Thursday, October 25- 8 PM


THURSDAY, OCTOBER 25 | 8 PM
DETROPIA
Heidi Ewing & Rachel Grady, 2012, 90 min.

**Please Note: No filmmakers in attendance but Q&A following the screening with Rachel Grady via Skype!

“The most moving documentary I have seen in years.” —David Denby, THE NEW YORKER

Detroit’s story has encapsulated the iconic narrative of America over the last century— the Great Migration of African Americans escaping Jim Crow; the rise of manufacturing and the middle class; the love affair with automobiles; the flowering of the American dream; and now . . . the collapse of the economy and the fading American mythos.

With its vivid, painterly palette and haunting score, DETROPIA sculpts a dreamlike collage of a grand city teetering on the brink of dissolution. As houses are demolished by the thousands, automobile-company wages plummet, institutions crumble, and tourists gawk at the “charming decay,” the film’s vibrant, gutsy characters glow and erupt like flames from the ashes. These soulful pragmatists and stalwart philosophers strive to make ends meet and make sense of it all, refusing to abandon hope or resistance. Their grit and pluck embody the spirit of the Motor City as it struggles to survive postindustrial America and begins to envision a radically different future. —Caroline Libresco, Sundance Film Festival Senior Programmer

Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing are co-directors of Detropia and co-owners of Loki Films. The filmmaking duo has been lauded for gaining unprecedented access in to unknown worlds and taking an intimate approach to their subject matter. In 2007, Grady and Ewing were nominated for an Academy Award for Jesus Camp, a candid look at the new generation of the Christian Right. Their new film Detropia is a cinematic tapestry that looks at Detroit as America’s canary in the coal mine. The film premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and won the award for best editing. In 2010 they debuted their Peabody Award-winning documentary 12th & Delaware, also at Sundance. Previously, the team was nominated for an Emmy for The Boys of Baraka. They recently co-directed an adaptation of Freakonomics for the big screen as well as a rare documentary on Saudi Arabian teenagers for the MTV Network.