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screening
In 1985, the Tiberino family of Poweltown Village filmed The Mural, a noisy, lively look at Philly’s Beat generation of contemporary artists, poets and musicians who hung out at Joseph and Ellen Tiberino’s Bachanal bar. Along with The Mural being a giddy tour guide to the then-battered area, the grainy black-and-white film examines Joseph’s legendary painting The Liberation of Women, and delves into the mythology surrounding the Tiberino clan. Twenty-five years later, that family started filming Tiberino, an autobiographical mockumentary that finds their patriarch searching for an allegorical pot of gold at the end of an imaginary rainbow. Tonight, the Troc will screen the former in hopes to raise funds to finish the latter.
TONIGHT, Thu., Nov. 15, 8 p.m., $10, The Trocadero, 1003 Arch St., 215-922-6888, troc.com.
For the third year (and third location this year), Awesome Fest will present a series of free outdoor screenings, every Saturday till the end of August at Race Street Pier. As usual, the programmers will screen Philadephia premieres of flicks from indie festivals like Sundance and SXSW.
For your convenience, we've rounded up the complete schedule below, complete with dates and silly little descriptions:
PILGRIM SONG An ex-music teacher sets out to find himself along Kentucy's Sheltowee Trace Trail, joining forces with a father-and-son duo along the way. Sat., June 30.
The Awesome Fest has been doing its name proud lately, bringing a ton of weird and great rep film to to town. They were extremely fast about obtaining the rights to show Beastie Boys concert video (sort of) made by Adam Yauch:
“Awesome; I Fuckin' Shot That!” is a 2006 concert film of the Beastie Boys, directed by Adam Yauch. It was created by giving camcorders to 50 audience members of a sold out concert at Madison Square Garden on October 9, 2004. The audience members were instructed to keep the cameras rolling at all times. For a low budget operation, all cameras were returned to the place of purchase for a refund. The film premiered at Sundance in 2006.
The screening's next Thursday, May 18; doors at 7, movie at 8. It's technically free, but the suggested $5 donation goes to a charity of Yauch's family's choice.
Las Vegas will always have The Hangover, but what about Atlantic City? Say hello to Mancation, a locally produced buddy-adventure romp minus the blackout. The film stars Matt Kawczynski as Vince, who finds his wife in bed with another woman right after his wedding. This prompts his buddies, one of which is played by Joey Fatone, to take him to Atlantic City for a weekend of bro-bonding and tail-chasing. But unexpectedly Vince runs into an old crush, played by The Wonder Years’ Danica McKellar.
In anticipation of this week’s test screening at the Troc, director Frank Vain, a native of Haddonfield, N.J., sat down with City Paper to tell us more about the film's creation process.
City Paper: How did this film come to be?
Frank Vain: The story is a concept I’ve had for a little while. I hired a friend of mine to write the actual script. My group of friends has pretty much been working on indie films in the area for the last couple years, so everyone came on board to produce it together. This is the third one we’ve done as a group in the last three years. Each one goes a little bit bigger, and we bring in bigger named talent and get a little more money in the budget.
CP: When and where did you shoot the film?
FV: This one features a lot of Philly and the Jersey Shore. The story itself takes place in Atlantic City but we shot all over the shore. We shot during last March and April. One of the parts of the movie involves a flower show and we went into the one in Philadelphia last year to do some behind the scenes shooting. We shot about 25 percent of the film in Philly.
Morgan Spurlock takes no crap. That fact was readily apparent at the Q&A session after the April 14 screening of his new film, POM Wonderful Presents The Greatest Movie Ever Sold (check out Sam Adams' review). While he is snarky, silly, and genuinely funny — watching him giggle in his film about the equine/human shampoo brand (yeah) Mane ‘n Tail was a bit like watching a five-year-old giggle about poop — he has made himself known through this film as the sort of director who won’t be trodden upon. And in the advertising world, that’s all anyone wants to do to you.
After the screening, Spurlock stood before the audience wearing his custom-made suit emblazoned with all the logos of the corporate sponsors who financed the film. The suit has been making the rounds with the director on the late night circuit, and is yet another tongue-in-cheek stab at the ad industry. Maybe he believes that one day we’ll all wear suits covered in ad logos. Don’t we already, what with Nike, Abercrombie, et al?
Just as the Q&A got going, three people got up and began to walk out. Spurlock paused from answering a question to call out the ditchers. “Oh, thanks for coming you guys. Don’t worry, the Q&A will get much more interesting once you leave. Hurry on out of here so we can all talk about you behind your backs.” They shamefully walked out and the audience wolf-whistled like the abandoners were elementary school kids getting called to the principal’s audience.
Far beyond that sort of no-nonsense shtick, Spurlock answered questions primarily about his relationship with the advertisers in the film and whether he had “sold out.” He said that he would have if he had he let the brands get final cut of the film (which they didn’t), and he sacrificed no control over the movie. “The brands wanted a monetary return on their investment,” he said. “I said hell no! Your return is being in this film!” The audience burst into applause at the point.
When asked how a budding filmmaker can maintain artistic integrity, he said the most important thing is maintaining one’s vision and creative control. No easy feat, surely, in the shark tank of advertising. That’s what makes the film so genius. Spurlock doesn’t really offer a solution to the problem, though. He doesn’t even seem to think, from the answers he provided, that a city with no advertising (in the film we see Sao Paulo, Brazil, a city that has outlawed any form of outdoor advertising) can even happen in America. He thinks it can happen from people getting fed up enough and making it happen.
