Welcome back, friends, to the cinefiles! I hope you got a chance to see tons of films over our long winter break, especially after all your high school friends went back to school three weeks before you did. We’ve got a great week ahead on the series, with three (three!) documentaries of wildly diverse styles, and a little obscure animated film from this up-and-comer studio Disney we think ten or twelve of you might like…
THE BLACK POWER MIX TAPE 1967 – 1975
2011. Sweden. Dir: Goran Olson. Documentary. 100 min. 8pm.
WEDNESDAY, February 1, 8 p.m. $5
Much like Nicholas Winding Refn’s “Drive” is a Danish love-letter to L.A., Goran Olson’s “The Black Power Mix Tape” takes a famous, though often overlooked, period in U.S. history and uses an outsider’s perspective to make it both fresh and familiar. Olson mixes retrospective looks at the movement—including musicians Erykah Badu and ?uestlove, among others—with archival Swedish news coverage and interviews from 1967–1975. It’s as much a feat of editing as anything else that the film, illuminating as it is, finally leaves you in a space between tracks, wondering how much has really changed.
DOLPHIN BOY
2011. Israel. Dir: Dani Menkin. Documentary. 72 min.
THURSDAY, February 2, 8 p.m. FREE.
OK, so which of these doesn’t sound like the others: a tale of healing, the Red Sea, true story, or Spinner dolphins? The “Dolphin Boy” doc line might throw you, but Dolphin healing is actually a real thing, and the film, which charts Morad’s interaction with our Delphinidae cousins, is also a real thing: it shows the tremendous and magical power we have to destroy and/or rebuild ourselves, without contrived happy endings or feel-good movie clichés. The director, Dani Menkin, will be on hand to speak after the film.
THE LION KING
1994. USA. Dir: Roger Allers, Rob Minkoff. Animated. 89 min
FRIDAY, February 3, 8 p.m. $5
“The Lion King” was made at the peak of Disney’s golden age and tends to compete with “Beauty and the Beast” on lists of most beloved animated classics. Y’all already know this screening will be a 400-person sing-a-long (arrive early), but here are some fun facts you can spring on your friends while getting your seats:
-The song “Hakuna Matata” wasn’t in the original script
-The official story from Disney about the infamous subliminal message in the scene where dust in the night sky spells out the word “SEX” is that it actually spells out “SFX” and was put in by the effects team. See what you spot for yourself.
-While it’s been eclipsed by CG films in terms of highest gross in the US, “The Lion King” is still the top grossing hand-drawn animated film of all time.
2005. Germany. Dir: Philip Groning. Documentary. 169 min.
SATURDAY, February 4, 8 p.m., FREE
This isn’t a documentary about monks. It’s not. That synopsis you read while googling the run-time is wrong. This film is about capturing the experience of a life lived unhurriedly and free from fear. It’s about serenity, with lots of gorgeous French mountains and gothic architecture added in for good measure. It took Groning 16 years to get permission to shoot footage in the Grand Chartreuse monastery, and the resulting film is truly a portal into a fascinating and alien world. There will be a post-film Q&A with History Prof. William Johnston and Catholic Chaplain Father Hal.
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