Now Showing @ ALA Film Program
All films will be show in room 304C of the Anaheim Convention Center.
Saturday, June 23
8:00am - 10:00am: Pink Ribbons Inc.
The ubiquitous pink ribbons of breast cancer philanthropy - and the hand-in-hand marketing of brands and products associated with that philanthropy — permeates our culture, providing assurance that we are engaged in a successful battle against this insidious disease. But the campaign obscures the reality and facts of breast cancer – more and more women are diagnosed with breast cancer every year, and face the same treatment options they did 40 years ago. Yet women are also the most influential market group, buying 80 percent of consumer products and making most major household purchasing decisions. So then who really benefits from the pink ribbon campaigns — the cause or the company? And what if the very companies and products that profit from their association have actually contributed to the problem? In showing the real story of breast cancer and the lives of those who fight it, Pink Ribbons, Inc. reveals the co-opting of what marketing experts have labeled a "dream cause." Preview: http://firstrunfeatures.com/trailers_pinkribbonsinc.html
Running Time: 98 minutes
10:30am - Noon: Tony & Janina's American Wedding
Tony & Janina’s American Wedding follows a Chicago Polish family through decades of red tape navigating the U.S. immigration system. Breaking out of the negative media stereotype, this film tells the human rights story of post-9/11 America that every undocumented immigrant in the US faces today. The film became a clear agent for change and a breaking news story when the Wasilewski family was reunited in Chicago in August 2011.
Preview: http://tonyandjanina.com/
Running Time: 83 minutes
1:30pm - 3:00pm: Coexist
Join Filmmaker and Learning Director of award-winning documentary Coexist about reconciliation in post-genocide Rwanda. Participants will see film, explore interactive learning activities that foster social emotional and global awareness. Thousands of schools use Coexist to deepen student knowledge of genocide, colonialism, and how to counter bullying. Discounted resources for participants.
Preview: www.coexistdocumentary.org
Running Time: 47 minutes
3:00pm: Got Book? Auntie Helen's Gift of Books
GOT BOOK? profiles Helen Agcaoili Summers Brown, founder of the Filipino American Library. Auntie Helen, as she is widely known in the Los Angeles Filipino Community is interviewed by one of her sons, George Brown, tracing her upbringing in the Philippines as a mestiza (half Filipino and half Caucasian American). Reputedly the first Filipina to attend UCLA, Helen married her UCLA sweetheart, Bill Brown, became a teacher and raised a family. Her collection of Philippine books from her father became the basis of her dream, the Filipino American Library, a community based non-profit in the Los Angeles Historic Filipinotown district.
Preview: http://flashpoint-design.net/got-book/
Running Time: 8 minutes
4:00pm - 5:30pm: These Amazing Shadows
What do the films Casablanca, Blazing Saddles and West Side Story have in common? Besides being popular, they have also been deemed "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and listed on The National Film Registry. These Amazing Shadows tells the history and importance of the Registry, a roll call of American cinema treasures that reflects the diversity of film, and indeed the American experience itself. Co-directors Paul Mariano and Kurt Norton will attend the screening to introduce the film and hold a Q&A session after the screening.
Preview: www.theseamazingshadows.com
Running time: 88 minutes
Sunday, June 24
8:00am - 9:00am: Scrabylon
Scrabylon is an award-winning, critically-acclaimed documentary on the cutthroat world of tournament SCRABBLE®. Featuring the most fierce anagrammers, rack balancers, and bingo experts in competitive SCRABBLE®, Scrabylon delves deep into this sometimes wacky, sometimes odd, always compelling subculture. Shot primarily during the World SCRABBLE® Championships in Las Vegas, Scrabylon features players from around the globe and gives an up-close look at why people get so obsessed with that seemingly benign game played at countless kitchen tables. The glue between all these players is John D. Williams, Jr., the Executive Director of the National SCRABBLE® Association, who describes in great detail the quirks, strategies and personalities of this fascinating group of individuals.
Preview: www.Scrabylon.com
Running time: 50 minutes
9:00am - 10:00am: The Renaissance of Mata Ortiz
The amazing cross-cultural story of how an intrepid American adventurer and a brilliant, self-taught Mexican artist transformed a dying desert village into a home for world-class ceramics. The Renaissance of Mata Ortiz reveals how anthropologist Spencer MacCallum encouraged the self-taught budding master Juan Quezada to further innovate on the traditional designs of Paquimé ceramics, leading to the phenomenal and award-winning post-modern styles of younger artist Diego Valles. The film was just awarded Best Arts Film at the Sedona Film Festival.
Preview: www.MataOrtizMovie.com
Running time: 54 minutes
10:30am - Noon: Truth in Numbers: Everything according to Wikipedia
After viewing this provocative documentary, you will never look at Wikipedia the same way. Filmmakers Scott Glosserman and Nic Hill engagingly explore the cultural implications of one of the most traveled and referenced sites on the Internet.
