The Rooftop Films 2008 Summer Series

Hear from a range of filmmakers about the craft and possibilities of the short film. On Saturday, June 14, in conjunction with IndiePix and Shooting People, Rooftop Films will host two panel discussions, on The Art of the Short Film and Cinema and Social Justice , bringing in filmmakers, programmers and funders to discuss issues that are crucial to Rooftop Films’ mission. THE ART OF THE SHORT FILM: The filmmakers on this panel work in animation, documentary, narrative and the hard-to-describe, and they will talk about what they do, why they do it and how they get it done. Get inspired by the sheer range and creativity of these amazing filmmakers. These filmmakers do not make shorts as calling-cards, they make them because they love to work within the limitations of the form. These are not shorts in search of a feature but films that you will fall in love with. Just as they are. Panelists include: Benh Zeitlin (Filmmaker, Glory at Sea); Duana Butler (Filmmaker, Curator of ReelNY); Signe Baumane (animator), and Casimir Nozkowski (the man who has shown more short films at Rooftop than any other). Ticket price includes admission to both two panel discussions ( The Art of the Short Films and Cinema and Social Justice ), a reception in the Old American Can Factory Courtyard with free wine courtesy of Brooklyn Oenology , and admission to the short film screening Industriance Shorts: Eminent Domain .  

Iranian-American filmmaker Marjan Tehrani chronicles her brother's return to Iran as he travels with his American wife to have a Persian wedding ceremony and explore his lost heritage. Special Note: The event has been rescheduled for this Sunday, Sept. 7, starting at 8 PM. *Venue: on the lawn at Firefighter's Field on Roosevelt Island *Directions: F train or the tram to Roosevelt Island. Please note this MTA advisory : if coming from Manhattan, you must take either the Tram or take the F train to Roosevelt Avenue and then come back 3 stops to Roosevelt Island. Once on the island, walk South (if coming from subway) or North (if coming from Tram) to East Rd. Walk East on East Rd to the field and you will see our screen set up. MAP Rain: In the event of rain the show will be held the next day, September 7th, at the same location. 8:30PM: Live Music 9:00PM: Films Admission: FREE! Preview: See short films from this and other programs at www.IFC.com Presented in partnership with: IFC.com , New York magazine , City Council Member Jessica Lappin & The New York City Council Manhattan Delegation & the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation PROGRAM NOTES: Arusi: Persian Wedding (Marjan Tehrani | New York, Iran | 1:02:00) Iranian-American filmmaker Marjan Tehrani chronicles her brother's return to Iran as he travels with his American wife to have a Persian wedding ceremony and explore his lost heritage. Using dynamic historical footage and weaving it with the couple's personal story, Arusi Persian Wedding explores the history and impact of the broken relationship between Iran and America. Behind the curtain of political tension, the film offers rare glimpses of both modern and traditional Iran, displaying a vibrant and complex country that is sealed off to much of the West. Brooklyn filmmaker Marjan Tehrani and her brother Alex were born in America to Iranian parents in the mid 1970’s. They grew up in the U.S. during the Iranian Islamic Revolution, when the Shah was expelled and anti-American sentiment exploded to the surface, resulting in the infamous hostage crisis of 1979 and setting in motion decades of miscommunication, threats and vitriol between Americans and Iranians. Some of their earliest memories of “being Iranian-Americans” involve their classmates and schoolyard bullies acting out the aggressions of their angry and misinformed parents. Marjan and Alex’s father had a deep love for his country but had emigrated to the U.S. in the 1970’s to find his fortune. But following the revolution, complications with visas prevented him from bringing his children with him on his frequent return trips to Iran. But in 2005, in the midst of the Iraq war, Alex and his American wife Heather announced that they were going to journey to Iran to have a traditional Persian wedding--an Arusi. Marjan immediately knew it was time for her to return to her native country to document this very relevant and personal story. Her father had hoped his whole life that his children would return to Iran as adults and experience the country as it really is—poetic, complex, beautiful and dramatic—and now they would all return together for a huge family reunion and a traditional celebration in their home town. Of course, it would not be so simple as that. Heather’s parents are born again Christians, very patriotic, and deeply mistrustful of Muslim culture in general, so much so that her father fails to make a distinction between Iran and Iraq, despite the fact that the two nations have been in a perpetual state of conflict for decades. The matter was made that much more complicated when Heather’s parents realized that she would have to convert to Islam in order to get a visa to travel with her new husband to Iran. Alex and Heather’s young union consists of some strange trials, including quite vocal conflicts between the couple’s families, the nearly surreal obligatory marriage negotiations they must perform in the company of an imam in the U.S., and the complications involved in traveling to a Muslim nation in the middle of the war. Tehrani’s film is many things at once, simultaneously telling the story of a couple in love, of a family being reunited, and of a country at odds with itself and the world. Iran itself is a character in the story, a proud figure looming over every scene, but once the Tehrani’s make it to Iran, the shadow this character casts is a surprisingly soothing shade against the glare of inflammatory rhetoric and prejudice. After seeing dozens of Iranians encircle Alex and Heather in a Park in Tehran to wish the young couple good luck, it is impossible to think of the conflict in the region in the same way again. Preceded by: The Tourists (Malcolm Sutherland | Montreal | 3:00) Another transient day at the beach. A l’ombre du voile (The Shadow of the Veil) (Arnaud Demuynck | Belgium | 9:00) An elegantly animated alternative view of life as it is seen from behind the veil. A Different Color Blue (Melanie Levy | Palo Alto, CA | 4:00) Meet Charles Curtis Blackwell -- poet, artist and activist who, at the age of 20, lost his eyesight. Despite being unable to see fully, he continues to work through visual medium, creating pieces of beauty and remarkable spirit. www.adifferentcolorblue.com Click on the films below to read descriptions, rate them, add them to your calendar, and more.

