As Molly told you last week, the Philadelphia Independent Film Festival is going on this weekend. I’ve got one personal plug: Live From Bethlehem. The reason I’m plugging it is that a friend of mine, Joe Sousa, is the Producer/Director, but you might want to see it if you’re interested in either Israel/Palestine issues or in questions of media perspective.

The film is about the Ma’an News Network, “the only major independent news source in the Palestinian territories.” I saw some rough footage maybe a year ago and I remember it rendering everyday life in the territories with a greater degree of nuance and intimacy than anything I was accustomed to seeing.

Anyway, trailer here. It’s playing tonight at the Yards Brewery at 10:30 and tomorrow at the Piazza at 1:40.

Don’t know what to do tonight? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

Trek Project

The folks over at the A-Space are leading a discussion on how Americans see themselves in the world — and there’s actually an occasion, other than it being a regular old Wednesday, for it. It’s a fundraiser for the Trek Project, a documentary that’ll be following around kids from Philly and New York City this summer as they build a school in a Nigerian village. They’re planning to address all sorts of questions that should be addressed but very rarely are — like, do these visits do more good than bad? It’s free, but donations will be happily accepted.

Also, as a side note: We’re psyched about Pterodactyl’s screen printing class tonight. If you need a refresher on why, check out Sherri Hospedales’ article about the new snobbery-free art space here.

Wed., June 24, 8:30-10:30 p.m., free, A-Space, 4722 Baltimore Ave., 215-727-0882, the-aspace.org.

Heard a rumor that your boy M. Night Shyamalan is filming scenes for The Last Airbender at Girard College today. Anyone up in that area spot the production?

The first trailer for the film, an live-action adaptation of the Nickolodeon animated kids’ series Avatar: The Last Airbender, just dropped. Peep above. The Insider says a majority of the flick has been shot at the Navy Yard and in East Falls.

philly.com

From philly.com:

Getting over an ex: We’ve all done it, and over time the stories — of broken hearts and egged houses — get easier to tell. But there’s always some lingering drama. At May 26’s First Person Arts-sponsored Story Slam, where “Baggage” was the theme, winner and audience favorite Renee Campbell got some of that baggage off her chest.

She tells the tale of being broken up with by a boyfriend who, she realizes, is probably gay. Heartbroken, she seeks the advice of her closest friends and family members. First there’s the gays, who remind her that “the best way to get over somebody is to get under somebody.” Next, Renee’s lesbian friends take her country-line dancing and buy her self-help books. Third, her mother gives her some Xanax. After none of that works, Renee tries a different approach, which you can watch below:

Renee will go on to participate in the Grand Slam competition this fall; but if you can’t wait till then to hear a good yarn, First Person Arts is setting up shop twice in the next few days — first at Saturday’s Summer Solstice celebration at the Kimmel, and second for the monthly L’Etage slam on Tuesday the 23rd.

Read a Q&A with Renee after the jump, and in the meantime, get yourself to a Slam — they’re tons of fun, even if you’d rather listen than unload your own baggage.

Summer Solstice “The Great Outdoors” Slam, Sat., June 20, 8 p.m., free with $10 event admission, Kimmel Center, 300 S.Broad St.; “Do It Yourself” Slam, Tue., June 23, 8:30 p.m., $8, L’Etage, Sixth and Bainbridge streets, firstpersonarts.org. (more…)

the artblog

Earlier this month, Molly Eichel clued you in on the North Philadelphia Puberty Survivors Support Forum — a weirdo art event wherein people discussed their funniest, worst, most life-ruining puberty stories. It complimented John O’Donnell’s exhibit “Salad Days,” a multimedia installation at FLUXspace that explored that horrible time in everyone’s life. In case you were wondering how it went, the ladies over at the artblog have a great summary:

The group was predominately female, however the Moderator did a bang-up job eliciting juicy prepubescent recollections from the males in the group. One topic where the females were unanimously clueless, and the males in absolute secret agreement was ‘The best way to hide a spontaneous erection that popped-up at the wrong time’ — ‘Tuck it under the belt’.

Other topics during the nearly three-hour long meeting ranged from periods to first ejaculations, from training bras to first encounters with pornography, and everything in between.  Irony and utter-relief ruled the tone of the room, and everyone seemed to feel lighter as they related to their peers’ recollections of that trying period of young-adult life.

Sounds, um, uncomfortable. But funny. Check out O’Donnell’s great works here.

Philadelphia writer and poet CAConrad will celebrate the release of his new book, Advanced Elvis Course, with a reading and discussion. The author of The Book of Frank presents a zealous meditation that surpasses the limits of a mere study of one of America’s most iconic figures. Past and present reality bends before the awe of the author’s devotion as he takes us on an ecstatic trip to Graceland — real and metaphorical — meant to proselytize and bring the King to life. This fractured presentation of reality is mirrored by the crazed form of the book itself — CAConrad employs poetry, interviews and voice messages in the narrative.

