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Visiting Artists
Visiting Artists
2012-2013 PROGRAM
An core part of Northwest Film Forum's mission is to discover and champion the work of visionary filmmakers: join us as we bring an array of film artists and arts professionals to speak in person about new film, both on and off our screens.
Want to talk movies with other film lovers? Join us for our monthly, free Framing Pictures critics' talk.
Let Your Light Shine: Experimental Animations by Jodie Mack
Director in attendance!
Jun 01
Jodie Mack's insightful, handmade films use collage to explore the relationship between graphic cinema and storytelling. Combining the formal techniques and structures of abstract/absolute animation with those of cinematic genres, her film work explores the tension between form and meaning. Mack received her MFA in film, video, and new media from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2007 and currently teaches animation at Dartmouth College.
The Invisible Forest
Director in attendance!
Jun 12
(Antero Alli, USA, 2008, HD, 111 min)
Antero Alli's The Invisible Forest is a surrealistic trip through the internal landscape of one man's subconscious to a place beyond belief, beyond words and beyond the mind itself to. Alex, an experimental theater director (Antero Alli), brings his troupe to a forest to perform his vision of French Surrealist Antonin Artaud's magic theatre of ghosts, gods, and demons. During their "paratheatrical experiment," Alex is haunted by a recurring nightmare where Artaud appears and mocks his ambitions. With his sanity pushed to its outer limits, Alex visits a psychotherapist who suggests hypnotic regression to remedy his problem. Written and directed by Antero Alli with text also by William Shakespeare and Antonin Artaud.
Dreambody/Earthbody
Director in attendance! Seattle premiere!
Jun 13
(Antero Alli, 2012, USA, HD, 80 min)
Since 1977, underground filmmaker Antero Alli has been developing a medium of "paratheatre," inspired by the late Polish visionary of theater, Jerzy Grotowski. Alli's paratheatre is a highly visceral process that incorporates physical theatre, Zazen meditation, modern dance and vocalization to gain access to the internal landscape. For this "dreambody/earthbody" ritual, Alli trained a group of seven in paratheatre methods to execute a ritual choreography, using movements recalled from their nocturnal dreams. The result is a rare and haunting glimpse into a microculture of asocial group ritual dynamics, normally performed in total privacy.
The Rambler
Seattle premiere! Director in attendance opening night!
Jun 28 - Jul 04
(Calvin Reeder, 2013, USA, Blu-ray, 97 min)
If you’ve ever comforted yourself with the knowledge that the worst of America’s horrors were safely locked behind bars, The Rambler will make you think twice. A nameless prisoner is released from under lock and key and begins a search for his brother, making him an eyewitness to all that is strange and gruesome in America’s overlooked corners. As he experiences these nightmares with an unfazed and uncomplicated vision, The Rambler takes us on a once-in-a-lifetime wandering across highways and through wilderness, leaving us perplexed as to whether the film’s true subject is its hero or the people he encounters.
Band of Sisters
Extended run by popular demand! Director and Sister Nancy Sylvester in attendance opening weekend!
Apr 12 - Apr 28
(Mary Fishman, USA, 2012, Blu-ray, 88 min)
The new film Band of Sisters tells the story of the Catholic Church's bravest heros—the nuns of the 1960s and onwards who were inspired by the reforms of Vatican II and the great social movements of the 20th century to fight for social justice across the United States. Even when their actions provoked the anger of the Vatican, the graceful struggles of these sisters for civil rights and immigration reform persisted. This poignant, funny and moving documentary by first-time director Mary Fishman shows us a forward-thinking portrait of religious women as citizens of the world and covers half a century of activism.
Nathaniel Dorsky: Program 2
Director in attendance!
Q&A moderated by Jonathan Marlow, co-founder of Fandor
Apr 11
Nathaniel Dorsky is one of a rare breed of filmmakers whose work can be classified as essential viewing. In his visually handsome films, Dorsky renders the prosaic a poetic experience, editing nature, light, and figure to create an utterly sensual cinema. In tonight's program, enjoy a series of 16mm shorts delving into themes and images of memory, grieving and the passage of friends.
Nathaniel Dorsky: Program 1
Director in attendance!
Q&A moderated by Jonathan Marlow, co-founder of Fandor
Apr 10
Nathaniel Dorsky is one of a rare breed of filmmakers whose work can be classified as essential viewing. In his visually handsome films, Dorsky renders the prosaic a poetic experience, editing nature, light, and figure to create an utterly sensual cinema. In tonight's program, enjoy a series of 16mm shorts delving into themes and images of winter, poetry and prayer.
The Men of Dodge City
Director in Attendance Friday!
Mar 22 - Mar 28
(Nandan Rao, USA, 2011, Blu-ray, 94 min)
The men of Dodge City are not quite men yet. J., Zach and Ben, three young friends transplanted to Detroit with the aspiration of transforming an abandoned cathedral-sized church into a lively arts space, are trying hard to articulate their enthusiasm and noble ideas. All the while they play, flirt, tell stories and struggle to define themselves with their grand schemes. Filmed in the winter, the physical space in The Men of Dodge City—the church, in all its beauty and decrepitude—is a character of its own. The film moves, joyfully, in small steps, rewarding the audience with thoughtful and charming characters, confident cinematography and stunningly beautiful location. Winner of our Jury Award for Best Feature at Local Sightings Festival 2012.
Eco Warriors
Seattle premiere!
Producer Jennifer Pickford in attendance!
