael Hudecek and Christina Zurbrügg (A/CH)
Length: 8min06
Production: Gamsfilm
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«ORVUSE ON OANWE»
Vienna's last Doodlers
A film by Christina Zurbrügg
Three Viennese singers, Trude Mally, Poldi Debeljak and Luise
Wagner, are the last folk singers who have mastered the almost
forgotten art of "doodling" (a Viennese version of
alpine yodeling). When they are gone, a part of Viennese musical
tradition will disappear with them forever. The life stories
of these women and of the singing landlady Anny Demuth are unique
documents of Viennese folk music.
«Cities have their
own face and their own voice. A city is a big landscape in itself.
The doodlers are the voice of this landscape – unmistakable
and unique»
Dr. Erhard Busek
Directed by: Christina Zurbrügg
Script: Martin Auer based on an idea of Christina Zurbrügg
Cinematography: Heinz Brandner, Renée Kellner, Wolfgang
Thaler, Robert Winkler
Editing: Zuzana Brejcha, Michael Hudecek
Animation: Martin Auer
Music: Reinhard Ziegerhofer
Scientific advice: Maria Walcher
Cast: Poldi Debeljak, Trude Mally, Luise Wagner, Anny Demuth,
Pepi Matauschek a. o.
Production Company: A GAMS-Production of the Musikverein Café
de Chinitas in cooperation with Österreichisches Volksliedwerk
Austrian Support: BMUK, Stadt Wien, BKA, Wiener Städtische
Versicherung
ORVUSE ON OANWE - Vienna's
last doodlers,
Austria 1998
Viennese dialect, color/b&w, 54 min./Beta SP
ORVUSE ON OANWE! - SERVUS IN WIEN!
Please
order here
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«I only write when there is something
so strong inside myself that it just has to get out. So it
is not really me writing – something is writing me.»
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«ORVUSE ON OANWE» Vienna’s
doodlers
Life histories and songs
Vienna, 1996
Reviews
«The title of Christina Zurbrügg’s book reveals
a second treat besides doodling: ‘Orvuse on Oanwe’
… a sample of the Viennese musicians’ jargon.»
Kurier
«Zurbrügg allows each woman to tell her life story
in her own words and just adds cautious comments… But
what makes this book really precious are the songs, partly transcribed
for the first time by Zurbrügg … With the warmest
recommendations.» Anschläge
«As the storytelling was hardly intervened with by editing,
every life story connects itself to the contemporary history
of this century and so renders very special eyewitness accounts
… and another important part of the book: Christina Zurbrügg
has transcribed lyrics and music of favorite songs and so has
accomplished a pioneer deed for the conservation of female song.»
AUF
To be ordered at Österreichisches Volksliedwerk
Text sample >>
Introduction to «Orvuse on Oanwe»
These smoky and crowded Monday evenings at the inn “Zum
alten Drahrer”, when snatches of songs, sounds of doodling
and accordion-playing still would reverberate in my ears afterwards
through the night – they are no more. The inn-keeper Anny
Demuth has died, the popular singer Poldi Debeljak lives in
an old-age asylum, only Luise Wagner, the 91-year old ‘siskin’,
and Trude Mally, the 68-year old ‘teenager’ among
the doodlers, still perform.
But even if we never again shall hear Poldi Debeljak sing 'Wann
mich der Herrgott fragert', never again see her make her little
bow and lift up her arms, even if Anny Demuth never again sings
'Wo i bin geborn' with this unique faraway look in her eyes
– they will remain unforgettable to all those who have
ever heard them sing.
Maybe this book will succeed to give its readers, who never
did listened to these singers, an impression of these four women
and the importance of music in their lives – so that they
too may get an idea of the charm of this unique art of singing.
[...]
Many of the songs have been transcribed for this book for the
first time – until then they only existed through oral
tradition, some of them also on sound carriers. These songs
are supplemented with the harmonies that the partners of the
singers used for their accordion accompaniments.
The selected songs and doodlers are pieces of music that these
women in some cases have been singing since their childhood
and that constitute a part of their very own repertoire. Of
course some of my favorite songs are among them, and maybe some
readers in a quiet moment will seize their guitar or accordion
and discover their own favorite melody. Christina Zurbrügg
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«NEHKI LIK» - Let me tell
you.
Vienna: edition handmade books, 1996 (1993)
Text sample >>
«One time» from «Nehki lik»
One time I shall change to an animal
that leaps like a frog
crawls like a snail
and dashes like a doe.
I’ll possess the eyes of an eagle-owl
and I’ll turn my head like a falcon.
I’ll dig into the soil like a caterpillar
and I’ll let the wind carry me through the land on a spider
thread.
And I’ll spread my tail
like a peacock
I’ll coo like pigeon
croak like a raven.
One time the hunter will come:
But he won’t hit me.
The poems «One time» und «Sometimes»
also were published in «Großer Ozean. Gedichte für
alle.» Weinheim und Basel: Beltz & Gelberg, 2000,
published by Hans-Joachim Gelberg. Likewise in: «Was für
ein Glück.» Weinheim und Basel: Beltz & Gelberg,
1993, published by Hans-Joachim Gelberg
«One time» can be heard set to music on the CD «Startled».
