Ariel Avissar
@arielavissar.bsky.social
Media scholar, video maker and PhD student at Tel Aviv University. TV studies, popular culture and videographic criticism. https://www.arielavissar.work/ https://vimeo.com/arielavissar
New issue just launched, with nine new video essays on topics including Red Desert, One Night in Miami, surveillance footage, visual representations of sound, feminist zombie narratives, the British cine-club movement, and Before Sunrise! Check them out: intransition.openlibhums.org/issue/1969/i...
[in]Transition | Issue: Issue: 3(13) (2026)
intransition.openlibhums.org
In his own words. A CLASS WITH JOAQUIM JORDÀ uses archival interviews with the Catalan filmmaker to piece together a videographic lecture. The result is a deft, thought-provoking video essay by @nuriacancela.bsky.social and Samantha da Silva Diefenthaeler. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
A Class With Joaquim Jordà by Nuria Cancela and Samantha da Silva Diefenthaeler
“A Class with Joaquim Jordà” approaches the teaching facet of Catalan documentary filmmaker Joaquim Jordà. The video essay is structured around Jordà’s voice-over, drawn from different documentaries a...
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THE HOLES WE LEFT BEHIND views the coming-of-age film Breaking Away through an industrial lens. Jacob Smith uses archival footage of a stone carver who appeared as an extra to open up a fresh way of reading Peter Yates' film. The result is a remarkable video essay that "extracts" new insights.
The Holes We Left Behind
This video essay has been published in Movie: a journal of criticism issue 12, and an accompanying statement can be read here.
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Benedetta Andreasi sings the praises of an Italian talkshow host in PHENOMENOLOGY OF MARCO DAMILANO. Through inventive visuals, her video essay explores the source of his appeal. Published on @intransition.bsky.social
Phenomenology of Marco Damilano by Benedetta Andreasi
"Phenomenology of Marco Damilano" is a study on how Damilano’s talk show Il Cavallo e la Torre mediates displacement and humanitarian crises through reassuring televisual forms. By destabilizing its a...
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The work of script supervisor Penny Eyles takes center stage in the video essay MAKING FICTION FLOW. Combining oral testimony with well-chosen and thoughtfully arranged film excerpts, @feministbell.bsky.social and @filmstudiesff.bsky.social give voice and visuals to her underappreciated labor.
MAKING FICTION FLOW
A video essay on film continuity and the life and work of script supervisor Penny Eyles. Published with an accompanying authors' statement in the scholarly journal MOVIE: A Journal of Film Criticism i...
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In TO SEE YOU (IS TO LOVE YOU) – NOVAK VARIATIONS, two Hitchcock masterpieces are joined and conjoined with a film of lesser stature. John Gibbs' great video essay turns the mash-up format into a tool for cinematic emancipation.
To see you (is to love you) – Novak variations
Published in Research in Film & History where you can read a creator's statement. Official Selection Marienbad Film Festival 2025 Official Selection Adelio Ferrero Award 2025 Nominee: Best Experimenta...
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Seductive and destructive, oil takes many forms. In TIMELINE DRIPPING, Celia Sainz contrasts its glossy allure in music videos with its devastation in news footage. The result is an unsettling video essay about our "petromodernity." Published by @intransition.bsky.social
Timeline Dripping by Celia Sainz
This video interrogates the contradictory aesthetics of oil using music videos and footage of oil-spill catastrophes to examine how petroleum can hold both exuberance and catastrophe in our lives and ...
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The video essay MOMENTS OF INTEGRATION is a close reading of Robert Wise’s noirish Odds Against Tomorrow. Henry Rownd goes through the movie’s mise-en-scène with a fine comb, finding a wealth of overlaps and visual echoes.
Moments of Integration: A Close Analysis of Odds Against Tomorrow (Robert Wise, 1959)
Published in Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism, Issue 12 (2025) https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/scapvc/film/movie/contents/rownd._a_close_analysis_of_odds_against_tomorrow.pdf Author: Henry Rownd H...
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The Coens have as keen an ear for sound as they do an eye for images. In his video essay TALES TOLD IN TUNES, Martin Hall argues that the brothers do more than use diegetic folk songs. Their filmmaking, he suggests, displays characteristics of folk music. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
Tales Told in Tunes by Martin Hall
This video essay examines the films of the Coen Brothers, arguing that their distinctive and compelling approach to filmmaking reflects the essence of creating folk music. It posits that the Coen Brot...
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The supercut may be a simple format, but in the right hands it still packs a punch. Made for @filmkrant.bsky.social, WILDER MACHINE strings together shots and sounds from Billy Wilder's filmography to reveal his fascination with mechanics and machines, rhythm and repetition.
