Les Blank Movies

Oakland bluesman Sonny Rhodes sings “Cigarette Blues”: a musical warning that compares cigarette smoking with playing with a loaded gun.

This short film by Les Blank with Skip Gerson features the charismatic legendary blues icon Lightnin' Hopkins sing a beautiful song about a...

Roland drives a dada art gallery on wheels and attracts more girls than he knows what to do with. Unfortunately, they rarely stick around. Can it be...

From Worldcat: Presents new musical sounds and new ways of treating old sounds. Includes examples of chance music, tape music, synthesizer music, and...

The Ways of Water was made with the Earth Science Curriculum Project and the Environmental Studies Project of the American Geological Institute. A...

A short film looking at the early married life of a young couple.

Lightnin' Hopkins sings about playing cards with Les Blank and Skip Gerson - a card game he won which turned critical to the making of the film "The...

When you think of Latin percussion, think of Francisco Aguabella. Perhaps the finest Afro-Cuban master percussionist still living, he has become...

Conjoined fables are told, one Japanese, the other African, a ghost story colliding with farcical folklore.

Directed by Terry Nowak. This early film about the Southern California Renaissance Fair, with Les Blank as cameraman, is shot in sensuous detail on a...

One of Les Blank's student films: a horror film following a young couple.

Les Blank marries his passion for spicy, down home food and his love for Cajuns and Creoles in this mouth-watering, exploration of the cooking, and...

This aloha-filled portrait of Auntie Irmgard Farden Aluli, one of Hawaii's best loved composers, gently focuses on Hawai'ian women's contributions to...

An obsessively-made documentary, filmed over 16 years, exploring the creative life and adventures of the eccentric artist and entrepreneur Harrod...

In a mountain village in southwestern China, just south of Tibet, one of the last remaining traditional bearers of the Lisu ethnic group is amid the...

Home video footage shot by Maureen Gosling during the filming of Les Blank's feature "A Poem is a Naked Person".

This little-known Blank gem is a portrait of the Serbian-American communities of Chicago and California, highlighting their history in this country,...

A lyrical recreation of Lightnin’ Hopkins’ decision at age eight to stop chopping cotton and start singing for a living. Preserved by...

This short film features Les Blank (in a rare acting role) and Getachew Abbai. Directed by David Lawrence. This was a student film made at the USC...

This film, photographed and edited by Les Blank, produced and directed by Pieter Van Deusen, documents a spontaneously improvised concert by musician...