Josef Dabernig
All the Stops

Video / Commissioned work

Dates
25.9.–31.12.2020

Details
No language

Location
Paranoia TV

Production specifics
Commissioned and coproduced by steirischer herbst ’20

Supported by Austrian Cultural Forum Budapest

Funded by Federal Chancellery of Austria, Arts Division / Film Department

A lady instructs her handymen and has her chauffeur drive her across deserted country roads. In between various silent meetings, she goes to a church to rehearse the weirdest tunes, while flies dance on the windowpane like heralds of the plague. Like all of Dabernig’s previous short films, this new work is a small masterpiece. Its deceptively simple action unfolds along concentric circles on rural backroads. All the Stops thus ambiguously refers at once to a rhythmic plot and to the organ stops that serve as a switching station of sorts to the protagonist. So, instructions are given, conversations held, and music rehearsed, all with a mounting sense of absurdity. As carefully rhymed camera angles, textures, and lighting thicken, the world falls under some evil spell. The film’s growing tension somehow evokes the time right before the global outbreak. However, such contemporary subjects are ultimately in sharp contradiction to Dabernig’s consciously anachronistic practice of working with analog 16 mm film, giving All the Stops a timeless quality best enjoyed with headphones and in full screen mode.

Director, script, editing, and production: Josef Dabernig
​Production assistant Hungary: Zsolt Szalai
Camera: Christian Giesser
Music: Christoph Herndler
Sound design: Michael Palm
Cast: Ingeburg Wurzer (organist), Gregor Schmoll (chauffeur), Zsolt Szalai (locksmith), Wolfgang Dabernig (gardener), Susanne Szalai-Urbanek (hairdresser), Isabella Hollauf (hairdresser), Gyöngyi Bata (waitress), Josef Dabernig (guest at the bar), Laura Szalai (church choir), Paula Szalai (church choir), Flora Szalai (church choir), Anita Toth (church choir), Christoph Herndler (church choir)
Film processing: Hiventy France, Paris
Scan: LISTO MediaServices Cine+TV Postproduction GmbH
Color grading: Matthias Tomasi
Rerecording: Alexander Koller
Postproduction: The Grand Post

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