Friday, August 12th, 2005
8:30 - Live music by Subway Musicians (details to come)
9:00 - It's your city. Take a look.
On the lawn at Automotive High School
50 Bedford Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
Dress warmly (it's cooler when you're sitting still).
In the event of rain the show is indoors at the same location.
New York Non-Fiction
As the song says, if you can make it here, you'll make it anywhere, and this program of films is all about people trying to make it in New York. But these aren't the Frank Sinatras and Franklin Roosevelts, legends whose stories are told over and over. These are the so-called "ordinary" people, showing off why the everyday is extra-ordinary around here. In this city, skateboarders, sketch artists and stuntmen are stimulated by the city, inspired to make their mark in stunning ways and make the city their own. The first half of the program features folks who do little things in big ways, who break boundaries, conventions and laws (including the law of gravity), who make it in New York.
Of course, not everyone can make it here, and not for lack of trying. It's a lot harder to succeed if you're a person of color, if you don't speak English, or if you try to run a small independent business on valuable real estate. But even when things are hard, real New Yorkers—wherever they were born—find a way. In the second half of the program, we find the people who make use of what the rest of us throw away, who create ways to communicate even if they don't speak the language, who activate long after others would've given up. New York legends are great. But it's these New York nobodies who make this city great.
THE FILMS:
What I'm Looking For (Shelly Silver / New York, NY / 15:00)
A series of still photos of people in NYC, with a voiceover about the filmmaker's obsession with shooting strangers, seeing small truths and many lies. In her searching, she gets at many of the essences of New York: a place where strangers watch each other without looking, and show each other a face, a gesture, an attitude, without revealing anything. This wonderful film captures the pathos, the toughness and loneliness, the cockiness and desperation, of this city.
Wet Dreams and False Images (Jesse Epstein / Brooklyn, NY / 11:18)
Brooklyn barber and self-confessed "booty expert," Dee Dee was only too happy to show documentary-maker Jesse Epstein the collection of tits-n-ass pin-up pictures that he salivates over. Convinced that their flawless, big-butt beauty is the "real deal," he and his posse get a rude awakening when she brings a digital retouching expert in to show the boys how their "perfect" women are re-proportioned by computers, and how cellulite, stretch marks and spots are airbrushed away.
Grand Luncheonette (Peter Sillen / New York, NY / 4:47) Grand Luncheonette documents the final days of one of 42nd Street's unforgettable lunch counters. The closing of Fred Hakim's hot dog stand marks the end stage of Times Square's much publicized gentrification.
Playground (Lauren Madow / 13:00) Playground is a film about three New York City teenagers with limited resources and how they use the urban environment for their own purposes. Rio, a skateboarder; Ashley, a basketball player; and Alex, a breakdancer spend every spare moment playing in ways inspired by the city.
Coop (Lisa Whiteman & Martin Zartarian / Brooklyn, NY / 3:30)
Using an antique camera the filmmaker capture fluttering images of pigeon flocks flying above the ever changing Brooklyn cityscape.
Carfire (John Furgason & John Ayala / 17:00)
On the deserted streets of East Williamsburg, the burnt-out remains of carfires have become a familiar neighborhood landmark. Rooftop revisits its Bushwick roots with this artful documentary about the site of the highest concentration of auto arson in North America, known as the "Dead Zone" by locals.
Latitas (Sol Aramendi / Long Island City, NY / 4:40)
Sol Aramendi shows us a day in the lives of Latin American women who collect cans and bottles from all over New York and redeem them for nickels at a depot in Long Island City.
The Man Who Walked Between the Towers
(Michael Sporn / New York / 10:00)
A sweetly nostalgic animated remembrance of Phillipe Petit's daring tightrope walk between the late Twin Towers. Based on the children's book by Mordecai Gerstein. Narrated by actor Jake Gyllenhaal.
The Kings of Christmas (David Katz / New York, NY / 10:27)
The flashy yet underground outer borough phenomenon of elaborate, ornate Christmas exterior house decorations is given a human face in this documentary short. You'll meet the obsessed, quirky people behind the biggest, brightest, and most over-the-top holiday decorated houses in New York City, including Steve Pancini who owns 600 animated dolls for his lawn and takes an entire month off from work to maintain his display.
Three Times Oppressed (Lyell Davies / New York, NY / 10:00)
A short portrait of a homeless New Yorker who considers himself thrice oppressed due to his Irish, Cherokee and African heritage.
Manhattan Canyon (Greg King / 2:00)
Gregory King is a painter and an experimental filmmaker who plays keys and percussion with the indie-chamber music band The Rachel's and designs the band's intricate album art. For two full days in the summer of 2004, Greg strapped three cameras (two Super-8 and one video) onto his body and trekked up and down the length of Manhattan, taking one picture at each intersection. Set to The Rachel's music, Greg created a visual diptych representing the east and west sides of Manhattan, creating the effect of being whisked down the bottom of an urban canyon.
Rules of Engagement (American Noeman Samdani and the Lab Sponsored by HBO Young Filmmakers / New York, NY / 7:00)
16 year old Muslim American filmmaker Noeman Samdani confronts his issues with arranged marriages and his problems maintaining his faith while growing up in America. Courtesy of The Lab Sponsored by HBO
Storyboard of My Life: Coming To New York
(Robert Castillo / New York, NY / 3:00)
Professional storyboard artist Robert Castillo tells the story of his life in clips of sped up video that capture his drawing process. In this chapter he tells of first meeting his mother and father in Queens at the age of 7 after having been raised by his grandmother in the Dominican Republic. Courtesy of Shooting People
Main Street (Seth Wochensky / Springville, NY / 5:00)
A quick cataloguing of the small tragic steps that led to the demise of a central strip in a small downtown in upstate New York.
