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Films
 12/19/07
- 8:00 pm
An Unreasonable Man
Ralph Nader is America’s most famous and respected consumer advocate and possibly its most reviled presidential candidate. This unflinching film documents his life from the glory years of "Unsafe At Any Speed" and other triumphant consumer-safety campaigns, through his divisive decision to run for president in 2000 and again in 2004. Using fascinating archival footage and featuring interviews with Nader's family, friends, enemies, and Nader himself, the film fairly bristles with compelling arguments pro and con, creating a larger context from which to judge this controversial hero's true legacy.
09/05/07
- 8:00 pm
Convenient Truths: Winners of the Green Video Contest
Ten amateur videos: winners of the Convenient Truths contest sponsored by
TreeHugger and Seventh Generation.
For ten years, Ann Murray Paige covered the news. But when she was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 38, the only way she knew how to remain strong was to
turn the camera on herself and document her battle. She challenges everything
from "drive-through mastectomies", to how American society defines women by their breasts. Balancing work, motherhood, marriage and her illness, Ann's powerful
diary speaks volumes for one in seven American women now diagnosed with breast cancer.
08/08/07
- 8:00 pm
All That I Can Be
A student film about the catch-22 of joining the army in exchange for a college education.
A documentary film that is neither pro nor anti war about three national guardsmen who film their day-to-day lives in the Iraq War.
"the single best document (book, film or article) you could see" on the war in Iraq
"Riveting! Compelling!... Gives a stronger taste of the Iraq war experience than any film I can remember."
Winner Best Documentary Tribeca Film Festival
Winner Best International Documentary Britdoc Festival
07/11/07
- 8:00 pm
Out in the Heartland
Over the past ten years, gay and lesbian families in Kentucky have made progress toward acceptance from their local communities, workplaces and their children's schools. But when an anti-marriage amendment is mounted in their home state, they ’re forced to reevaluate their position and rise up against a doctrine of inequality.
While many gay, lesbian and transgendered people flee small towns to find acceptance in larger cities, some decide to stay. This is their story. Small Town Gay Bar addresses the struggle to find a safe space and strong community in rural Mississippi, a merciless environment for outsiders of all kinds. For decades Mississppi's gay bars have served as oases of self-expression among a group of people who are forced to hide their true identities from their communities every day.
06/27/07
- 8:00 pm
When director Judith Helfand's parents install vinyl siding on their house, she sets out with filmmaking partner Daniel B. Gold to find out the truth about the
toxic manufacture and corporate corruption behind a seemingly innocuous plastic product. From vinyl sided homes in suburban Long Island, to hushed cancer outbreaks in Louisiana and Venice, Italy, this vibrant exposé tracks vinyl's shocking history with willful irony and a healthy dose of humor.
05/30/07
- 8:00 pm
Walleyball: Yeah, Yeah. We Speak English. Just Serve.
Sit on the sidelines for cross-border volleyball game between team US and team Mexico.
Kirby Dick's film is an investigative documentary at its best. When the MPAA denied his team access to the inner-workings of the film ratings board, he hired a private investigator to uncover their process and their identities, in a humorous sleuth-style quest. Between raw interviews with filmmakers whose work has been unfairly rated and a bold exposé of the MPAA's ratings system, it's no wonder that this film is still not yet rated.
03/21/07
- 8:00 pm
Walleyball: Yeah, Yeah. We Speak English. Just Serve.
Sit on the sidelines for cross-border volleyball game between team US and team Mexico.
Kirby Dick's film is an investigative documentary at its best. When the MPAA denied his team access to the inner-workings of the film ratings board, he hired a private investigator to uncover their process and their identities, in a humorous sleuth-style quest. Between raw interviews with filmmakers whose work has been unfairly rated and a bold exposé of the MPAA's ratings system, it's no wonder that this film is still not yet rated.
02/28/07 - 8:00 pm
Fair Trade: The Story
This short documentary film circles the globe following the story of how your food gets from the source to your table through fair trade.
Interview with
Amartya Sen
Amartya Sen (Nobel Economics Prize, 1998), talks about the power of reason to solve our global problems of poverty and overpopulation.
Ethiopian coffee co-op manager Tadesse Meskela travels the world seeking fair trade policies for his growers in the exploding international coffee market.
01/25/07 - 8:00 pm
Interview with Jody Williams from “Nobelity”
Jody Williams (Nobel Peace Prize, 1997), founder of the International Campaign
to Ban Landmines, talks about the struggle and importance of taking action in the name of peace. This is the first in a series of interviews we’ll bring you
with Nobel Prize winners from the feature film “Nobelity”.
