Chico Hamilton

The Miss USA Pageant is a beauty contest that has been held annually since 1952 to select the United States entrant in the Miss Universe pageant. The Miss Universe Organization operates both pageants, as well as Miss Teen USA.

New York City newspaper writer J.J. Hunsecker holds considerable sway over public opinion with his Broadway column, but one thing that he can't control is his younger sister, Susan, who is in a relationship with aspiring jazz guitarist Steve Dallas. Hunsecker strongly disapproves of the romance and recruits publicist Sidney Falco to find a way to split the couple, no matter how ruthless the method.

Beautiful young manicurist Carole suffers from androphobia (the pathological fear of interaction with men). When her sister and roommate, Helen, leaves their London flat to go on an Italian holiday with her married boyfriend, Carole withdraws into her apartment. She begins to experience frightful hallucinations, her fear gradually mutating into madness.

A multi-layered satire of race relations in America. Live-action sequences of a prison break bracket the animated tale of Brother Rabbit, Brother Bear, and Preacher Fox, who rise to the top of the crime ranks in Harlem by going up against a con-man, a racist cop, and the Mafia.

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Felix is a down-and-out young drummer who obtains a pair of magic drumsticks from a street vendor. He soon finds out the sticks are able to make native New Yorkers dance uncontrollably.

Angie and Helen are in love. They live and work together designing women's evening wear in Vancouver. When Helen decides she wants to have a baby, the pair set out to find a suitable sperm donor.

The true story of a British heiress's love for jazz genius Thelonious Monk.

Accused murderer Frankie Steele walks free, thanks to the efforts of San Francisco defense lawyer Joe Ricco. Then a pair of cop killings strikes the city. All signs point to the newly released Steele as the perpetrator. Has Ricco sprung a killer? Dean Martin keeps his affable ease but abandons his hipster Matt Helm-series swagger to portray Ricco in his final leading-role film, a whodunit mystery set in the city that also was the gritty center of action for the era’s Bullitt and Dirty Harry. Convinced that Steele isn’t behind the murders, Ricco launches an inquiry and runs up against a police lieutenant assigned to birddog him, evidence planted by a racist cop and several assassination attempts on Ricco himself. As the mystery deepens, so does the danger. And behind it all is someone the attorney never suspected. The pre-Laverne & Shirley Cindy Williams plays Ricco’s office assistant.

Set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, this documentary mixes images of water and the town with performers and audience. The film progresses from day to night and from improvisational music to Gospel. It's a concert film that suggests peace and leisure, jazz at a particular time and place.

This newly rediscovered short was created in Jim's home studio in Bethesda, MD around 1961. It is one of several experimental shorts inspired by the music of jazz great Chico Hamilton. At the end, in footage probably shot by Jerry Juhl, Jim demonstrates his working method.

An American film critic flies to Berlin to investigate the life of German filmmaker Murnau. After meeting his former girlfriend and finding a statue near Murnau’s tomb, he begins a strange mystic journey through time and space: a romantic unification of the ancient and modern world, suspicions and memories, art and life. And the critic is about to learn something new about himself...

"This film depicts how people around the world benefit from innovations developed by the U.S. space program. Without narration, the film uses motion pictures, still photography, and animation to show advances in food production, education, communications, navigation, meteorology, resource exploration, mapping, and other activities. The film was produced by Murakami Wolf Films, Inc. (Hollywood, CA), directed by Jimmy Murakami, executive produced by Fred Wolf, and features the voices of Olan Soule and Lennie Weinrib, with music composed by Chico Hamilton" (US National Archives).

CAT AND MOUSE is Jim Henson’s second and more ambitious interpretation of a composition from jazz drummer Chico Hamilton whom Jim met and collaborated with in 1961. This short, imbued with sly humor, portrays a brief narrative of the dance performed when predator meets prey. Working in his home studio in Maryland, Jim used collage and drawings to animate a story, displaying his unique visual shorthand used to create distinctive characters.

"Jazz Seen" is an exploration of the life of William Claxton, whose photographs turned the world of jazz on its keen and perceptive ear. Various jazz artists, photographers, and actors recount memories they had with Claxton and explore his work, while parts of his life are re-enacted by actors.

An abstract animated film inspired by the work of jazz musician Chico Hamilton.

Hippies, peace-niks, students, beautiful girls, civil righters, old ladies and more, protest the war. Who dares to say that they don't influence the mainstream? Beautiful color and exciting montage capture the feeling and motion of the march on the United Nations.

Confessor, a city-dweller who has “bugged” several telephone lines, hears the stories of: a woman who wishes for a white knight but realizes the man is sterile upon his arrival; a woman living with a mannequin that takes the place of a husband; and females who attend parties in the nude. A proxy for the Vietnam War is staged in a supermarket, and the Confessor, or one of the subjects he has surreptitiously monitored, dies amid an assault of mass media imagery. "...an American underground effort by Edward Bergman and Alan Soffin shown in the Film Market. Despite some portentous attempts at structure, this is closer to a collection of shorts than a feature, and often amateurish shorts at that, pivoted around the general theme of media overload (another version of Future Shock?)" - Jonathan Rosenbaum