We are proud to announce that Thom Andersen, (born 1943, Chicago) filmmaker, film critic, and teacher, will
be the guest of Reykjavik Shorts&Docs this year.
His documentaries include, Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer (1974) about the 19th century photographer who is one of the pioneers of film history, Red Hollywood (1996), about the Hollywood blacklisting of filmmakers in the 40´s and 50´s, and lastly his recent Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003), ( Won the National Film Board Award for Best Documentary at the 2003 Vancouver International Film Festival).

From Indie Wire:
"The best piece of film criticism I've encountered lately isn't a book, newspaper, or magazine article. It's "Los Angeles Plays Itself," Thom Andersen's 169-minute documentary about how Los Angeles, "the most photographed city in the world," has been depicted in cinema. The kind of masterpiece that expands one's notions of what film can do, its closest peer is Jean-Luc Godard's "Histoire(s) du Cinema," a densely poetic and allusive work that's often been compared to James Joyce. Unlike "Histoire(s) du Cinema," it's quite accessible and paced better than the vast majority of action films.
Early on, Andersen's narration -- spoken by fellow filmmaker Encke King -- takes a swipe at the abbreviation of Los Angeles to "L.A.," which he finds implicitly contemptuous. Some may scoff or find this concern petty, but this caveat is crucial to the film's ethos. "Los Angeles Plays Itself" takes the unfashionable stance that cinema should have a direct, accurate relationship to reality. For Andersen, this is both an aesthetic and political position. Against a canon of "official" classics about Los Angeles -- "Chinatown," "Blade Runner," "L.A. Confidential" -- he celebrates films made by European "high tourists" and African-Americans.
"Los Angeles Plays Itself" is powered by a fierce ambivalence, a love/hate relationship with cinema. Its intermingling of cultural and social history is erudite but unpretentious. If many of the best recent documentaries -- "Bus 174," "Capturing the Friedmans," "Control Room" -- show how our reality is contaminated by media, "Los Angeles Plays Itself" tries to grab control back by searching for truth within the image overload. Despite its length, it's riveting viewing: lucid, funny, and inspiring. I haven't seen a better new film so far this year. "