March 15, 8:00 pm - Special Screening

Smith-Buonanno 106, free.

Peggy and Fred in Hell: the complete cycle, Leslie Thornton
An astonishing, daring, nine-part cycle of films, videos, and their combinations made between 1985 and 2000, Leslie Thornton's Peggy and Fred In Hell is a science fiction-like chronicle of two small children making their way through a post-apocalyptic landscape.
Bill Krohn writes in Cahiers du Cinema:
"Leslie Thornton has directed ten films of differing lengths, including a second époque about Isabelle Eberhardt currently in production, but her place in cinema history has already been assured for the sole reason that she is the author of Peggy and Fred in Hell. Forever unfinished, Thornton's magnum opus resembles nothing else known in the cinema avant-garde: two children, Peggy and Fred, in a setting that could have been invented by an elder, pessimistic brother of Samuel Beckett, talk, dance, sing and squabble with each other as they move through the 20th Century. ... The film will live eternally as a psychic landscape of the 90's, unraveling into a never-ending poem or nightmare."
The complete cycle was recently featured at the Whitney Museum in New York.

This screening will be followed by a discussion with Leslie Thornton and Catherine Russell.

March 16-17, 7:30pm - Festival Screenings

Smith-Buonanno 106, $5.00. Please see our schedule page for each night's program.

88 Years in Brooklyn, Gabrielle Weiss, 1999, 25 minutes
88 Years in Brooklyn is the filmmaker's close, personal look at her grandmother: a spirited, lonely but thoroughly engaged woman, living in a familiar building surrounded by a changed and constantly changing neighborhood.

This is For Betsy Hall, Hope Hall, 1999, 6.5 minutes
The story of Betsy Hall, a woman whose life-long struggle with anorexia and bulimia has had a profound effect on her daughter, the filmmaker. Through a montage of home-movies, still photographs, and filmed interludes a touching portrait emerges.

No Laughing Matter, Tony Sehgal, 1998, 25 minutes
From the land that brought us yoga and transcendental meditation, now comes the laughter club. Members of India's laughter clubs candidly reveal their reasons for attending early morning laughter sessions throughout India. 'No Laughing Matter' explores the origin, techniques and the physical and emotional impact the laughing club phenomenon is having on Indian society.

Blink, Elizabeth Thompson, 1999, 60 minutes
'Blink' is the story of the transformation of former white supremacist Gregory Withrow. Unlike other evil-racist-turned-model-citizen stories, however, the film draws one into the fiery middle ground where Withrow still battles his ghosts. We witness his efforts to remake himself in a world where masculinity is often defined by violence.

Moonshine, Kelly Riley, 1999, 22 minutes
A portrait of Jim Tom Hedrick's rebellious spirit, his relationship with his Southern Baptist sister, and the process of distilling moonshine from corn mash. It's a taste of bootleg whiskey and Jesus. Straight fromthe mountains of North Carolina.

Lili on Air, Lisa Oppenheim, 1999, 11 minutes
Lili on Air engages with ideas of femininity and war, translation and myth as produced by and through cinema and radio during World War II. Media, like troops, can be mobilized, and this video examines the way technologies are organized to particular ideological ends.

Okay, Bye-Bye, Rebecca Baron, 1998, 40 minutes
A piece of footage found on the street was the impetus for 'Okay, Bye-Bye', this personal meditation on the Cambodian genocide of the late 1970's. It is about the filmmaker's attempts to understand her own experience, and about the difficulty of grasping the incomprehensible horror of genocide. The film will be shown later this year in the Whitney Biennial, and has been selected for awards at the San Francisco International Film Festival, the Montreal Festival for New Cinema and New Media, and the Ann Arbor Film Festival.

Look Back, Don't Look Back, Randy Bell & Justin Rice, 1999, 30 minutes
The Bob Dylan of D.A. Pennebaker's 'Don't Look Back' had wit and energy. He was charismatic and subversive. Fascinated by the mysterious power of the film, obsessed with the image of Dylan, two student filmmakers pick up a camera and head to New York on an impossible quest.