At least one Elvis impersonator will be in attendence. In addition, Heather Raquel Phillips will sell her prints  of Honky-Tonk wannabes whose paths she has crossed and she’ll prepare goodies from the cookbook Are You Hungry Tonight?, which consists of recipes based on the King’s favorites — I assume it’s a big book. Elvis movie
footage will play to gems carefully selected by CAConrad himself. One should attend in their rhinestoned leisure-suit best.

Fri., June 19th, 6 p.m., Moonstone Arts Center, 110A S. 13th St., 215-735-9598

Jeez, for what was originally pitched to me as a small, indie rom com, Fox Searchlight is really putting the promo push behind (500) Days of Summer, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel and written by Penn grad and Shore kid Scott Neustadter. This Sunday, June 21, starting at noon, you’ll have the opportunity to snap up some goodies, all on Fox Searchlight’s tab. Participating vendors include

• RITA’S WATER ICE- 1511 Spruce St. (Center City) — free kiddie-sized water ice
• PHILLY PRETZEL FACTORY- 2125 Oregon Ave. (South Philadelphia) - free pretzels
• WRDW-FM ICE CREAM TRUCK- South Street, Citizens Bank Park, Kelly Drive/Art Museum/Boathouse Row, Valley Forge Park - ice cream
• PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES GAME- Citizens Bank Park - one row gets free hamburgers (plus aforementioned ice cream)

Supplies are limited to 500 because promos are cute like that. So is the movie any good? Sam Adams thought so when he reviewed it as the opening night film at this year’s Cinefest:

At first blush, the feature debut of music-video veteran Marc Webb seems like a Fox Searchlight special: a young adult romance with a killer soundtrack and enough nudging self-awareness to disarm cynical Gen-Yers. The difference is that, unlike Napoleon Dynamite or Juno, (500) Days of Summer hurts. The time-scrambled script puts the meet-cute between Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel back to back with their decline, and the point where her fetching elusiveness shades into blithe cruelty. Webb tiptoes on the edge of clever-clever land and sometimes hurtles over the line; a Hall & Oates-scored musical number is a nifty set piece (and potent trailer-bait) but also shatters the mood. But for a movie that often doesn’t seem to have much on its mind, the cumulative effect is oddly devastating.

Related: INTERVIEW: (500) Days of Summer screenwriter Scott Neustadter

OK, folks, BQ Giveaway Week may be over, but we’ve got a good thing going here (read: free books!) so we’re keeping the ball rolling.

If you picked up a CP today you already know this, but Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s making an appearance at the Free Library tonight to promote her book of short stories, The Thing Around Your Neck. Here’s what senior editor Patrick Rapa had to say:

Adichie thrives on the social, political, historical complexities of the place where she grew up. But the 31-year-old, who moved to the U.S. when she was 19 — to study at Drexel, no less — also has a thing or two to say about Americans. In the title story from her new collection, The Thing Around Your Neck (Knopf), a young Nigerian woman moves to New England, where she’s beset upon by well-meaning Americans too proud of their open-mindedness. Adichie is fond of recounting such stories at speaking engagements, too, so your NPR-listening, gele-wearing ass might squirm a bit at the library tonight. Relax, she called you well-meaning.

We’re giving away a copy of The Thing Around Your Neck to the first Clog reader who can answer the following trivia question:

Adichie grew up in a home once occupied by what famous writer?

E-mail your answers to carolyn.huckabay@citypaper.net. In the meantime, check the Free Library details below.

Thu., June 18, 7:30 p.m., free, Free Library, Central Branch, 1901 Vine St., 215-567-4341, freelibrary.org.

It’s the final installment of our Book Quarterly Giveaway Week, and I’ve saved a great beach read for last.

Mishna Wolff’s memoir I’m Down (St. Martin’s, 288 pages, $23.95, May 26) chronicles her growing up in a poor neighborhood outside Seattle with a dad who, despite being white as Spencer Pratt, acted, talked, dressed as if he were black.

Our BQ critic Gary Kramer gives us the lowdown in last week’s CP:

In the very first sentence of her poignant and often uproarious memoir, Mishna Wolff declares that she is white. “My parents, both white,” she writes. Wolff establishes this fact — repeatedly — because her father, a white man, truly believes he is black. “He strutted around with a short perm, a Cosby-esque sweater, gold chains and a Kangol.” I’m Down recounts the author’s efforts to “integrate” in a mostly black neighborhood by overcoming her lack of rhythm, braiding her hair in cornrows and attending Baptist church.

