Advance screeners, director interviews and press images available upon request. Monday-Sunday, June 24-30, 2013, The Maysles Cinema, a  theater devoted to documentary film, is proud to present the exclusive U.S. theatrical premiere of Christine Turner's Homegoings (2013, 56 minutes, not rated). The film will be preceded byStoryCorps Shorts: A 10th Anniversary Celebration, a series of oral histories recorded by the award-winning organization and animated by the Rauch Brothers. Screenings are nightly at 7:30 p.m., Monday through Sunday, except on Thursday, June 27, when it will take place at 4:00 p.m. only. This program is part of the ongoing series Documentary in Bloom: New Films Presented by Livia Bloom. |
Harlem's own Isaiah Owens, proprietor of the Owens Funeral Home-just a few blocks away from the Maysles Cinema on Malcolm X Blvd-and his family are the focus of this thoughtful and moving cinematic portrait by New York filmmaker Turner. Growing up, Owens felt like an outcast for his interest in death and its rituals. Today, however, he is beloved for a gentle, practical approach to "homegoings" at a time when discussions of death are taboo and the undertaking profession dominated by impersonal big business. Venturing behind the scenes of a much feared and misunderstood field, this moving film examines the rituals of African American funerals and the approach that Owens takes to his craft, one of the few that black Americans could enter into freely after slavery. Combining cinéma vérité with personal interviews, Homegoings paints a portrait of Harlem's the dearly departed and the man who serves them. Trailer and official film website: www.homegoings.com
|
Preceded by
"STORYCORPS SHORTS: A 10TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION"
StoryCorps/The Rauch Brothers, 2010-2013, approximately 20 mins.
 StoryCorps, the national nonprofit oral history organization, has recorded more than 45,000 interviews since they opened their doors in 2003. Archived at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, the stories document the lives of people from all backgrounds and beliefs. In honor of StoryCorps' tenth anniversary, Documentary in Bloom at the Maysles Cinema is proud to present this program of StoryCorps Animated Shorts, featuring the stories of everyday people, told in their own voices and brought to life with the Rauch Brothers' animation. Official website: http://storycorps.org/
This program is made possible by PBS, POV, StoryCorps, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Black Programming Consortium.
|
Coming soon in the series Documentary in Bloom:
September 16-22, 2013
U.S. Theatrical Premiere
"PRICE OF GOLD"
A film by Sven Zellner. 2012, 86 mins.
Gold: today's most popular investment product. This astounding film is the first to document the illegal gold-diggers in Mongolia's Gobi Desert risking their lives for a few grams of the precious mineral. While the speculative market value of gold in the Western world holds little relation to any tangible yardstick, the film describes in very direct and stark images what it means to prospect for gold by hand, in brutal conditions eerily reminiscent of the California Gold Rush during the late 19th-century. In amazingly intimate shots, Sven Zellner shows us the people at the other end of the world who pay the real price of gold.
|
The Maysles Cinema was founded by legendary documentarian Albert Maysles (Grey Gardens, Salesman, Gimme Shelter). This non-profit, 60-seat theater in Harlem, with programming directed by Jessica Green, is dedicated to the exhibition of documentary film and video. In addition to presenting masterworks of the documentary tradition, overlooked or under-distributed gems and new releases, the Cinema is a space for meaningful social exchange, offering a forum for the discussion of questions of social and economic justice.
Documentary in Bloom: New Films Presented by Livia Bloom is an ongoing Maysles Cinema series which highlights challenging, controversial, and thought-provoking new documentaries of outstanding artistic merit. For more information, including an archive of past programs, visit: http://www.mayslesinstitute.org/cinema/documentaryinbloom.html
Livia Bloom, series curator, is the editor of "Errol Morris: Interviews" (University Press of Mississippi), a book of conversations from the career of the Academy Award-winning documentarian. She has lectured on documentary film at Cornell University and New York University, contributes to Cinema Scope and Filmmaker Magazine, and is Director of Exhibition and Broadcast of Icarus Films, an all-documentary distributor.
More information: www.mayslesinstitute.org / cinema@mayslesinstitute.org (212) 537-6843. Maysles Cinema is located at 343 Lenox Avenue/Malcolm X Boulevard, between 127th and 128th Streets, New York, NY 10027. Screenings are open to the public with a suggested donation of $10. Subway: Take the 2/3, 4/5/6, A/B/C/D trains to 125th Street. The Maysles Institute is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council for the Arts (NYSCA).
|
|
