" }
  • THE FINE ART OF REAL LIFE

    Documentaries about artists and their times

  • N E W S

    broken image

     

    We are pleased to announce our collaboration with The Criterion Collection  on the major 8K restoration and remastering of this classic film on rural Japan
    using the original 35mm film elements.
     
    Arturo Silva's Essay
    The Inland Sea: Invitation to the Voyage
     
    ARCHIVAL NEWS
    THE INLAND SEA 
    Permanent Collections
    UCLA /SUNDANCE COLLECTION
    THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART
    Ormond Gigli Glenn Gould Recording Artist poster Sharon Watts Randall Martin

    GLENN GOULD, RECORDING ARTIST

     

    Join us in the studio with

    GLENN GOULD and friends,

    as we relive a golden age in recorded music.

     

    From Columbia Records to the

     Canadian Broadcasting Corporation,

    from The Goldberg Variations

    to The Solitude Trilogy,

    travel with us on a journey through sound

    in a movie filled with

    music, ideas, and technology.

    Fred Plaut, Yale University

    GLENN GOULD, RECORDING ARTIST

    features rare, never before seen

    Fred Plaut photographs we curated after extensive archival work at

    Yale University.

    Thanks to our funders at the

    National Endowment for the Arts.


    Glenn Gould and Howard Scott; photograph by Fred Plaut,
    courtesy Irving S. Gilmore Music Library, Yale University

    Directed and Written by Lucille Carra

    Produced by Lucille Carra

    and Joan Baran

    Cinematography by Allen Moore

    Poster and Graphics by Sharon Watts

    and Randall Martin

    Photo Credit: Ormond Gigli

     

     

    NEAnyscalogos
  • SIGHT & SOUND MAGAZINE
    Jasper Sharp reviews
    the restored version of
    THE INLAND SEA

    broken image

     

    Artdigiland

    Gerry Guida's conversation in Italian and English

    VIAGGIO IN PELLICOLA NEI TERRITORI DELL'ARTE

    broken image
  • ABOUT  TRAVELFILM

    We are a documentary film production company exploring cross-cultural perspectives on music, architecture, the environment...and more. We are dedicated to new research, and to the preservation of timeless images. We specialize in unique collaborations with international artists and scholars, and producing partners world-wide. We work with archival film and photographic media originating in all formats.

    broken image

    Crossing over time periods

    and time zones

    "Offbeat - satisfyingly personal and idiosyncratic."

    - Variety

     

    • THE INLAND SEA is the celebrated version of Donald Richie's classic travel memoir (U.S.-Japan). The film captures visions of a rapidly fading "old Japan."
    • DVORAK AND AMERICA is the first U.S. - Czech Television co-production, and uses new scholarship to explore Antonin Dvorak's relationship with his African-American students in New York.
    • THE LAST WRIGHT is the only project in any medium to record the history of the Park Inn and the City National Bank commission of Frank Lloyd Wright and to link it with his work in Japan.
    • GLENN GOULD, RECORDING ARTIST is the first film to explore the intersection between Gould's classical musical recordings for Columbia Records and his experimental radio art in Canada.
    photobyandrewkazdin

    International Collaborations

    "Cut sharply, with telling closeups."

    Classical Music on the Web, U.K.

     

    Music scores feature original work by Toru Takemitsu, Maurice Peress and the Prague Radio Orchestra.
    Partners include The Criterion Collection, PBS, Czech Television, AVRO (Netherlands), Ronin Films (Australia), RM Associates (U. K.), Janus Films, PBS Video. Our films have been shown on international television, and are available on DVD and streaming services internationally, with distribution from Ronin Films, Alexander Street, PBS Video, Voyager Company, and others. We have screened at over one hundred film festivals, including Sundance, San Francisco, London, Leipzig, Sydney, Melbourne, Auckland, Bombay, Golden Prague. Funders include the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Japan Foundation.

    broken image

    Cutting Edge Meets Archives

    “The travel film at its most personal and evocative.”