He wants to make us see that advertising is everywhere, and maybe that will frustrate us enough to try to change things. “I’ve ruined TV and movies for you,” he said. “You will see ads more now than you ever did before.” So the solution really, is his film. Now we’ll really see that advertising everywhere, and it’s up to us to get fed up enough to try stop it. If that’s what we want, of course.
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| Kazuhiro Soda |
| Still from Mental |
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| Kazuhiro Soda |
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| Kazuhiro Soda |
| Still from Campaign |
the boundary between the mentally ill and healthy people. If you closely look at them, the more you observe, it becomes more questionable the differences between the healthy and the ill. The appearance of this "the" ought be a red flag to anyone, sadly it is not. "The" Jews, "the" Blacks, over time many groups have been subjected to it, and a great many of us accepted it. I am not sure why it is such a popular metaphor, but reducing groups to an abstraction seem to entertain us. The reality behind each is the same. Mental illnesses do not discriminate, people with them are as likely highly successful as not, earn in the millions, hold high office, professional, blue and white collar jobs. We are first people, and then ill, Black, Jewish, whatever. Harold A. Maio, retired Mental Health Editor khmaio@earthlink.net
Harold, Kazuhiro Soda used "the mentally ill" the same way he would have used "the young" or "the wealthy" or "the syntax sticklers". It should be clear from reading the complete article (or even the rest of the sentence) that he does not descriminate against the ill (i.e. he refers to healthy people as "the healthy"). However, I can appreciate your empathy towards mentally ill people, and if you attend the screening, I think you'll find that Kazuhiro Soda does as well.
"The" healthy and "the" young differ from "the" mentally ill, as they differ from "the" Blacks. It is an interesting form, it can be employed poetically, "the" gifted, and can be entirely the opposite. We are presently fascinated with the form, "the" mentally ill, and a few others, "the" homeless, "the" disabled among them. They delimit our understanding. In my youth I fully appreciated "the" Blacks, their limits were carefully desribed for me. I believed those limits, only to discover culture had lied to me. I have not seen the film, will likely not get the opportunity, but I hope it includes a professor teaching German. Illness intrudes on our lives to various degrees, from little to consuming. It does not consume most of us. I hope the film shows that range. Harold
I had the opportunity to watch K. Soda's documentary and read some interviews about it. In my opinion this kind of exchange is an interesting starting point to discuss about "the conception of mental illness" in the context of "the concept of culture ." Harold refers to the concept of "sub-cultures" when he talks about "the black culture", "the youth culture" ... on his words: "as a way to discover how culture (or these cultural categories) had lied " to him . From his point of view these categorizations are a risky way to divide, discriminate and control different expressions of the culture... and he adds "They delimit our understanding. " The concept of "subculture" is an operational concept in the field of Anthropology for the purposes of the study of "inter cultural exchange" (in Spanish language "interculturalismo " ). This concept allows to analyze how these subcultures relate one to the other to confront or negotiate their interests. Other examples of these categorizations are: "gender culture", "original cultures ", "the culture of cybernauts" ... etc. To be part of a subculture, members of the same should be aware of it, have a sense of belonging. From this theoretical starting point... can we consider that " THE mentally ill " is a sub culture ? are there any previous studies in this regard? I don't consider this category as possible. As Harold writes "Mental illness" does not discriminate social classes or ethnic groups. From the psychopathology field, psychic structures are universal, that means, cultures do not discriminate pathologies. As social anthropologist I would like to add that the treatment of these diseases or their denial are culturally determined. From this point of view mental illness are "ALSO" culturally defined not only psychologically determined. we have to admit that we are "locked" by our cultural point of view. Kazuhiro Soda describes in his documentary how mental illnesses are treated at an mental institution in Japan. His view is extremely respectful in relation to the mentally ill as well as mental illness, and he complains about the economic insecurity faced by mental institutions, which depends on government subsidies, (allowing to discuss about a "sort of institutionalized discrimination") I am sure that if Harold has the opportunity to watch this documentary he will be fascinated by Soda 's work. Marcela L.
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| Elaine Watts (right) with her daughter Susan Watts. |
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| from louisck.com |
Sarah Palin, smiles. looks like a deer in headlights.smiles like a bobblehead. weeble wobble.
An anagram for Sarah Palin's name could be "attention whore." wait...
You are a moron. You're accent is annoying. I would still hit it.
I love you Louis, Sarah said with a smile. I love that shiny red dome.
I'm from Wasilla, in middle America! It's right near Russia.
MILF,Politician,Dope, our next President? one can only HOPE....NOT.
Abstinence only? Your knocked up kid is single Some Sex Ed. plan, huh?
Sarah, you hairy cunt, I can only pray, you are not in the presidential hunt....unless it's a moose hunt
I'm from Wasilla You are my embarrasment Sarah Palin sucks
beware of palin dangerous as ignorant dumb teabagging slut
How oh how I ask, Did a boob get such limelight? Stop the attention!
THE BLUE MOON CHANTS A LULLABYE TO SARAH PALIN BUTTERFLY NOW GONE
Sad, silly Sarah You are the worst example of us four eyed girls
To Sarah Palin: Nobody likes you. No one. Shut your whore mouth now.
Sarah, capture your wonderfulness (in) 17 syllables? Silence.
When you winked at us It made my vagina hurt. Less sense than an egg.
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| The Joe Dante classic Piranha was one of the offerings from the 2009 Horrorthon |
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