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Doc WatchersPresents: The African Film Festival

In partnership with Doc Watchers and The New York African Film Festival, Maysles Cinema will be showing a selection of short and feature length African films from Friday, May 4th through Sunday, May 6th.

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                     African Film festival

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Street ViewsCo-curated by Paul Dallas & Anthony Titus April 3rd, 5th, 10th, 24th and 25th at 7:30pmExploring our connection to the built environment through documentaries, narratives and experimental works.About the curators of Street Views: Paul Dallas studied architecture at The Cooper Union and filmmaking at the Art Institute of Chicago. Paul was a 2008 Schindler Architecture Fellow at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture in Los Angeles where he spent six months developing a mobile sculpture that travelled from Hollywood Blvd to the US-Mexico border. In 2011, Paul worked as the film programmer for the BMW Guggenheim Lab, an event space in downtown Manhattan that served as a place for public engagement on issues related to sustainability, community and the future of cities. Highlights included a panel discussion with key figures in the No Wave scene, a talk about the future of the American city by David Simon (The Wire), a special presentation by filmmaker Charlie Ahearn (Wildstyle) and an evening of short films curated for the Lab by Red Bucket Films (Daddy Longlegs). Anthony Titus is the founder of Anthony Titus Studio, an interdisciplinary practice based in New York City. His studio has been a laboratory for the exploration of ideas related to the contemporary practices of art and architecture. Over the past decade the studio has been responsible for numerous experimental projects, including built works, site- specific installations and exhibitions of paintings and sculptures. Over the past decade, Anthony Titus has taught architecture at numerous schools including The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science & Art and Pratt Institute. In addition to serving as a member of the faculty of these institutions, he has served as a guest lecturer and critic at institutions throughout the United States, including Cornell University, Columbia University, The New School for Social Research, Yale University, Art Center and SCI-Arc. Titus currently holds the position of Associate Professor, within the School of Architecture at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
“What do we do now?” Sing Your Song Susanne Rostock, 2011, 104 min. With remarkable intimacy, visual style, and musical panache Sing Your Song, surveys the inspiring life of singer, actor, and activist Harry Belafonte. From his rise to fame as a singer and his experiences touring a segregated country, to his crossover into Hollywood, Belafonte’s groundbreaking career personifies the American civil rights movement. Rostock reveals Belafonte to be a tenacious activist, who worked intimately with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., mobilized celebrities for social justice, participated in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, and took action to counter gang violence, prisons, and youth incarceration. Belafonte’s beliefs elicited unwarranted invasions by the FBI into both his personal life and career, leading to years of struggle with the powers that be. Nonetheless, an indomitable sense of optimism still motivates Belafonte, as he continues to ask, “What do we do now?”.
Every first Sunday of the month, Keeling Beckford of Keeling’s Reggae Music and Video shares his vast library of films, concerts and vintage dancehall parties. Box office open for advance ticket purchases Mon-Fri 12-6 & from 1 hour before until the end of all events. During these hours, knock on the window if door is locked. Only ticket holders arriving 15 minutes before showtime can be guaranteed a seat in the theater. Overflow seating available for sold out shows. Tickets $10 suggested donation, unless otherwise noted.Members only: Reserve your seat at reservations@mayslesinstitute.orgBecome a member> Hit Me With Music Miquel Galofre, 2011, 74 min. Sunday, Jan. 8th, 22nd & 29th

Docs in Theaters: Battle for Brooklyn

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This week’s Docs in Theaters post is a couple days late due to the holiday (I hope you all had a good one), but it’s better this way since the only new documentary opening in theaters is not actually released until Wednesday. If you’re in the NYC area, I highly recommend it. If you’re not, there’s always the docs continuing or expanding. See those below, and keep in mind that a number have recently been shortlisted for the Academy Award, namely Battle for Brooklyn (which has returned to cinemas), Bill Cunningham New York, Buck, Hell and Back Again, If a Tree Falls and We Were Here, which is also screening in many cities this Thursday for World AIDS Day.