Beyond the Call
Three middle-aged men, former soldiers and modern-day knights, travel the world
delivering life-saving humanitarian aid to civilians and doctors in some of the
most dangerous yet beautiful places on Earth. As humanitarian renegades, this band of ordinary guys with extraordinary courage takes risks and bends rules in the name of making a difference.
12/15/06 - 8:00 pm
Ryan's Well
7-year-old Ryan Hreljac is called to action when he comes to learn that his pen pal Jimmy’s village in Uganda has no access to clean water. What starts with asking his mother for $70 to help build a well turns into a community effort to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars toward clean water in Africa. When Ryan visits Jimmy in Uganda, he comes to understand that his life and the lives of those he’s helped are changed forever.
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The Boys of Baraka
When twenty “at risk” 12-year-old boys attend an experimental boarding school in Kenya, East Africa, their goals, worldviews and hopes for the future are given a new path. When they return to inner-city Baltimore, however, they find that their past lives have not made room for their new dreams. This compelling documentary asks the most important question of all: Will these young people be able to bring positive change to their own lives and their communities?
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11/17/06 - 8:00 pm
Sir! No Sir!
Risk, passion, rage. These are the pillars of the GI antiwar movement that echo through this powerful documentary about the soldiers and veterans who worked to bring a message of peace to the public eye. Through interviews and extraordinary use of archival footage from the Vietnam era, director David Zeiger weaves together the engrossing tale of this overlooked moment in time. From mutiny and underground presses in the war zone to full scale protests at home, this collective portrait of the GI movement illustrates a forgotten story of dissent and commitment to peace.
(Also shown on 11/11/06 as part of the Veterans Day activities.)
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Night Visions
The old axiom, "war is hell," is particularly fitting when reflecting on the escalating violence of the Iraq War. Night Visions is a powerful look at one American soldier's experience, processing his memories and emotions before, during, and after his service. With an honest voice, this film expresses the conflicting feelings of one brave soldier. From the Media That Matters Film Festival 6.
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10/13/06 - 8:00 pm
How Democrats and Progressives Can Win: Solutions from George Lakoff
In this clear, how-to guide, U.C. Berkeley Professor of Linguistics George Lakoff outlines how Democrats and Progressives need to look at the world and frame their messages in order to be heard in the era of sound-bytes and catch phrases.
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American Blackout
This 2006 Sundance Film Festival winner takes a disturbing look at the ways in which the African-American vote has been manipulated and disenfranchised in American elections. From the outrageous maneuvers in Florida in 2000 to the Republican efforts to unseat controversial Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, it’s all too clear our “by the people, for the people” democracy is in jeopardy.
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09/22/06 - 8:00 pm
Live From Shiva's
Dance Floor
From the acclaimed indie-pioneer director of Slacker, Dazed and Confused, Waking Life, School of Rock, and A Scanner Darkly, Live from Shiva's Dance Floor is
a roving philosophical exploration of New York City told by the city's most
famous "cruiser," Timothy "Speed" Levitch.
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Genesis
Life is amazing - see for yourself. Genesis takes a mystical, beautiful look at the life cycles on Planet Earth, from beginning to end and in between. Claude Nuridsanay and Marie Perennou, creators of Microcosmos, combine ingenious footage, a wise African narrator, an eclectic score, and all creatures great and small to create a special film that captivates kids and adults alike.
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08/12/06 - 7:45 pm
Shakespeare Behind Bars
Shakespeare Behind Bars follows an all-male Shakespeare company working behind bars at Kentucky’s Luther Luckett Correctional Complex. For one year a cast comprised of convicted felons rehearse and perform a full production of Shakespeare’s last play, The Tempest, a play fittingly about forgiveness.
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The Wildest Show in the South: The Angola
Prison Rodeo
This follow-up to the 1998 Oscar nominated doc "The Farm: Angola USA" tells the only story that couldn't be included in the original Angola documentary. Every Sunday in October, the Louisiana State Penitentiary hosts one of America's most unusual events. Amateur inmate cowboys risk their lives to participate in this dangerous sport in front of five thousand cheering locals. Is this modern-day Roman Circus, or the one time in the year that these convicts have the chance to prove their courage?
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07/13/06 - 8:00 pm
Private
A Palestinian family living between an Arab village and an Israeli settlement finds their house beseiged by the Israeli army. Rather than leave, the family stays confined to a few rooms, living as virtual prisoners in their own home. From beginning to end, Private, an Italian film shot in Calabria, is as tense and suspenseful as any Hollywood thriller. Saverio Costanzo’s gritty, urgent camera work gives the Palestinian-Israeli conflict a realistic, human face as the family and the soldiers co-exist uneasily, both sides questioning the point of their actions. Private was Italy’s submission for the 2005 Academy Awards’ Best Foreign Film, but was disqualified because it is performed in Arabic, Hebrew, and English, but not Italian.