The Thinking Machine #103: Wilder Machine
On so many levels, Billy Wilder’s films are obsessed with mechanics and machines – the precisely structured scripts he co-wrote have even been described as ‘narrative machines’ in their own right. On ...
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When Hitchcock visited Jerusalem in 1966, he had an Israeli state-sponsored film crew in tow. Iddo Better Pocker's video essay BEHIND THE CURTAIN cleverly splices that propaganda film with Hitchcock's Torn Curtain, blurring the line between fiction and fact. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
Behind the Curtain by Iddo Better Pocker
This video examines With Hitchcock in Jerusalem (1966), an Israeli state-sponsored propaganda film documenting Alfred Hitchcock’s visit to Jerusalem. By juxtaposing it with Hitchcock’s feature film To...
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EARLY CINEMA’S FISH TANK FILMS dives into the appeal of aquariums for cinema’s pioneers. In a visually rich video essay, @alexzivkovic.bsky.social traces the fascination with fish from Méliès' fantasy films to the documentaries of Jean Painlevé and beyond. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
Early Cinema's Fish Tank Films by Alex Zivkovic
This video essay encourages us to look closely at early cinema’s aquariums. First, seeing the fish and aquatic effects as a “distraction” in the age of the cinema of attractions (Georges Méliès), then...
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PLAYING WITH MEDIATION is a fascinating video essay about a fascinating video game. Clémence Folléa documents her playthrough of Season: A Letter to the Future, a game that invites players to document a world on the verge of disappearing. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
Playing with Mediation by Clemence Follea
This is "Playing with Mediation by Clemence Follea" by Open Library of Humanities on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.
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Mariana Schwartz looks beyond (and behind) the characters in Kubrick’s films. Her supercut compiles the colors and textures, patterns and artworks that frame them. WHAT’S BEHIND THE KUBRICK CHARACTERS? was published by Tecmerin.
What's behind the Kubrick characters. Mariana Schwartz
This is "What's behind the Kubrick characters. Mariana Schwartz" by JOURNAL OF AUDIOVISUAL ESSAYS on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.
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THE RED SHOES: A DESKTOP FAIRY TALE is a love letter to Powell and Pressburger’s film. In her well-crafted video essay, @veronikahanakova.bsky.social attempts to capture the elusive red color of the titular footwear. Published by @intransition.bsky.social
The Red Shoes by Veronika Hanáková
“The Red Shoes: A Desktop Fairy Tale” explores the color red in Emeric Pressburger and Michael Powell’s 1948 film. Though shaped by shifting materials and technologies, red remains potent and spellbin...
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Some summer listening? How about the new episode of The Video Essay Podcast with guest host Lucy Fife Donaldson interviewing @arielavissar.bsky.social, Matthew Payne, and me, included in the fabulous new issue of Open Screens: www.openscreensjournal.com/article/id/2...
Thinking in the Timeline: A Conversation with The Video Essay Podcast
This conversation, produced in collaboration with The Video Essay Podcast, brings together three of the special issue co-editors – Ariel Avissar, Colleen Laird, and Matthew Thomas Payne – and guest mo...
openscreensjournal.com
Screen Stars Dictionary #42 - Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, by Alexander Greenhough: vimeo.com/1209600663
Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Screen Stars Dictionary. By Alexander Greenhough (Stanford University)
Screen Stars Dictionary Entry on Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton by Alexander Greenhough
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Open Screens would like to announce the publication of its latest Special Issue “Thinking in the Timeline: Videographic Dissection as Analytical Method” (8.2). Eds: Ariel Avissar, Barbara Zecchi, Colleen Laird and Matthew Payne. Available open access here openscreensjournal.com/issue/1749/i...:
Open Screens | Issue: Issue: 2(8) Thinking in the Timeline: Videographic Dissection as Analytical Method (2026)
openscreensjournal.com
Now on Open Screens - "𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞: 𝐕𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐨𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐜 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐬 𝐀𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐲𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐌𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐝", the second peer-reviewed special issue to come out of last summer's "Reframing the Argument" videographic workshop: www.openscreensjournal.com/issue/1749/i...
Coen Brothers Supercut #7 - the shortest one yet: vimeo.com/1208867955
What's Going On? (A Coen Brothers Supercut)
A Year of Supercuts#7
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#6 in A Year of Supercuts. What is a supercut. What is a video essay. vimeo.com/1204964369?s...
The Secret of Success
A Year of Supercuts: Athena Exploration: Voice-over
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Our new issue just published - a special issue on Reframing the Argument, emerging out of a graduate student workshop on incorporating videographic work in eight students' research projects! intransition.openlibhums.org/issue/1730/i...
Coming in a bit late, but my fourth supercut of the year is finally done: vimeo.com/1191277564?s...
The Landlady
This is "The Landlady" by Colleen Laird on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.
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