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Trimpin: The Sound of invention Troll 2
USA
Trimpin, the largely unknown and eccentric composer/sculptor/inventor
USA / ITALY
The shelves of hell’s own video store are surely lined with copy after VHS
Director: Peter Esmonde called only by his last name, inhabits a world of sound unlike any other. Director: Claudio Fragasso copy of Troll 2, a 1991 horror movie that raises one profoundly compel-
Producer: Peter Esmonde A collaborator who has worked with choreographer Merce Cunningham Producer: David Hills, Brenda Norris ling question: “What the #*@% is going on here!?” For a new genera-
Cinematographer: Peter Esmonde
and the Kronos Quartet, Trimpin has a childlike presence that director/
Screenwriter: Rossella Drudi,
tion of moviegoers determined to find answers, this one-time flop has
Editor: Rick Tejada-Flores
producer/cinematographer Peter Esmonde painstakingly captures in Claudio Fragasso attained cult status (as chronicled in the documentary Best Worst Movie,
Cast: Trimpin, Conlon
the footage he shot for this documentary over the course of two years.
Cinematographer: Giancarlo Ferrando also screening at SDFF 32).
MS: A to Z
Nancarrow, David Harrington,
Whether engaged in the broad strokes of performance or the minutiae of
Editor: Vanio Amici
MS: A to Z
il Charles Amirkhanian
passing observation – a squeak or a crash or a strange resonance – Trimpin
Cast: Michael Stephenson,
Not only completely unrelated to the earlier released creature feature
il
2009 / color / 78 min. is fascinating, charming, and completely unselfconscious, as is his extraor- George Hardy, Margo Prey, Troll but also devoid of the titular fellas altogether, Troll 2 begins as the
E F
dinary brand of musical invention, which is visually as well as sonically
Connie McFarland, Robert Ormsby
Waits family heads to the quaint little town of Nilbog for a vacation.
E F
h h
T
oriented: examples include a toy guitar concerto, a perpetual motion 1990 / color / 95 min. Unbeknownst to them (despite warnings via ghostly visitation from jolly
T
PETEr ESMonDE sculpture installed at a glass foundry, a 60-foot-high tower of self-tuning old Grandpa Seth), Nilbog is populated with crazed vegetarian goblins
After studying at Yale University
electric guitars, and giant marimbas that translate real-time earthquake disguised as humans, whose diabolical plan is to eat the newcomers
and the American Film Institute
data into melodic knocks and hoots. after making them eat in turn magic food that will transform them into
Conservatory, Peter Esmonde spent
CLauDio FraGaSSo
plants. It’s a plot so crazy it just might just work – but it doesn’t.
more than ten years in various roles
Born in 1951 in Rome, Claudio Fragasso
in the film industry in New York
An early clip shows this recipient of a MacArthur Foundation grant produc-
has been writing and directing films
City and Los Angeles. During the
ing a symphony with a typewriter and trying to explain himself to a TV
as well as working in Italian television
So why would you want to sit through such a mess yourself? Easy: Troll
mid-1990s, he worked as a producer crew, not realizing their purpose is to make fun of him – an experience that
since the 1970s. He has directed many
2 is a shining example of the power of even the worst cinema to make a
for the Discovery Channel. Trimpin:
initially made him wary of being the subject of Esmonde’s documentary. cult classic horror films in addition real human impact. It was clearly produced with the hope that it would
The Sound of Invention is his first
Indeed, his abilites surprise even his own family; in a reunion after many
to Troll 2, including Zombie 4: After
reach out and touch all who watched it – though the Italian filmmakers
documentary feature.
years apart, his older sister compares him with a sense of disbelief to
Death (1988). In addition to making
likely never imagined it would take nearly 20 years of universal mockery
Einstein and Mozart, hardly recognizing the person he has become. The
films, Fragasso operates a conch-
fishing vessel off the coast of northern
to do just that.
moment underlines the gift both Trimpin and Esmonde give viewers by
Italy.
including them on this cinematic voyage of discovery: Trimpin’s mind is
Sponsored by:
sharp and sweet, he has a clear sense of mission, and he marvels at how Selected Filmography
much he has left to learn after 25 years of work.
Palermo-Milan One Way (1995)
Night Killer (1990)
Preceded by:
House 5 (1990)
Zombie 4: After Death (1988)
Stage Fright
Monster Dog (1984)
USA The Seven Magnificent Gladiators
Director: Brian Wimer (1983)
2009 / color / 6 min.
It’s a men’s room musical! A nervous cellist battles performance anxiety
while standing at the urinal – and discovers he is not alone.
144 145
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