Rooftop Filmmakers’ Fund Grantee “The City Dark” opens at the IFC Center for one week only, starting Wednesday, January 18th. Tickets are available online or at the IFC Center Box Office: 323 6th Ave at W 3rd St.
Each year as the fall sets in, and winter looms, I’m among the first to lament the darkened early afternoon sky – and I know that I’m not alone. Humanity has always had an affinity for the light, and a fear of the dark. But whatever darkness has come to represent, it retains a kind of mysterious beauty. While the evenings are slowly on their way to brightening, it is easy to forget that illumination can sometimes become too bright. Rooftop Alum Ian Cheney’s Filmmakers Fund film, The City Dark, is a thoughtful reminder of the importance of darkness, and the ways that light and dark effect our lives and our environment. After months of touring festivals and screens around the world, the 2009 Filmmakers Fund Grantee has returned for its New York City theatrical premiere at the IFC Center on January 18th.
The City Dark begins as an investigation of the night sky — or rather of its disappearance. Cheney describes his passion for astronomy and astrophotography as a child growing up in Maine, a passion that became impossible to fulfill when he moved to New York City. A curiosity bloomed from his loss, and he began to investigate the larger scale impacts of brightening the modern world. The project begins with astronomers, most of whom have been displaced by light pollution to the remote corners of the world. His inquiry also extends to some more unlikely places: interviews with neuroscientists, cancer researchers, Chicago ‘bird collision monitors’, and the sea turtles on the beaches of Boca Raton.