My Name is Pochsy: An Industrial Film
My Name is Pochsy: An Industrial Film marks the filmmaking debut of award-winning writer-performer Karen Hines, whose cult character Pochsy has delighted cabaret and theatre audiences across the continent for over a decade.
The film’s signature, subversive comedy fuses parody, pathos and an unforgettable character all set against a backdrop of northern Ontario’s slag heaps, and on the glorious Island of Manitoulin. Shot on Super 8, this is the first in a series of “Pochsy” films now in the works.
Synopsis
My Name is Pochsy: An Industrial Film
Pochsy works at Mercury Packers … where she packs mercury. Having missed some kind of mass evacuation, she is utterly alone on a ravaged industrial landscape. ‘My Name is Pochsy’ is Pochsy’s fictional ‘personal documentary’: a mercury-addled waif’s ode to life, death, karmic reckoning and the future of the human soul. Ostensibly directed by Pochsy, starring Pochsy, and shot by her on abandoned scraps of black-and-white super 8 film, ‘My Name is Pochsy’ is Pochsy’s message in a bottle to a forgetful world; a subversively comedic ode to a century of industrial film propaganda, and a mindful attack on mindless progress. Set against the stark, spectacular backdrop of northern Canada’s mining fields (abandoned factories, ravaged rivers and streams, troubled animals…) it pits gritty realism against magic realism. With affirmations culled from sources as disparate as the Dalai Lama, ‘The Secret’ and the Wal-Mart Mission Statement, ‘My Name is Pochsy’ is a scathing satire for our times. Poisoned, and poisonous, Pochsy is a spokesgirl for a human species on the brink. The comedy is black, the aim is dead serious. With a musical score featuring the darker side of Tony Award-winner Greg Morrison (The Drowsy Chaperone).
(‘Pochsy’ is pronouned ‘Poxy’ as in ‘the pox,’ and is an anagram for ‘Psycho.’)
Festival Screenings: 2007-12
- Festival of Queer Futurities, Berlin
- Festival du Films sur l’Art, Montreal
- EckoNights: Kuala Lumpur
- Toronto Film Festival – Talent Lab
- Flickering Light Series, MIX NYC
- Strasbourg International Film Festival (Award) Palm Springs
- International Film Festival Mountainfilm at Telluride
- Hazelwolf International Environmental Film Festival
- Athens International Film Festival
- Atlanta International Film Festival
- Female Eye Film Festival (Award)
- Palm Beach International Film Festival
- Dawson City International Short Film Festival (Award)
- Boston Underground Film Festival (Award)
- US Festival of Super 8 and Digital Video
- Rutgers University (Award) Calgary Bravo!FACT Screening
- Royal Theatre, Toronto
- Edmonton International Film Festival (Award)
- Just For Laughs Comedy Festival, Montreal
- Nuit Blanche, Toronto
- CBC’s Reflections.
Festival Awards for Pochsy:
- Strasbourg International Film Festival – Best Short – Experimental
- Boston Underground Film Festival: Audience Choice Award – Best Short
- Dawson City International Short Film Festival: Lodestar Award – Best Film
- Female Eye Film Festival In Toronto – Best Director Debut
- Edmonton International Film Festival: Kodak Canada Prize – Best Canadian Short
- Rutger’s University: US Super 8 and Digital Video Film Festival – Best Experimental Film
- Strasbourg International Film Festival – Costume Design