Here is your one new theatrical release followed by the weekly list of docs still in cinemas:


Khodorkovsky

An extraordinary tale of the richest man in Russia, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who is presently serving time in a Siberian prison. Does he deserve to be there for alleged crimes of tax evasion and theft, or is he really a political prisoner due to his criticisms of Prime Minister Putin? Directed inquisitively by German filmmaker Cyril Tuschi, this doc is filled with recent history, intrigue and a bit of irony given these times of our typically considering billionaires to be the bad guys. It often plays like a complex political thriller, and it’s a great film to follow this year’s other important Putin-involved nonfiction film, A Bitter Taste of Freedom. If you need more proof that it’s a necessary doc, a print was stolen from Tuschi’s office just before its premiere at the Berlin Film Festival. Always see those films that a government is attempting to keep you from seeing.

Opens in NYC on Wednesday, November 30, at Film Forum. For upcoming openings in other cities, check the film’s playdates page.

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Trailer for Battle for Brooklyn

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From the victimless to the devastatingly brutal, crime is in New York City’s bloodstream. A meditation on the complexity of “true” crime in the rotten apple — from the Central Park Jogger Case to Giuliani Time, Bernie Goetz to Bernie Madoff. Ripped from the tabloid pages to the big screen, True Crime New York is a quarterly film, speaker and performance series. Tonight at Maysles Cinema: Month One Suki Hawley, Joanna Arnow, Michael Galinsky, 2011, 10 min. A short that gives a sense of the first month of Occupy Wall Street. Battle for Brooklyn Suki Hawley and Michael Galinsky, 2010, 93 min. Battle for Brooklyn is the epic and universal tale of one man under pressure, and how far he will go to save his community and his home from the private developers who want to build a basketball arena on top of it. Along the way, he loses a fiancée, falls in love again, gets married, and starts a family. Shot over the course of eight years and compiled from almost 500 hours of footage, Battle for Brooklyn is an intimate look at the very public and passionate fight waged by the Prospect Heights community to save their neighborhood from destruction. Daniel Goldstein spent five years carefully looking for the perfect apartment. Not long after he had begun to settle in, he was informed that he and his neighbors would be cleared out to make way for the Atlantic Yards development project. This massive plan to build a basketball arena for the New Jersey Nets, and 16 skyscrapers, had been arranged by a private developer. This company, Forest City Ratner, claimed that the building of Atlantic Yards would provide jobs and additional housing, and that the arrival of the New Jersey Nets would be important to the community.    In turn, Goldstein and a host of Brooklynites formed the group “Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn” to counter Ratner’s proposal and to expose misconceptions about the project. The effort to stop the project pits Goldstein and his neighbors against Ratner and an entourage of lawyers and public relations emissaries, the government, and those residents taken in by the promises of jobs, housing, and a basketball team on their turf. Focusing on the Goldstein’s struggle to save his property from becoming center court, the film tells a story of the infuriating erosion of individual rights in the interest of corporate concerns and political maneuvering. Q&A with Month One director Joanne Arnow, Dr. Mindy Fullilove, author of Root Shock: How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America and What We Can Do About It, and Develop Don’t Destroy’s Daniel Goldstein (and the subject of Battle for Brooklyn). Tickets

The Making of “What’s Happening”

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"As a documentarian I happily place my fate and faith in reality. It is my caretaker, the provider of subjects, themes, experiences – all endowed with the power of truth and the romance of discovery. And the closer I adhere to reality the more honest and authentic my tales. After all, the knowledge of the real world is exactly what we need to better understand and therefore possibly to love one another. It’s my way of making the world a better place."

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Albert Maysles (via juliakip)

Happy Birthday Albert!

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A Special Screening of What’s Happening! The Beatles in the USA In Honor of Al Maysles’ 85th Birthday!   What’s Happening! The Beatles in the USA Dir. Albert and David Maysles, 1964, 81 min. A humorous, freewheeling and candid account of The Beatles arrival in America in February 1964. The Maysles follow the Fab Four for five days, from the crazed JFK airport reception to unguarded moments inside the Plaza Hotel in preparation for their landmark Ed Sullivan Show appearance to their equally frenzied homecoming. Inspiring Richard Lester’s A Hard Day’s Night (1964), What’s Happening! The Beatles in the U.S.A. was subsequently rereleased by Apple Corps. in an edited version as The Beatles: The First US Visit (1999). Post Screening Q&A with Albert Maysles.