06/23/06 - 8:00 pm
The Education
of Shelby Knox
Lubbock, Texas has an abstinence-only sex education policy in its schools—and some of the highest teen pregnancy and STD infection rates in the nation. Shelby Knox is a Lubbock high school student, a good Baptist girl—and the most outspoken advocate of sex education in town. The Education of Shelby Knox (76 min) follows Shelby for three years as she grows into her own beliefs, which increasingly differ from those of her family, church, and community. Marion Lipschutz and Rose Rosenblatt provide a fascinating look at a culture and issues that upon first look can only be seen in Blue and Red, but where with closer scrutiny the color lines begin to bleed. Shelby Knox received the Sundance Film Festival Award for Best Cinematography and the Audience Award at the SXSW Film Festival.
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05/26/06 - 8:00 pm
Street Fight
The gloves come off in Marshall Curry's Oscar-nominated documentary chronicling the 2002 mayoral race in Newark, New Jersey. Incumbent Sharpe James and challenger Cory Booker are both African American and both Democrats, but the similarities end there. James is a Rolls-Royce-driving, homegrown, streetwise politician running for a fifth term; Booker is a 32-year-old newcomer, a city supervisor and Rhodes Scholar with degrees from Stanford and Yale who lives in public housing to stay real with his constituency.
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04/19/06 - 8:00 pm
Salt of the Earth
This 1954 classic independent film, the only banned film in American
history, is as famous for the events surrounding it as for its radical ideas.
Salt of the Earth (94 min), based on real events surrounding a zinc miners’
strike in New Mexico, was filmed against opposition from the government and the
movie industry by a group of blacklisted filmmakers, including Herbert J. Biberman
of the Hollywood Ten, Paul Jarrico, and Michael Wilson.
Salt of the Earth is a landmark film, one of 100 American films chosen to be
preserved by the Library of Congress, a film as relevant today as it was 50 years
ago.
The evening will start with a short film: Something Other Than Other (9 min).
Filmmakers and new parents Jerry and Andrea talk about discrimination, their
multiracial son and their dream of an identity for him beyond the "Other" check
box.
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03/30/06 - 8:00 pm
Seoul Train
Seoul Train is an emotionally wrenching look at a heroic Underground Railroad, an international band of activists who risk their own lives to lead North Korean refugees out of China and into countries that will give them asylum. The film's haunting verite' footage follows groups of refugees and their escorts through safe houses and covert routes to uncertain fates. Seoul Train spotlights a harrowing and potentially explosive human rights crisis where, in the absence of news coverage and international humanitarian aid, a small group works to make a big difference in the lives of desperate refugees.
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North Korea:
A Day in the Life
If the cityscapes and patriotic anthems of this film seem a far cry from the bleak landscape of Seoul Train, that's no accident. Dutch filmmaker Pieter Fleury, with the full permission and cooperation of the North Korean government, created this propaganda film that gives us a glimpse of a day in the life of one of the world's most enigmatic societies. A Day in the Life, largely dictated by the North Korean film bureau, follows a typical North Korean family through their daily duties, largely dedicated to the pride in the North Korean nation of comrades and the glory of General Kim Jong Il. The film is meant to extol the success of modern North Korea. But does it? With straight footage and a total absence of narration, viewers may interpret Fleury's film in a slightly different manner than intended.
02/17/06 - 8:00 pm
Wetback:
The Undocumented Documentary
Wetback, directed by Arturo Perez Torres, follows several immigrants on their dangerous journey from Central America and Mexico to the United States. From the director, “The intention of this documentary is to put a human face on illegal immigration and to reposition the journey of the “wetback” as what it also is: an act of freedom and bravery."
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Program Overview
Ironweed was launched by Act Now Productions, which, since 1997, has been producing and distributing socially-conscious media out of the sunnier parts of San Francisco. Founded by Adam Werbach, who was elected national president of the Sierra Club when he was an unrepentantly idealistic 23 year old, Act Now produces media, helps non-profits communicate their missions, and distributes films.
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Ironweed Film Club
Ironweed is an online subscription film club. The Studio@620 Ironweed Film Club chapter shows these films in a friendly relax environment in downtown St.Petersburg. For more information or to join The Studio@620 Ironweed Film Club email mailing list contact:
Admission
General
$5
The Studio@620 Members (with tickets).
Free
Free popcorn.
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