USA

Quote:
Robin Wood located the seeds for the ghoulish moppet’s maternal stabbing in Night of the Living Dead (and The Exorcist, The Omen, The Brady Bunch, et al.) in little Tootie pulverizing the snowmen in Meet Me in St. Louis; roots had already settled by the time Maxwell Anderson’s play about a soulless sprite got transplanted to screens, only the intergenerational anxiety is whipped into safe, static, psycho-babbling kitsch hysteria. Rhoda (Patty McCormick), the pigtailed, 8-year-old devil, skips back home from drowning a schoolmate and asks mom Nancy Kelly for a peanut-butter sandwich; a “perfect little ray of sunshine,” Au Clair de la Lune played on a loop while the handyman (Henry Jones), wise to the monster behind the curtsies, is barbecued in the basement. Read More »

From Spike Lee, the legendary director of Do the Right Thing, Mo’ Better Blues, Malcolm X, Clockers and BlacKkKlansman, comes this vibrant semi-autobiographical portrait of a school teacher, her stubborn jazz musician husband and their five kids living in Brooklyn in 1973. Make yourself at home with the Carmichael family as they experience one very special summer in their Brooklyn neighborhood that they’ve affectionately nicknamed Crooklyn. Lee fashions a bold, flavorful picture of family life starring the wonderful Alfre Woodard as Carolyn, a loving, but fiercely independent mother who, along with her musician husband Woody (Delroy Lindo), struggles to raise their family in difficult but often wonderful circumstances. Complemented by an energizing, vintage R&B soundtrack, this tender and colorful film was beautifully shot by Arthur Jafa (Daughters of the Dust). The strong supporting cast includes Spike Lee, David Patrick Kelly, Zelda Harris, Isaiah Washington, José Zúñiga and Vondie Curtis-Hall.Read More »

Synopsis
For some immigrants, the United States represented the promised Shangri-La. But in the 19th and early 20th centuries the reality was very different. Isabel Sandoval’s film looks at this historical moment.Read More »

Quote:
At the age of 20, Patti Smith arrives in New York and upsets the codes of rock, poetry, and genre. She has become a living legend without ever leaving the sidelines. A poet, actress, and musician. Also militant. An artist with a thousand lives, now 74 years old. The documentary follows the course of Patti Smith’s life. Childhood first, and the artist who says: “I wanted to be someone special. I felt distant. Not just from other children, I felt far from the whole world. I spent my childhood in think I was an alien. ” Little Patti grew up in rural New Jersey and received a religious education from her Jehovah’s Witness mother. But Patti Smith leaves the movement, which does not suit her artistic inclinations.Read More »

Featuring Skip James, Howlin’ Wolf, Son House, Rev. Pearly Brown, Bukka White

Imagine you have stumbled into a juke joint where the mentor of Robert Johnson, Son House, and the idol of the Rolling Stones, Howlin’ Wolf, dis one another. Picture a place where Wolf taunts Bukka White while the robust Parchman Farm alumnus spins his proto-funk dance grooves and the spectral skip James weaves his haunting “Devil Got My Woman.” It’s an archetypal blues “crossroads” where legends of the 1920s Delta and 1950s Chicago share the same musical space, suspended out of time in a super-real present, a non-specific blues time. Read More »

Quote:
Sam Green’s intimate portrait of pioneering experimental composer and musician Annea Lockwood gives a glimpse into the enthralling world of sound that she has been creating and exploring for many years.Read More »

Quote:
As the shadow of night falls across the American West a lone man begins his work. Far from the confines, calamity, and culture of society, multimedia artist and storyteller Jeff Frost sifts through the visual dregs of places and people who once were.

Combining still and time-lapse photography with motion, music, and art, Frost reveals a world rarely seen. Rooted in science and the exploration of space, Frost’s work explodes with light, fire, and sound, utilizing 2D and 3D perspective, leading the viewer on a unique visual journey through worlds both real and imagined.Read More »

Humble stamp dealer Otto Becker has little to do with international politics, so when he receives a surprise visit from his estranged twin brother and Nazi spy, Baron Hugo Von Detner, his world is thrown into turmoil. Threatening Becker with deportation, Hugo forces him to use his shop as a front for espionage. But when Becker’s friend Professor Sterling turns up dead, Becker accidentally shoots his brother and assumes his identity.Read More »

Synopsis:
Sheila kills her husband at the start of the film with a smoking gun. We don’t know how or why. All we know is men are banging on her door and she escapes. There is a notable dialogue as she makes her way to a New Years celebration with Richard Basehart as the poet William Williams. As she goes up the stairs to John Friday’s apartment (her producer), she wishes she could relive the year and undo what she has done. William Williams, in an offhand remark, states he wishes he was the one who shot Barney, her erstwhile husband. We see that Destiny is not too happy with making changes to her plans.Read More »