Mar 12
(The Red Octopus Collective, Canada, 2012, Blu-ray, 52 min)
When did activism become terrorism? And why are America's heroes being jailed, while its corporations continue to be rewarded? These questions are front and center in the timely, heartfelt and engaging documentary Eco Warriors. The film follows the story of Portland activist Tre Arrow, who was on the FBI's Most Wanted List for his radical environmental actions and forced to seek asylum in Canada rather than face life in jail.
Fourplay
Director in attendance Monday! Sponsored by Three Dollar Bill Cinema, the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture and The Center for Sex Positive Culture
Mar 04 - Mar 05
(Kyle Henry, USA, 2012, Blu-ray, 80 min)
Bathroom sexcapades, porn store shenanigans and complex human-canine relationships are just some of the adventures in Kyle Henry’s engaging feature anthology, Fourplay. The film is divided into chapters/cities: in Skokie, a closeted woman’s infatuation with her minister’s wife is sublimated during a weekend of dog sitting. In Austin, a young couple struggles with opposing desires regarding conception and arrive at a startling compromise. In Tampa, a queer man plagued with self-doubt finds a surreal nirvana in a public mall restroom. And in San Francisco, a cross-dressing prostitute faces a challenging assignment with a quadriplegic man.
The Bitter Buddha
Director and comedian in attendance, with a Q&A moderated by Linas Phillips!
Feb 23
(Steven Feinartz, USA, 2012, Blu-ray, 90 min)
Ever been to a famous city and gone on an underground tour with a friend who’s lived there for years? The Bitter Buddha is a side-streets tour through the world of comedy, hosted by names most of us know (Dana Gould, Sarah Silverman, Zach Galifianakis) and spotlighting a comic most people don’t: Eddie Pepitone, secret cornerstone of today’s young comedy tradition. Though he’s never been a household name, Pepitone continues to craft his hilariously livid stage persona. In Buddha, a wide circle of Pepitone's friends come together to help tell the story of his decades-long “rise and fall.”
Arcadia
Director in attendance!
Feb 22
(Olivia Silver, USA, 2012, Blu-ray, 91 min)
Independent film favorite John Hawkes, riding on a series of award-nominated performances over the last two years, stars in Arcadia as a single father trying to move himself and his children across the country, to California. Though he promises his daughters a life of luxury and sunshine, Tom struggles to keep his head up while dealing with the difficult truth about his children’s mother, which threatens to tear his family apart.
Nana
Director in attendance Friday, Monday, Tuesday!
Jan 11 - Jan 17
(Valerie Massadian, France, 2011, 35mm, 68 min)
Nan Goldin collaborator Valerie Massadian’s directorial debut stars a four year old. “There's not one word, one gesture—nothing—that I imposed on her. We played,” she told Craig Hubert of Interview Magazine. Toddler actor Kelyna Lecomte plays Nana, a girl abandoned by her mother on the outskirts of her grandfather’s pig farm. Filmed with a voyeuristic distance, Nana unfolds in the allowed space as the character’s isolation endows her own developing independence. Audiences are given an innocently intimate, contemplative glimpse of the world as Nana views it. Played with extraordinary composure, the character of Nana is a quiet delight to watch. Winner of the Best First Film prize at the Locarno Film Festival, this is a sweet, life-affirming faux-fairytale, simultaneously enchanting and elegiac.
Now, Forager
Seattle premiere!
Director in attendance opening night!
Nov 30 - Dec 06, 2012
(Jason Cortlund and Julia Halperin, USA, 2012, HD, 93 min)
At first glance, Regina and Lucien’s lifestyle seems saturated with romance: husband and wife make a living foraging for mushrooms in the woods of New York, then go door to door selling their wares to restaurants in Manhattan. But as Now, Forager intrudes further upon their life together, it reveals a wife desperate for stability and a husband threatened by his wife’s “disloyalty.” Now, Forager expertly weaves tension into the story of a marriage, punctuated by gorgeous glimpses of the food around which that marriage revolves, while challenging our ideals of romance both within relationships and without. Special Film Forum member ticket price for Slow Food USA members.
In Conversation: Julio Ramirez
Free!
Nov 02, 2012
Our free quarterly In Conversation series is moderated by Warren Etheredge, as he joins local filmmakers in conversation about their process. Our inaugural program features a new project by filmmaker Julio Ramirez.
In The Family
Seattle Premiere! Director in Attendance!
Oct 05 - Oct 11, 2012
(Patrick Wang, USA, 2011, 35mm, 169 min)
In his remarkably assured directorial debut, Patrick Wang offer a sensitive story of a child custody battle in a two-Dad family. Wang also gives an outstanding performance as Joey, a gay Asian American man living in the South whose idyllic life is torn asunder when he loses his adopted son after the death of his partner. This is an absorbing, courageous first feature shown in the context of marriage equality laws pending across the country.
Everyday Sunshine: The Story of Fishbone
Sep 03, 2012
(Lev Anderson and Chris Metzler, 2011, USA, Blu-ray, 100 min)
Join us for a one-time screening of Everyday Sunshine, an outstanding documentary about Fishbone, musical pioneers who have been rocking on the margins of pop culture for the past 25 years. From the streets of South-Central Los Angeles and the competitive Hollywood music scene of the 1980s, the band rose to fame, only to fall apart on the verge of "making it." Laurence Fishburne narrates this look at a unique black punk rock band, a story of fiercely individual artists reclaiming their musical legacy while debunking myths of young black men from urban America. With an introduction and Q&A from the band, this promises to be a memorable screening experience.