    - LA Times

     

    We have assembled some of the brightest talents working in the arts today. From 8mm to 16 to 35, from 2 inch video masters to the latest digital technology, we've been experimenting with formats and collaborating with some of the most esteemed cinematographers in documentary, television and features: Hiro Narita (Never Cry Wolf, Gilmore Girls, The Last Waltz), Allen Moore (Ken Burns Jazz, The Civil War), Richard Rutowski (The Americans, Person of Interest) and Antonin Chundela (DEVATKO, IN SEARCH OF JANACEK).

    Our scholars are among the most prestigious in their fields: Gerald Early, Josef Svorecky, Bruce Brooks Peiffer, Donald Richie.

    We are noted for our original research, working at over one hundred international archive houses in Europe, Japan and North America.

     

  • THE LAST WRIGHT
     

    The first project in any media about Frank Lloyd Wright's Park Inn Hotel

     

     

    Filmed on location in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, New York, Arizona, and Japan, where we visit Wright's inspirations in Japanese art and architecture,

    as they directly relate to The Park Inn.

     

    Photographed on 16mm film and presented in 4K

     

    Period music from original wax cylinder recordings

     

    EMMY NOMINEE: Best Narration Writing for a Documentary

     

    GRAND PRIZE WINNER-BEST DOCUMENTARY - Iowa Motion Picture Association

     

    In 1908, when Frank Lloyd Wright was considered the most innovative architect in Chicago, he traveled to Mason City, Iowa, to design a unique, mixed-use city block - a bank and adjoining hotel facing a park. By 1914, scandal and tragedy would ruin Wright's career. By 1926, The Park Inn Hotel would begin a serious decline, but still standing, it remained one of his last Prairie style structures. Although little known, and vulnerable to the economic changes in Mason City, The Park Inn influenced the Bauhaus Movement and served as inspiration to one of Wright's most famous designs - The Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. Through rare archival footage, period music and a comparative look at famous Wright structures, The Last Wright offers a provocative, ironic tapestry of an American century, tracing the life, death and rebirth of a Midwest town through the prism of The Park Inn.

     

    During the 20th century, the forgotten Park Inn faced alterations and degradation while Mason City drew unwanted national attention with a Dillinger Bank robbery in the 1930s, an economic downturn in the 1960s and the label Porn City in the 1970s. In an effort to promote heritage tourism, the city struggled to fund renovations of The Park Inn in the 1990s while attempting an economic revival with a $20 million tribute to the musical comedy, The Music Man, based on Meredith Willson's boyhood in Mason City.

     

    Which vision of Mason City history has prevailed?

     

  • DVORAK AND AMERICA

     

     

    "An imaginative, absorbing film." - Rob Cowan, The Independent

     

    "An extraordinary documentary!" - Michael Steinberg, San Francisco Orchestra

     

    A rarity! Sumptuous cinematography. Music history that rises above the usual bromides of television documentaries - The Washington Post

     

     

     

    On September 26, 1892, when Antonin Dvorak arrived in New York to direct the National Conservatory of Music of America, he was given the daunting task of creating a school of music for a young nation boundlessly confident in its resources, but still looking to Europe for a sense of identity. When Dvorak pronounced that America already had a source for national music - 'based on Negro melodies' - he not only sparked controversy but invigorated an already burgeoning community of African-American musicians.

     

    Through a colorful and provocative mix of film, poignant first-person accounts, priceless archival material and a treasure trove of music, DVORAK AND AMERICA takes us on a surprising journey from Harry T. Burleigh's renderings of plantation songs and the creation of The New World Symphony to the twentieth century and the birth of the Broadway musical with Will Marion Cook's 'In Dahomey'.

     

    Director Lucille Carra combines classical and popular music, Dvorak's original music scores for The New World Symphony and the American Quartet, unpublished personal letters, oral histories, rare wax cylinder recordings, and sumptuously photographed locations in Prague, New York, and the American prairies, to reveal the musical links between cultures.

