Science and the Paranormal

Includes the following films:

The Name Is Not the Thing Named

2012. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. This black-and-white film opens with a slow entry into a dark tunnel and the faint echoes of a siren. Stratman states, “In support of experiences that are essentially common, but to which language does not easily adhere, the video passes through places that are both themselves, and stand-ins for others.” The title comes from Aleister Crowley’s 1918 translation of the Tao Te Ching. 11 min.

These Blazeing Starrs!

2011. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. A film about comets, the empirical information that can be derived from them, and their historic ties to divination. 14 min.

The Magician’s House (The Paranormal Trilogy, part 3)

2007. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. Supernatural lingering, the Magic Lantern or Sorcerer’s Lamp, and La lutte des Mages (The Struggle of the Magicians), composed by Armenian mystic Georges Gurdjieff and Thomas De Hartmann. 6 min.

It Will Die Out in the Mind (The Paranormal Trilogy, part 2)

2006. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. Texts from Andrei Tarkovsky’s film Stalker, in which Stalker’s daughter offers a more expansive concept for the human spirit than logic or technology. 4 min.

How among the Frozen Words (The Paranormal Trilogy, part 1)

2005. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. Inspired by a chapter in Francois Rabelais’s 1653 epic novel Gargantua and Pantagruel, in which explosions, cries, and sounds of battle have been frozen into discernable shapes. 1 min.

On the Various Nature of Things

1995. USA. Directed by Deborah Stratman. This homage to Michael Faraday reinterprets scientific conventions to illustrate physical concepts based on his 1859 Christmas lectures to the public. “I say apparently, for you must not imagine that, because you cannot perceive any action, none has taken place" (Michael Faraday). 25 min.