Preview: http://truthinnumbersthemovie.com/
Running time: 85 minutes, followed by Q&A
1:30pm - 3:30pm: Islamic Art: Mirror of the Invisible World
Join the ALA Public Programs Office and the National Endowment for the Humanities for an advance screening of "Islamic Arts," which is set for broadcast on PBS affiliates beginning in July 2012. Narrated by Academy Award winning performer Susan Sarandon, this dazzling documentary reveals the variety and diversity of Islamic art. It provides a window into Islamic culture and brings broad insights to the enduring themes that have propelled human history and fueled the rise of world civilization over the centuries. Join us for an epic journey across nine countries and over 1,400 years of history, exploring the stories behind many great masterworks of Islamic Art and Architecture. A Q&A session with filmmakers and scholars will follow with information about how to receive a free copy of the film with public performance rights for your library. "Islamic Art" is being offered to libraries as part of the NEH's "Bridging Cultures Bookshelf on Muslim Journeys" grand initiative. For details, see www.ala.org/programming/muslimjourneys
Speakers: Karen Kenton, Senior Program Officer, Division of Public Programs, National Endowment for the Humanities, Daniel Tutt, Outreach Director, Unity Productions Foundation
Preview: http://www.upf.tv/films-menu/upf-islamic-art-film.html
Running time: 90 minutes
4:00pm - 5:30pm: Hey, Boo: Harper Lee and To Kill a Mockingbird
After more than half a century, To Kill a Mockingbird remains a beloved bestseller and quite possibly the most influential American novel of the 20th Century. Nearly one million copies are sold each year and the novel has been translated into more than forty languages. The film version, starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch, won a trio of Academy Awards. Behind it all was a young Southern girl named Nelle Harper Lee, who once said that all she wanted to be is the Jane Austen of South Alabama. Hey, Boo explores Lee's life and unravels some of the mysteries surrounding her, including why she never published again. Containing never-before-seen photos and letters and a rare interview with Lee's sister, Alice Finch Lee, the film also brings to light the context and history of the novel's setting in the Deep South and the social changes it inspired.
Preview: http://firstrunfeatures.com/heyboodvd.html
Running time: 82 minutes
8:00pm - 10:00pm: Fahrenheit 451
Fahrenheit 451 - Francois Truffault got the honor of filming this 1966 adaptation of Ray Bradbury's classic dystopian novel, starring Julie Christie and Oskar Werner. Set in a world of massive censorship and hyper surveillance, Fahrenheit 451 never ceases to be provocative in any of its forms. To be followed by a discussion of the film, the book, and the continued relevance of Bradbury's vision. Sponsored by the Office for Intellectual Freedom and the IFLA Committee on Freedom of Access to Information and Freedom of Expression (FAIFE), part of the FAIFE Book Club series of events. http://faifebookclub.ala.org/
Running time: 112 minutes
Monday, June 25
8:00am - 10:00am: The Pruitt-Igoe Myth: An Urban History
Destroyed in a dramatic and highly-publicized implosion, the Pruitt-Igoe public housing complex has become a widespread symbol of failure amongst architects, politicians and policy makers. The Pruitt-Igoe Myth explores the social, economic and legislative issues that led to the decline of conventional public housing in America, and the city centers in which they resided, while tracing the personal and poignant narratives of several of the project's residents. In the post-War years, the American city changed in ways that made it unrecognizable from a generation earlier, privileging some and leaving others in its wake.
Preview: www.pruitt-igoe.com
Running time: 83 minutes
10:30am - Noon: Wikileaks: Secrets and Lies
Wikileaks: Secrets and Lies - Does Wikileaks represent the freedom of information or a violation of information ethics? Is Julian Assange a folk hero or a security threat? Is he a rapist, or the target of a character assassination plot? And what of the ongoing treatment of American leaker Bradley Manning? Direct from its screening at SXSW, this documentary is a definitive factual account of the 2010 Wikileaks controversy, featuring the first televised interview of Assange. The screening will be followed by an open discussion. Sponsored by the Intellectual Freedom Committee and the ALA Committee on Legislation.
Running time: 76 minutes
1:30pm - 3:30pm: Surviving Progress
Technological advancement, economic development, population increase - are they signs of a thriving society? Or too much of a good thing? Based on the best-selling book A Short History of Progress, this provocative documentary explores the concept of progress in our modern world, guiding us through a sweeping but detailed survey of the major "progress traps" facing our civilization in the arenas of technology, economics, consumption, and the environment. Featuring powerful arguments from such visionaries as Jane Goodall, Margaret Atwood, Stephen Hawking, Craig Venter, Robert Wright, Michael Hudson, and Ronald Wright, this enlightening and visually spectacular film invites us to contemplate the progress traps that destroyed past civilizations and that lie treacherously embedded in our own. Leading critics of Wall Street, cognitive psychologists, and ecologists lay bare the consequences of progress-as-usual as the film travels around the world - from a burgeoning China to the disappearing rainforests of Brazil to a chimp research lab in New Iberia, Louisiana - to construct a shocking overview of the way our global economic system is eating away at our planet's resources and shackling entire populations with poverty. Providing an honest look at the risks and pitfalls of running 21st Century "software" (our accumulated knowledge) on 50,000-year-old "hardware" (our primate brains), Surviving Progress offers a challenge: to prove making apes smarter was not an evolutionary dead end. Preview: http://firstrunfeatures.com/trailers_survivingprogress.html
Run time: 86 minutes
4:00pm - 5:00pm: GIRLS ON THE WALL
GIRLS ON THE WALL is an Emmy Award-winning documentary which follows group of incarcerated teenage girls who get a shot at redemption in a most unlikely form: a musical based on their lives. As they write and stage their play, the girls must re-live their crimes, reclaim their humanity, and take a first step toward breaking free of the prison system.
For more information on our ITVS Community Classroom teaching modules, Women and Girls Lead, please visit this link: http://www.itvs.org/educators/collections/women-girls-and-the-criminal-justice-system
We've been awarded an outreach grant from The Fledgling Fund, whose mission is to "improve the lives of vulnerable individuals, families, and communities by supporting innovative media projects that target entrenched social problems," and it is our goal to get it in front of as many librarians (of all stripes) as is humanly possible as this funding will run out in late September.
Preview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9QsEj3KPAoFor
Run time: 62 minutes
