oscar jubis
05-06-2007, 09:56 PM
Currently enjoying theatrical runs, two remarkable documentaries that connect past historical events with the current political climate in America.
THE CATS OF MIRIKITANI
Linda Hattendorf, a film editor, stumbled upon the perfect subject for her directing debut a block away from her apartment in Soho. His name is Tsumoto "Jimmy" Mirikitani, an artist who sleeps in Washington Square Park most of the year and under the awning of a Korean grocery in winter. Hattenford met and befriended him in January of 2001 and started shooting film of Mirikitani making colorful paintings with a recurrent cat motif. In these scenes, one can see the World Trade Towers in the background. Mirikitani was born in Sacramento in 1920 and moved to his parents native Hiroshima in 1923. He had a rift with his father in 1937 because he refused to join the Army proclaiming himself an artist. So he moved back to the States on his own only to end up spending three and a half years at a concentration camp in California. On 9/11/2001, Hattendorf asks him to move into her apartment. Watching news of racial profiling of Middle East-Americans on TV, Mirikitani states: "Same old story". As it progresses, The Cats of Mirikitani grows increasingly more interesting and surprising.
Linda Hattenford's skills are "so developed that she doesn't have to articulate any of the points she wants to make_graceful juxtaposition does the job for her. As in the best classic Hollywood narratives, the film doesn't feel assembled, it feels like it's merely happening. Even the modest ways Hattendorf introduces herself into the story are glancing and unobstrusive, always done with an eye towards enhancing her main character, such as the droll moment when Mirikitani expresses his distress after she comes home late one night from a long movie".
(Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader)
The Cats of Mirikitani is magnificent. You must see it, and it's easy. It will screen on PBS this week. Here's the link to its PBS (http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/catsofmirikitani/) page. Click on schedule to find broadcasting times in your area.
SACCO AND VANZETTI
Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were Italian immigrant anarchists who were arrested in 1920 for the murder of two men in Massachusetts. It was a notoriously prejudiced trial, built on flimsy evidence, seemingly aimed to set an example. Our country was in the middle of the so-called First Red Scare and heightened xenophobia prevailed. Actors John Turturro and Tony Shalhoub provide the voices of the two men whose affair gained international notoriety. A rich variety of archival material is presented as well as interviews with historians, a neighbor of Vanzetti, and Sacco's niece.
Sacco and Vanzetti "does a superb job of condensing an overwhelming mass of documentation, archival imagery and artistic representation into a concise yet passionate history lesson whose relevance could not be timelier."
(Ronnie Scheib, Variety)
Here's a schedule of theatrical screenings (http://www.willowpondfilms.com/news.html)
THE CATS OF MIRIKITANI
Linda Hattendorf, a film editor, stumbled upon the perfect subject for her directing debut a block away from her apartment in Soho. His name is Tsumoto "Jimmy" Mirikitani, an artist who sleeps in Washington Square Park most of the year and under the awning of a Korean grocery in winter. Hattenford met and befriended him in January of 2001 and started shooting film of Mirikitani making colorful paintings with a recurrent cat motif. In these scenes, one can see the World Trade Towers in the background. Mirikitani was born in Sacramento in 1920 and moved to his parents native Hiroshima in 1923. He had a rift with his father in 1937 because he refused to join the Army proclaiming himself an artist. So he moved back to the States on his own only to end up spending three and a half years at a concentration camp in California. On 9/11/2001, Hattendorf asks him to move into her apartment. Watching news of racial profiling of Middle East-Americans on TV, Mirikitani states: "Same old story". As it progresses, The Cats of Mirikitani grows increasingly more interesting and surprising.
Linda Hattenford's skills are "so developed that she doesn't have to articulate any of the points she wants to make_graceful juxtaposition does the job for her. As in the best classic Hollywood narratives, the film doesn't feel assembled, it feels like it's merely happening. Even the modest ways Hattendorf introduces herself into the story are glancing and unobstrusive, always done with an eye towards enhancing her main character, such as the droll moment when Mirikitani expresses his distress after she comes home late one night from a long movie".
(Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader)
The Cats of Mirikitani is magnificent. You must see it, and it's easy. It will screen on PBS this week. Here's the link to its PBS (http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/catsofmirikitani/) page. Click on schedule to find broadcasting times in your area.
SACCO AND VANZETTI
Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were Italian immigrant anarchists who were arrested in 1920 for the murder of two men in Massachusetts. It was a notoriously prejudiced trial, built on flimsy evidence, seemingly aimed to set an example. Our country was in the middle of the so-called First Red Scare and heightened xenophobia prevailed. Actors John Turturro and Tony Shalhoub provide the voices of the two men whose affair gained international notoriety. A rich variety of archival material is presented as well as interviews with historians, a neighbor of Vanzetti, and Sacco's niece.
Sacco and Vanzetti "does a superb job of condensing an overwhelming mass of documentation, archival imagery and artistic representation into a concise yet passionate history lesson whose relevance could not be timelier."
(Ronnie Scheib, Variety)
Here's a schedule of theatrical screenings (http://www.willowpondfilms.com/news.html)