Blind Integration

Rufus is going to the HHS, a school in Hamburg. This school is quite unique because it allows blind and sight handicapped pupils to visit a normal school. Blind Integration shows one day in the life of Rufus Witt, from the early morning to noon: how he reads braille, takes part in the biology subject and other things.

Blind Integration was maybe the most succesfull Pinguin TV film: it was broadcasted on the Offener Kanal and the main program of the Abgezoomt video festival. Jan Twesten, Rufus Witt and I were allowed to leave school for one day and we could see our film on a big movie screen. We also did a short film at the video festival called Abgezoomt '94.

Rufus Witt had the idea for this film, I think. This documentation was my final film for the school subject Video. I got a very good mark from the teacher (a "1" which is like an "A" in the US). Luckily for me, the first film I made in the subject, The Barrel, did not have much influence on the final mark.

One of the few films which were finished quickly. It uses a mixture of interview and documentation parts.
A later cut was shorter than the first one, because a scene which showed Rufus as an actor was too long and distracting.
The only (broadcasted) Pinguin TV film that was neither cut at the Offener Kanal nor at home. There was a small room in the Heinrich Hertz School with two video recorders. Blind Integration was also one of the few films which were shot in VHS - the other films are usually shot in SuperVHS or MiniDV.
There are few strange camera positions in Blind Integration. Some of them were borrowed from Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho!
One of the documentary scenes showed Rufus during biology. This subject (and the teacher) appeared in two films: The non-released Drug Paradise showed common things you could get addicted to: comics, video games, sweets etc. .

Blind Integration

Documentation, D 1994, 19 Min.
Original title: Blindenintegration
Language: German
Setting: Hamburg
Music: It's a Hard Life, The Night Comes Down (Queen)
Format: PAL VHS
Cut: Analog
Camera: Matthias Jaap
Actors: Rufus Witt, D. Ihonor, Heike Viereck
Broadcast date: 17.11.1994 19:00 Uhr Offener Kanal Hamburg, Abgezoomt '94 (video festival), 30.9.1994 19:00 Uhr Excerpts shown in a broadcast by the Offener Kanal of the video festival, 14.02.1996 18:30 Uhr Offener Kanal Hamburg

Article about "Blind Integration" in the Abgezoomt magazine. (click to view)

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