2015 IN FILM
Season Five: Year In Review
It was Basilica’s fourth season of bringing unique and exceptional films to the region through Basilica Screenings. The season emphasized expansive documentary practices, with selections from Tell It Like It Is: Black Independents in New York, 1968-1986, formerly presented at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and hosting guest programmer Jake Perlin and filmmaker Charles Hobson. Additional highlights included screenings with filmmakers Kevin Jerome Everson and Wu Tsang in person, and a program co-presented with the HQTBD art collective that featured Peggy Ahwesh, Ephraim Asili and Takeshi Murata. And, the launch of our Sci-Fi Summer Nights Series included the community success Blade Runner Noodle Night! Our big annual events also featured crossover cinematic programming; 24-HOUR DRONE screened an all-female video program from the collection of Second Ward Foundation along with Bill Stone’s Pensato Clock. At Basilica SoundScape, Kiln Films presented Direct-to-Video, a program of films dedicated to eliciting dialogue between artists and challenge spectatorship, which was joined by Chris Bower’s We Won’t Bow Down along with several other Friday screenings in the North Hall.
BASILICA SCREENINGS: JULY 2015
Blade Runner Noodle Night
Inside Bedford-Stuyvesant Program
Wildness by Wu Tsang
Aspen by Frederick Wiseman
BASILICA SCREENINGS is a film series that presents an array of works from new and repertory narrative features, documentaries, experimental films, to video and media art, as well as guest curated programs, often with filmmakers and special guests in attendance for a discussion following the screenings. Programmed by Basilica Hudson’s film curator Aily Nash, and creative directors Melissa Auf der Maur and Tony Stone.
All films begin at 8 pm and are $5-15 sliding scale, unless otherwise noted.
BASILICA SCREENINGS: JULY
Friday, July 3, 7 PM
BLADE RUNNER NOODLE NIGHT!
free event, part of the Sci-Fi Summer Nights Series
dinner available for purchase + introduction by artist Maximilian Goldfarb!
Thursday, July 9, 8 PM
INSIDE BEDFORD-STUYVESANT PROGRAM, 1968-1971, 70 min.
part of the season-long series, Tell It Like It Is: Black Independents in New York, 1968-1986
Intro and Q&A with producer Charles Hobson and programmer Jake Perlin!
Thursday, July 16, 8 PM
WILDNESS, Wu Tsang, 2012, 74 min
Intro and Q&A with filmmaker Wu Tsang!
Food before the screening by Truck Pizza at 7 PM
Thursday, July 23, 8 PM
ASPEN, Frederick Wiseman, 1991, 146 min
FRIDAY, JULY 3, 7 PM
BLADE RUNNER NOODLE NIGHT!
7 PM: Dinner available for purchase at Blade Runner Noodlebar by Alimentary Kitchen/Nicole LoBue and Carrie Waldman. Noodle dishes created by chefs Nicole LoBue and Carrie Waldman will be served out of the Alimentary Kitchen located in Basilica’s courtyard. BUILDING FUN FACT: Basilica’s kitchen was inspired by the noodle bar in Blade Runner!
8 PM: FREE EVENT – BLADE RUNNER (FINAL CUT) & Handbook for Human Machines Book Launch
part of the Sci-Fi Summer Nights Series.
Introduction by artist Maximilian Goldfarb!
Experience the haunting and prophetic science fiction masterpiece by Ridley Scott alongside food inspired by the film. We’ll be showing Ridley Scott’s “Final Cut,” the only version over which he had complete artistic control and expressed his original vision for the film. Artist Maximilian Goldfarb will introduce the film and also present his new book, Handbook for Human Machines newly produced by Publication Studio. Handbook is comprised of visual research, drawings and found print material – instrumental in constructing episodes of Goldfarb’s monthly radio program, Human_Machine.
THURSDAY, JULY 9, 8 PM
INSIDE BEDFORD-STUYVESANT PROGRAM, 1968-1971, 70 min.
TRAILER
part of the season-long series, Tell It Like It Is: Black Independents in New York, 1968-1986
Intro and Q&A with producer Charles Hobson and programmer Jake Perlin!
Produced by Charles Hobson and aired on WNEW (better known as Channel 5), this weekly show was originally conceived by Robert F. Kennedy’s organization and community boosters to counter images of black neighborhoods as presented in the mainstream news. It is considered the first African American–produced television series in the USA. Hosted by Roxie Roker and Jim Lowry, the program reflected the home of 400,000 people as it transitioned into a new era, featuring open and unscripted dialogues with residents, guest celebrities, and, most notably, a powerful public forum with Harry Belafonte. This program will feature a selection of episodes, presented by Charles Hobson. – Jake Perlin
THURSDAY, JULY 16, 8 PM
WILDNESS, Wu Tsang, 2012, 74 min
Intro and Q&A with filmmaker Wu Tsang!
Food before the screening by Truck Pizza at 7 PM
TRAILER
Rooted in the tropical underground of Los Angeles nightlife, WILDNESS is a documentary portrait of the Silver Platter, a historic bar in the MacArthur Park area that has been home for Latin/LGBT immigrant communities since 1963. With a magical-realist flourish, the bar itself becomes a character, narrating what happens when a group of young artists create a weekly performance art/dance party (organized by director Wu Tsang and DJs NGUZUNGUZU & Total Freedom) called Wildness, which explodes into creativity and conflict. What does “safe space” mean, and who needs it? And how does it differ among us? At the Silver Platter, the search for answers to these questions creates coalitions across generations.
THURSDAY, JULY 23, 8 PM
ASPEN, Frederick Wiseman, 1991, 146 min
Aspen is a film about the town of the same name which became famous in the 19th century for silver mining and now for it’s scenic mountains, skiing culture, and fashionable clientele. Directed by Frederick Wiseman’s neutral, yet guided eye (absent of narration, talking heads, and subtitles) the town is presented as a study in contrasts. As Harry F. Waters in Newsweek commented when the film came out in 1991, “his target is Aspen, and his treatment — is an eyeful.”
Prior iterations of Basilica Screenings have brought filmmakers including Albert Maysles, who showed and discussed many of his rarely seen works from the 50s and 70s, essential cinematic works such as Susan Sontag’s Promised Lands, Chris Marker’s Sans Soleil, internationally renown contemporary directors including Jem Cohen, Deborah Stratman, and Denis Côté, and rare radical documentary forms such as Yumen produced by Harvard’s Sensory Ethnography Lab.