Oh Liberty!: Mock Up on Mu

'Mock Up on Mu is a modern American myth fashioned from all manner of cultural detritus' - J. Hoberman, Village Voice

'... this new work hits your synapses like a cluster bomb, assailing your tremulous gray matter with a barrage of cinematic fragments (most recycled, some newly shot), miscellaneous rants and ruminations' - Manohla Dargis, New York Times

'In Mock Up on Mu Baldwin may have found a new method of cinematic storytelling. Don't expect Hollywood to pick it up soon.' - David Bordwell

Oh Liberty! commences with this rare UK screening of Mock Up on Mu, the latest feature-length work from San Francisco-based experimental filmmaker Craig Baldwin, who also serves as curator of the infamous Mission District underground film night ‘Other Cinema'.

A radical hybrid of spy, sci-fi, Western and even horror genres, Mock Up on Mu cobbles together a feature-length collage-narrative based on (mostly) true stories of California's post-War subcultures of rocket pioneers, alternative religions and Beat lifestyles.

Pulp-serial snippets, industrial-film imagery and B-movie clips are intercut with newly shot 16mm live-action footage, powering a playful trajectory through the now-mythic occult matrix of Jack Parsons (Crowleyite founder of the Jet Propulsion Lab), L. Ron Hubbard (sci-fi author turned cult leader) and Marjorie Cameron (bohemian artist and "mother of the New Age movement"). Their intertwined tales spin out into a speculative farce on the militarization of space and the corporate take-over of leisure-time and spiritual fulfilment.

All films are 18+ unless otherwise stated. Please note that £3 Tuesday cinema tickets are limited to one per ICA Member.