Rooftop Films New York
Date: May 19th, 2009, 9 p.m.
Location: Reformed Church [Info]
Tickets: EUR 7,- (regular), EUR 6,- (concessions)
Rooftop Films (NYC) presents short comedies, documentaries, found footage and animation by and about immigrants in America. Curated by Mark Elijah Rosenberg (Founder and Artistic Director, ROOFTOP FILMS) for the 2009 Vienna Independent Shorts Film Festival.
Your Huddled Masses
At the base of the Statue of Liberty—visible from our screening venues on New York City rooftops—there is an inscription: "Give me your tired, your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…" America is a nation of immigrants, but the immigrant life is rarely easy. In this program, immigrants to (and from) America are lonely and ostracized, and deal with it through internet personals and Burger King. They are burdened by a need to fit in, and a desire to remain true to their heritage. These films are funny and strange, real and fictional, moving and inspiring. They are as diverse as America itself, but maintain a personal view of the political which is uniquely American. (Mark Elijah Rosenberg, Rooftop Films)
www.rooftopfilms.com
Are You Feeling Lonely?
USA 2003, 14 min
director, screenplay: Rosario García-Montero | photography: Christopher Bottoms | editor: Veronica Trelles | music: Burd Early | cast: Jesica Chaos, Pashupathi Ganeshan
García-Montero, who was raised in Peru, creates a garish and lovely character study about an isolated immigrant mortician. The spooky rants and misdirected attempts at friendship fall somewhere between Andy Kaufman and Travis Bickle.
Moonraker
USA 2004, 3 min
director: Fran Krause
Another beautiful and mysteriously amusing short from Fran Krause about a content but lonely astronaut stranded on a haunted moon. This is a startlingly funny and poignant film about exploration, honing in on how humanity affects the universe with our seemingly harmless intrepid investigations. The moon is watching.
A Son's Sacrifice
USA 2006, 26 min
director: Yoni Brook
27-year-old Imran, a former advertising executive, is taking over a very different kind of family business—a traditional Muslim slaughterhouse in New York City. But his father's demands and the community doubts may prove too much for him. On the holiest day of the year, Imran must lead a sacrifice that will define him as a Muslim, as an American, and as a son.
INTERMISSION
A Valentine to Perfect Strangers
USA, 5 min
director: Ben Coonley
Otto, a feral cat from Brooklyn, has created a postmodern pastiche for you, stranger, based on the 1980s American hit immigration sitcom, Perfect Strangers.
The European Kid
USA 2006, 23 min
director: Ian Martin | screeplay: Erik Johnson, Ian Martin | production: Ian Martin, Suzanne Todd | photography: Matt Egan | editor: Kipp Norman | music: Cory Hills | cast: Joseph Lazicki, Joey M. Baren, John Cates, Katy Colloton, Ben Grinnell
One night, the European kid turns up unexpectedly and wrecks havoc on all the relationships in the house. A comedy about our perception of outsiders.
My Father’s Lunch
USA, 7 min
director: Tony Mendoza
Tony’s father settles into America with a ritual, and proves that you can stake a claim to individuality and American-ness by doing the same thing every day for 25 years. Some of the great moments in videography come about when you set off to record a ritual that hasn't changed in decades only to find that you have recorded an epochal shift and that nothing will ever be as it was. And then you have to go to McDonalds.
Paris, 1951
USA, 10 min
director: Jasmin Gordon
"Forty years after my grandfather's death, my mother discovered that the man who raised her was not her father. This short film is a meditation on the process of reinterpreting personal history and the challenge of recollecting the past in the absence of all images and objects." - Jasmin Gordon
- Rooftop Films in New York City