     

     

    Produced by Lucille Carra
    Directed and Written by Lucille Carra
    Co-Producer and Chief Musical Consultant: Maurice Peress
    Producer for Czech Television: Radim Smetana
    Cinematography by Hiro Narita, Allen Moore, Antonin Chundela
    In Dahomey Overture and Swing Along by Will Marion Cook
    American Plantation Dances by Maurice Arnold
    Conducted and Orchestrated by Maurice Peress
    with the Prague Radio Orchestra


    Featuring Gerald Early, Jean Snyder, Reid Badger, Josef Svorecky,

    Josephine Herrald Love

    Mrs. Vera Janova (Granddaughter of Antonin Dvorak)

     

    A Co-Production of Travelfilm Company, Czech Television and AVRO

     

    Opening of the film, DVORAK AND AMERICA

  • THE INLAND SEA

     

    BEST DOCUMENTARY Hawaii International Film Festival

     

    NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC EARTHWATCH FILM AWARD

     

    Director's Choice Black Maria Film Festival

     

    TOP TEN FILMS OF THE YEAR Andrew Sarris, New York Observer

     

    Lucille Carra re-creates the lyrical vision of old Japan captured by Donald Richie in his classic travel memoir. The film adaptation combines select passages of Richie's text - romantic, prickly, amused - with original interviews and extended observational sequences playing on the structures of interior monologue and ethnographic cinema. The result observes Richie as a post-World War II expatriate American living in Japan as much as it observes a fading rural culture.

     

    THE INLAND SEA has been screened at over 100 international film festivals, including SUNDANCE, LONDON, SYDNEY, MELBOURNE, AUCKLAND AND WELLINGTON, SAN FRANCISCO, LOS ANGELES, MANNHEIM, LEIPZIG.

     

     

    Directed and Adapted by Lucille Carra

    Produced by Lucille Carra and Brian Cotnoir

    Written and Narrated by Donald Richie, based on his book

    Cinematography by Hiro Narita, ASC

    Music Composed by Toru Takemitsu

    © Travelfilm Company

     

     

    Miyajima, from the film, THE INLAND SEA

  • SHOP TRAVELFILM

    International and North American BluRay/DVD Sales from Criterion

    Streaming on The Criterion Channel

    broken image

    THE INLAND SEA

    THE PRIZE WINNING FILM BASED ON

    DONALD RICHIE'S ACCLAIMED MEMOIR

    "Invigorating, exuberant, vivid, fascinating!" - New York Times

     

    "The travel film at its most personal and evocative." - LA Times

     

    "Contemplatively captures the old Japan
    in offbeat, contrapuntal ways." - Variety

     

      "To travel deeper and deeper into the Inland Sea

    is to travel deeper and deeper into time."

    So begins Donald Richie's classic travel memoir of his journey to Japan's Seto Naikai - the sea within straits. Stunningly photographed by Hiro Narita (Never Cry Wolf) and with an original music score by Toru Takemitsu.

     

    US AND INTERNATIONAL SALES: THE CRITERION COLLECTION

    4K, 8K and Bluray

     

    Review of The Inland Sea in The New York Times

    broken image

    DVORAK AND AMERICA

    ANTONIN DVORAK AND HIS AFRICAN-AMERICAN STUDENTS

    CHANGE AMERICAN MUSIC

     

     

    "An extraordinary documentary!"

    - MICHAEL STEINBERG, SAN FRANSISCO SYMPHONY

     

    Through a colorful and provocative mix of film, poignant first-person accounts, priceless archival material and a treasure trove of music, DVORAK AND AMERICA takes us on a surprising journey from Harry T. Burleigh's renderings of plantation songs and the creation of The New World Symphony to

    the twentieth century and the birth of the Broadway musical

    with Will Marion Cook's 'In Dahomey'.

