Date: Wednesday, February 18, 2015
Time: 7:30 to 10 pm
Venue: Theatre 80 St. Mark’s (80 St Marks Pl New York, NY 10003)
Ticket: free
Tonight is the New York premier screening of Thomas Carillon’s Djuke with On Ka’a. A documentary film that explores the world of East Village musician, artist and ex-squatter activist On Ka’a Davis….the opener for djuke music!!
Photo courtesy of Raga Revelry
Date: November 21, 2014
Venue: Chhandayan Center (NY)
Review by Dawoud Kringle
On Saturday, November 21st a pre-release showing of the documentary Raga Revelry was presented in public for the first time at Chhandayan Center. Directed by Mahesh Nair, and produced by Shreedevi Thacker, the film easily succeeded in the herculean task of taking the music and tradition of Indian Raga, and presenting it in a two-hour documentary; like distilling the essence of an enormous garden into a vial of perfume.
Venues: AMC Empire (234 42nd Street, NY 10002) & Landmark Sunshine (143 E Houston Street, NY 10002)
Date: September 26, 2014
Ticket Phones: AMC Empire: 212-398-2597 & Landmark Sunshine: 212-260-7289
When filmgoers watch JIMI: All is By My Side, which opens on September 26 in 16 American cities, they will explore musical and narrative nuances rarely discussed in conversations about Jimi Hendrix’s career. The film, which stars André Benjamin (Outkast) and Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later), was written by Oscar-winner and directed by John Ridley (12 Years a Slave). Ridley tapped Grammy-award-winning music producer Danny Bramson (Almost Famous, Lord of the Rings) as producer and music designer and the two of them fastidiously interpreted the soundscape of the era in a way that will tickle music buffs of the period.
“The film takes place in that lost or underserved year in Jimi’s life,” explains Bramson. “We were well aware of the Hendrix Estate’s long standing reluctance to allow any of Jimi’s original songs for an unauthorized Hendrix themed film. Thus, we never sought out Jimi’s hits that came once he departed Heathrow for the Monterey Pop Festival. The musically fertile environment of John Ridley’s story allowed me to interpret Jimi’s development from playing second lead guitar with Curtis Knight in New York then forming his first group and gigging afternoon performances at the Café Wha?, onto his arrival in London at the height of it’s musical enthrallment with the indigenous American Blues. With the Hendrix standard songs out of the equation, we chose a musical design as an interpretation of Jimi’s development as a guitarist principally, and the English musical and cultural zeitgeist that informed, inspired, and propelled him. The creative challenge was staggering, underscored with the incessant personal responsibility to get it right.”
Date: August 12 through August 15, 2014
Theater: Lincoln Plaza Cinemas (1886 Broadway, 212- 757-0359)
Mitra Farahani’s lyrical documentary explores the enigma of provocative artist Bahman Mohassess, the so-called “Persian Picasso,” whose acclaimed paintings and sculptures dominated pre-revolutionary Iran. Irreverent and uncompromising, a gay man in a hostile world, Mohassess had a conflicted relationship with his homeland—revered by elites in the art scene and praised as a national icon, only to be censored later by an oppressive regime. Known for his iconoclastic art as well as his scathing declarations, Mohasses abandoned the country over 30 years ago for a simple, secluded life in Italy.
Date: Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Time: 7pm to 9pm
Venue: Anthology Film Archives (32 Second Ave, New York, NY 10003)
Ticket: $10
Every last Wednesday of every month, Docunight will screen a documentary about, around, in, made by Iran or Iranians. The screenings will take place on the same night across several cities, including San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Toronto, Dubai, New York (the list of locations is growing). Docunight films will be diverse in subject and will run the gamut. All films will have English subtitles. Tomorrow they will feature Mehran Tamadon‘s Bassidji.