«Nehki lik» can be ordered from C. Zurbrügg
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 «NEGRESS»
- A tale. Vienna: Apfel-Verlag, 1994
(First performed in the Theater Drachengasse in 1993)
Reviews
«‘A Sorrow Beyond Dreams‘ from the Swiss mountains
… With a keen sense for details Zurbrügg has traced
these women. Their biographies are dramatic and symptomatic
for the woman as ‘nigger’ of this world …»
Die Presse«...a tender vocal recital: The finest of folklore
and a wonderful voice.» Der Standard
«...one is enthralled by a fascinating atmosphere …
Together with the three musicians K. Trabitsch, P. Rosmanith
und N. Eggl she (C. Zurbrügg) reaches her top form. So
the evening turns into an experience, a feast.» Wiener
Zeitung
The text «About a girl who wanted to own everything»
from «Negress» was also published in «Die
Erde ist mein Haus.» Weinheim und Basel: Beltz & Gelberg,
1988, published by Hans-Joachim Gelberg.
Text sample >>
Text sample «Negress»
I shall start at the beginning, as far as that’s possible.
I have fetched the two shoe boxes with photos from my bureau
and started to paste them into an album. Two shoe boxes filled
with life, but nothing to tell about it. I liked the quiet of
the night so much, up in my small chamber under the roof top;
from the valley the rushing of the creek could be heard, now
and then a cow bell was tinkling – and I was arranging
and pasting and even forgot about my gout. [...]
Suddenly everything happened very fast. I salted the cheese
and turned it over, I cooked soup from leftovers, I fetched
logs of wood, I weighed fresh lumps of butter, refilled the
petroleum, sold bread, in winter I wadded old newspapers into
cracks in the walls, scratched dirt from the cracks in the floor
with a hairpin, I mended stockings, scrubbed the sink, brought
my drunk husband to bed, did the laundry at two o’clock
in the morning. I always was afraid of thunderstorms, I dug
the garden, always got up at six o’clock, stored winter
salad in the cellar, I fed children, I fed grandchildren, I
began to forget. Just a little while ago everything lay before
me. And suddenly you are what you have grown to be. [...]
Here, the last page. Only one picture. The valley with its
mountain that’s always white. A vaporous cloud is floating
upwards, another cloud up high in the sky. An unknown woman
is standing in the high grass and looking up at the mountain.
No more writing, no explanations. That is the end of this
album.
Once I had a dream about silver forks that move into the cutlery
drawer all by themselves. There they lie asleep and dream
their silvery dream. I woke up and asked myself, what kind
of silvery dream it might be that silverware dreams. There
was no dream fitting for them, and not at all any silvery
one.
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| The Translation
Garfield, Leon / Edward Blishen: The gods of the Olymp. Vienna:
Gabriel Verlag, 1998
Translated from English by Christina Zurbrügg and Martin
Auer. (Martin Auer also wrote lyrics for the CD «Startled»)
«A literary masterpiece translated congenially.»
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| The articles
Miscellaneous articles for the magazine Auf!
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«Even as a child I loved transformation
– to be somebody else, to live a different life –
till I finally realized that I myself was all these strange
“others”. Many tiny pieces of mirror on a big
round disco sphere.» Christina Zurbrügg
A demo video may be ordered at:
GAMSfilm & music
Tel: +43 6991 9667 446
Fax: +43 1 5050 220-9
email: posthorn@gams.cc
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| Film:
2008 Film “Half-Time” by zurbrügg & hudecek>
2006 Film «Staying / Leaving» by zurbrügg &
hudecek
2000 TV-Film «The arrest of Johann Nepomuk Nestroy»
Director: Dieter Berner
Experimental film «Salt» Director: Renée
Kellner
1985 TV-Film «The adventurous journey of Margrave Pallavicini»
Director: Erich Lackner
Theatre:
2002 «Christl's Wonderworld» Director: Michael Hudecek
– Kosmos Frauenraum, Vienna
2002 «What’s up with Daniela Dunioz?» Director:
Corinne Eckenstein – dietheater Künstlerhaus, Vienna
1998 «Ach, Garcia! Federico!» Director: Reinhard
Auer – Freies Theater Bozen
1996 «Town without doors» Director: Rremy Brandner
– dietheater Künstlerhaus, Vienna
1993 «Negress» Director: Martin Auer – Theater
Drachengasse, Vienna
1986 «Die Bluthochzeit» Director: Ingrid Kähler
– Junges Theater Berlin
1986 «Mörder, Hoffnung der Frauen» Director:
Peter Ily Huemer – Vienna Festival
1986 «Extremities» Director: Ewa Teilmans –
Theater zum Äußersten, Vienna
1985 «Das letzte Fest» Director: Ruben Fraga –
Vienna Festival
For own productions see Biografie |
Booking:
GAMSfilm & music
Tel: +43 6991 966 74 46
Fax: +43 1 5050 220-90
email: posthorn@gams.cc
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| References:
Languages: German, Swiss German, French, Italian, Spanish, English
Commercials: A-Online, Toblerone, Coca Cola, a. o.
Documentaries: Portrait «Georges Tabori», «Skiing
in Kitzbühel» (sports documentary), «Agriculture
and Nutrition» (science documentary), «S’
greane gwandl sagt net all’s» (radio play documentary),
«Alles ist heil im Geheimnis» (TV documentary) a.
m. o.
Miscellaneous radio- and TV-programs, a. o.
Synchronisations likewise.
Download
sample (mp3 1,4 MB) |
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