     

    Producers Lucille Carra and Brian Cotnoir combine classical and popular music, Dvorak's original music scores for The New World Symphony and the American Quartet, unpublished personal letters, oral histories, rare wax cylinder recordings, and sumptuously photographed locations in Prague, New York, and the American prairies, to reveal the musical links between cultures.

     

    For Streaming and Sales in PAL contact Ronin Films

    For Streaming and Sales in NTSC contact travelfilm@gmail.com

     

    Read international reviews! 

     

    broken image

    THE LAST WRIGHT

    AN ARCHITECT  A CITY  A  HOTEL  A   CENTURY

     

     

    "An informative and entertaining visual and audio blend of cinematography, rare archival footage and photographs."

    -WRIGHT IN WISCONSIN

     

    THE LAST WRIGHT offers images of The Park Inn and City National Bank before restoration in comparison to successful efforts to restore Wright structures; included are first looks at The Walter Residence, Stockman House (Iowa), as well as Taliesin (Wisconsin), Oak Park residences (Illinois), and newly filmed images of the Imperial Hotel (Meiji Mura), Imperial Hotel Bar (Tokyo), and Wright's hotel suite and garden at the Fujiya Hotel in Hakone, where evidence of Wright's inspiration is still seen.

     

    For Streaming and Sales in PAL contact Ronin Films

    ForStreaming and Sales in NTSC contact Filmakers Library/Alexander Street Press

    For Sales to Museum shops, Public Programs and other inquiries, contact travelfilm@gmail.com

     

     

    broken image

    GLENN GOULD,

    RECORDING ARTIST 

    Glenn Gould as you've never seen him.

    Glenn Gould as you've never heard him.

     

    Major awards from the National Endowment for the Arts

    and the New York State Council for the Arts

     

    Featuring dynamic musical insights from the greatest classical music producers of the twentieth century.

     

    A rich and satisfying recreation of New York's ground-breaking recording scene featuring some of Glenn Gould's closest collaborators at

    Columbia Masterworks.

     

  • LUCILLE CARRA

    Award winning filmmaker Lucille Carra was born in Manhattan. She holds a BFA in Film Production and an MA in Cinema Studies from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where she was cited Outstanding Woman Student of the Year (Tisch) from the New York University Alumni Association. Through her company, Travelfilm, she has produced, directed and written critically acclaimed cultural documentaries on an international scale.


    She conceived THE INLAND SEA (Earthwatch Film Award, Best Documentary/Hawaii International Film Festival) and DVORAK AND AMERICA, the first U.S.- Czech TV documentary co-production. Featuring previously unknown recordings of Dvorak's music, the film has been screened in conjunction with Dvorak festivals at several venues, including The Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Royal Festival Hall in London. DVORAK has been broadcast annually on Independence Day in the Czech Republic and the United States.

     

    THE LAST WRIGHT was funded, in part, by the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities Iowa. The film chronicles the history of the last-standing Frank Lloyd Wright hotel, the Park Inn, and the efforts to restore it. With a focus on sustainability issues, the film offers a comparative study of several Wright masterpieces in America and Japan. It received a regional EMMY nomination for Best Writing and the Grand Prize from the Iowa Motion Picture Association of America.

     

    GLENN GOULD, RECORDING ARTIST was awarded funds from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York State Council on the Arts. She has presented Gould's only U.S. television program (written by Gould and directed by Kirk Browning), "How Mozart Became a Bad Composer," at venues in the U.S., Canada, and Germany. With NEA funds, she located the master tape and presented the restored version. Her films are in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art and The Sundance Collection.

     

    Lucille Carra has an extensive background in arts administration and non-profit, and has worked in the distribution and archiving of international films, including the collections of several master Japanese filmmakers; in theater, she has worked as a production coordinator in New York's top theaters, and has facilitated the licensing of Broadway productions to Japan.

     

     

  • EMAIL US

    travelfilm@gmail.com