On 28 September 2020, Anti-Worlds returns with a second wave of Blu-rays – all of them world premieres – dedicated once more to some of the most challenging and innovative filmmaking happening today. This latest trio of releases encompasses two documentary portraits devoted to a pair of fiercely individual British artists – Richard Kovitch’s Penny Slinger: Out of the Shadows and Paul Duane’s Best Before Death, which follows Bill Drummond on his World Tour – and Krabi 2562, a collaboration between Ben Rivers (Two Years at Sea) and Anocha Suwichakornpong (Mundane History), born out of the Thai Biennale, that occupies a fluid space between fact and fiction.

Produced in close collaboration with the filmmakers, Anti-Worlds Limited Edition Blu-rays boast high-quality presentations and are complemented by extensive bonus content – including director commentaries, interviews, short films, deleted scenes, and more – as well as exclusive booklets. By showcasing such daring and exciting work with these definitive editions, Anti-Worlds hopes to surprise and delight in equal measure.

PENNY SLINGER: OUT OF THE SHADOWS (Richard Kovitch, 2017)

The incredible, untold story of the British artist Penny Slinger and the traumatic events that led to the creation of her masterpiece, the 1977 photo-romance, An Exorcism.

Coming of age against a backdrop of post-war austerity and the subsequent explosion of colour that characterised the 1960s counterculture, Slinger embraced her generation’s quest for personal freedom and sexual liberation, and channelled these desires into her ground-breaking collages, sculptures, and films (including collaborations with Jane Arden and Peter Whitehead). So powerful was her vision that fifty years later her work is still influencing contemporary artists.

LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY FEATURES:

• High Definition presentation
• Original stereo soundtrack
• Audio commentary with director Richard Kovitch (2020)
• Conversations in the Desert: Q&A with Penny Slinger (2019, 50 mins): the artist in conversation with writer and critic Chris Campion, recorded in Joshua Tree, California
• Return to Lilford Hall (2020, 5 mins): short film by Kovitch, detailing Slinger’s return to the inspiration for An Exorcism following a fifty-year absence
• Lizzi Bougatsos + Kim Gordon x Penny Slinger (2019, 32 mins): live improvised musical performance against a backdrop of Slinger’s early experimental 16mm films, recorded at Blum & Poe, Los Angeles
• An Exorcism: The Final Cut (1977/2020, 21 mins): video presentation of Slinger’s much sought-after collection, presented in sequential order for the first time
• Theatrical trailer
• Live from Miskatonic trailer: promo for Slinger’s 2019 appearance at the Miskatonic Institute, Los Angeles
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Limited edition exclusive booklet containing new writing on the film by Chris Campion, an interview with Penny Slinger by Richard Kovitch, analyses of Slinger’s works by Alissa Clarke and Patricia Allmer, and film credits
• Limited edition of 3,000 copies

BEST BEFORE DEATH (Paul Duane, 2019)

Twenty-three years ago, Bill Drummond ceased activities as part of the enormously successful pop group, the KLF. Since 2014, he’s been on a World Tour, travelling around the world with his show – The 25 Paintings – visiting a different city each year. In December 2016, he based himself in Kolkata, while in the Spring of 2018, he was in Lexington, North Carolina. In each place, he carries out his regular work, setting up a shoeshine stand in the street or building a bed in order to give it away. He walks across the longest bridge he can find, banging his parade drum at dawn, starts knitting circles with anyone who wants to join him, bakes cakes and offers them to strangers whose houses sit on a circle he’s drawn on a map of the city.

He’s not rich, and he’s deliberately designed his actions so they cannot be monetised. He’s mostly been ignored by the art world. So what is he doing it all for? Director Paul Duane shadowed Bill Drummond for three years before starting this film in order to achieve some level of understanding of what he’s about. Co-produced by Grammy Award-winning writer Robert Gordon and shot by Oscar-nominated DOP Robbie Ryan, the documentary is a fascinating look at an uncompromising artist.

Best Before Death is named after Drummond’s belief that the World Tour, scheduled to end when he’s 72, is a race against his own mortality. It’s a film about life, death, art, money, music, and cake. And some knitting.

LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY FEATURES:

• High Definition presentation
• Original stereo soundtrack
• Audio commentary with Bill Drummond and director Paul Duane (2020)
• What Is Film? (2020, 40 mins): Drummond interviews Duane for his Forty Minute Interviews project
• Deleted scenes and alternative footage (110 mins): extensive unseen footage from the film’s production
• Three Short Films from the ‘Best Before Death’ Project: Tenzing Scott Brown (2018, 3 mins), 23 Seconds with Bill Drummond in the Wig Shop (2018, 2 mins), and Big Mike and the Pike (2018, 3 mins)
• Three early dramatic works by Duane, united by their macabre themes: Ink (1988, 10 mins), Blind Alley (1992, 11 mins), and Misteach Bhaile Átha Cliath/The Dublin Mystic (1994, 33 mins)
• Theatrical trailer
•  Image galleries: behind-the-scenes photography
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Limited edition exclusive booklet containing new writing by Bill Drummond, David Keenan on Best Before Death, an interview with Paul Duane, Duane on his short films, and film credits
• Limited edition of 3,000 copies

KRABI 2562 (Ben Rivers & Anocha Suwichakornpong, 2019)

In the town of Krabi, a popular tourist destination in southern Thailand, the pre-historic, the recent past and the contemporary capitalist world awkwardly collide. The town’s local folklore and histories are promoted as attractions to tourists and commercial filmmakers, while the traditional labour force is muted and hidden from the tourists’ eyes. A nameless character, whose identity continually changes, explores various sites and meets people that capture Krabi in its current state. As fact and fiction merge, the mysterious woman slowly disappears into the fabric of the narrative, and time slips between ancient and modern. A dreamlike mystery, uncovering layers of Krabi to understand how humans change a landscape.

LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY FEATURES:

• High Definition presentation
• Original 5.1 surround sound and 2.0 stereo audio tracks
• Audio commentary with directors Ben Rivers and Anocha Suwichakornpong (2020)
• Deleted scene (3 mins)
• Mahasajan Phapphyon (2020): perpetual loop of a sequence excerpted from the film
• Ghost Strata (2019, 45 mins): diary film by Rivers, featuring behind-the-scenes footage from the making of Krabi 2562
• The Ambassadors (2018, 10 mins): Rivers and Suwichakornpong’s first collaboration, commissioned by the 2018 Thai Biennale
• Nightfall (2016, 16 mins): short film by Suwichakornpong and Tulapop Saenjaroen, chronicling a day in the life of a nameless woman as she navigates Singapore
• Jai (2007, 14 mins): short film by Suwichakornpong blurring the lines between documentary and fiction
• Sound Pieces by Ernst Karel (2019, 136 mins): nine works by the sound designer of Krabi, 2562, utilising recordings made during the film’s production
• Theatrical trailer
• Image gallery: behind-the-scenes photography
• Limited edition exclusive booklet containing writing on the film by Phoebe Campion, an interview with Ben Rivers and Anocha Suwichakornpong, notes on the short films, and film credits
• Limited edition of 3,000 copies