Mishna’s perceptive voice — not to mention her impeccable comic timing — developed when she went to an all-black community summer camp and learned how to cap on other kids. Doing the dozens gave her a defense mechanism for coping with a miserable home life where meals and money were scarce. It also helped her develop a thick skin for dealing with being in the minority. Her observations about her family and herself are achingly funny and painfully true.

If your cred is in question and you’d like a copy, answer this trivia question:

“I’m Down” is also the name of a song by what band?

E-mail your answers to carolyn.huckabay@citypaper.net for a chance to win. Thanks for playing, and keep watching the Clog for book giveaways.

[UPDATE, 5 p.m.]: Congrats to Clog reader Matt, who correctly answered the trivia question. The answer I was looking for? The Beatles. Although Aerosmith, Goldfinger and probably a million others would have worked, too.

Last year, Shaun Brady told you about the inaugural Philadelphia Independent Film Festival:

Coming as it does in between the city’s two flagship festivals — April’s behemoth Philadelphia Film Festival and July’s ever-expanding Philadelphia International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival — the Independent Film Fest has to be looked at as David next to a pair of well-established Goliaths. But by focusing on indies, the new kid on the block has a distinct advantage in differentiating itself from the marquee names and crowd-pleasers that increasingly fill PFF’s catalog, and the niche programming of PIGLFF.

The PIFF is back at it again and on Monday the posted their schedule, which you can see after the the jump…

The fest takes place from Thu., June 25-Sun., June 28 at various venues around Northern Liberties. Tickets are $6-8 for a single film and $25-130 for full day passes. You can purchase tickets online or go to the box office at North Bowl, 909 N 2nd St., which opens for business this Monday (but is cash only).

Don’t forget to pick up tomorrow’s paper for a story on the PIFF and it’s sister Philadelphia Film Market.

(more…)

Don’t know what to do tonight? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

Look at those pretty 16 MM reels. Aren’t they romantic? Don’t you just wanna grab a blanket and a wine bottle and sit down in front of them with your beau, watching old movies? Yes, yes you do — and tonight, so long as Mother Nature doesn’t shit all over us again like it did yesterday (our below-normal precipitation rate be damned), you can at The Lawn Chair Drive-In. Lair of The White Worm is up, and judging by the trailer, it’s a weirdo ’80s horror flick that features vampires a very hot, dapper Hugh Grant. See it for yourself here.

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Tue., June 16 (and every Tue. throughout the summer), dusk, free, Liberty Lands Park, Third Street above Poplar, lawnchairdrivein.com.

Today’s Book Quarterly Giveaway Week contest isn’t directly BQ-related, but we’re willing to make an exception for Joseph O’Neill. His Netherland (Pantheon, $24.95), which came out in 2008, has since won the Pen/Faulkner Award and the New York Times Book Review Best Book of the Year award. Not too shabby.

Tonight O’Neill will speak at the Free Library, as Shelf Life columnist Justin Bauer reminded us in last week’s CP:

Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland has collected a lot of well-deserved good fortune. Critics have praised it as a powerful, nuanced examination of 9/11 and its aftermath; … it’s the president’s choice for recreational reading. Any of these are good enough reasons to pick up a copy of one of last year’s best books. But it’s O’Neill’s acute parsing of dislocation, and his long, precise sentences drinking in New York City’s variety and hustle, that justify his luck and make his Free Library reading Philly’s good fortune.

Want a copy? Answer me this:

Where was Joseph O’Neill born? Where was he raised?

E-mail your answers to carolyn.huckabay@citypaper.net. In the meantime, head over to 19th and Vine this evening to get yer culture on.

Joseph O’Neill reading and signing, Tue., June 16, 7:30 p.m., free, Free Library, Central Branch, 1901 Vine St., 215-567-4341, freelibrary.org.

[UPDATE, 4 p.m.]: Congrats to Clog reader John, who correctly answered that O’Neill was born in Ireland and raised in the Netherlands. Thanks for playing! (Remember, My Goat Ate Its Own Legs is still up for grabs!)

The Rosenbach is hosting its 17th annual Bloomsday celebration today from noon to 7 p.m. The event celebrates James Joyce’s Ulysses, the story of Leopold Bloom taking his own “odyssey” — mirroring Homer’s legend of Odysseus — through Dublin.

Joyce fanatics have dubbed June 16 “Bloomsday” in Leo’s honor, and commemorate the day with readings of the novel. The Rosenbach, which is home to Ulysses’ original manuscript, has more than 60 Philadelphians participating in the book’s reading. Joyce fans, book lovers and the merely curious are invited to drop by to listen and check out the exhibition of Joyce materials inside.

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Tue., June 16, noon-7 p.m., free, 2000 block of Delancey Place, rosenbach.org.