Sat., May 31 Venue: on the lawn at Fort Greene Park, Brooklyn Directions: B/D/M/N/Q/R to DeKalb or C/G to Fulton / Lafayette. Enter park at Myrtle Ave. & Washington Park. Rain Date: Sun., June 1 (check rooftopfilms.com or call 718-417-7362 for updates) 9:00PM: Films Q&A with filmmakers Steve James & Peter Gilbert after the screening Tickets: Free! Presented in partnership with: IFC.com, New York magazine, Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn Partnership & Council Member Letitia James IFC and Rooftop Films Present At the Death House Door (Steve James & Peter Gilbert | Huntsville, TX | 1:38:00) Pastor Carroll Pickett oversaw 95 executions at a Texas prison, but the experiences changed his views forever. The makers of “Hoop Dreams” examine this contentious issue through the story of this unique anti-death penalty activist. Carroll Pickett was a pastor in Huntsville, TX—a place best known for its many prisons and high number of executions—when two of his parishioners were taken hostage in an infamous prison riot in 1974. He was called in to try to broker peace, but his friends were eventually killed, and Pickett vowed to never return to that prison. But years later, the prison asked him to become the chaplain, and he thought he could do some valuable work for the people there. Indeed he did, until suddenly his job description changed, and he was asked to be the minister presiding over executions. He would spend all day with the condemned, getting to know them, listening to their fears, concerns and confessions, and aiding any of their last wishes. Pickett agreed in principal with the death penalty, but he certainly had trepidation about the burden of task. Over 15 years, he was at 95 executions, each a fascinating story. And over those years, Pickett's opinion of the death penalty changed completely. "At the Death House Door," directed by Steve James and Peter Glibert (the director and producers of “Hoop Dreams”), is a gripping, fascinating, powerful film about Pickett, about a wrongly-executed man named Carlos De Luna and his family, and about the tragic moral mistake that is the death penalty. Pickett's character unfolds with a stately grace. Being an old-fashioned Texan, he's reluctant to reveal his emotions, a trait which only makes them burn with more ferocity as you see them shine through, as you watch an amazing evolution of a man's feelings and ideology. It’s a rare and stunning transformation to see in a documentary, or in life in general. After every execution, Pickett recorded an audio diary of what happened and what he was thinking and feeling. Until the documentary, not even his family knew these tapes existed, and watching Picket re-listening to them in the film is one of the most harrowing looks into man's soul that you’ll ever see. Finally, the execution of Hector De Luna, a man who Pickett suspected was innocent, is enough to set the ball in motion for Pickett to leave the prison and become an anti-death penalty activist. Emotionally, Pickett was verging on self-destruction. But he harnesses these core moral disturbances and uses them (and an array of factual evidence) to fight against the death penalty. He actively campaigns now, arguing that not only is the death penalty cruel and painful, not only are there irremediable mistakes made, not is the penalty ineffective as a criminal deterrent (there are hundreds more people on death row now than there were when it was reinstated 30 years ago), but it's a fundamentally immoral act, that's "not Christian, it's not American, and it's not Texan," a moral blight on our society which makes us weaker as a people. "I'm angry," says Rose De Luna, the sister of the wrongly-executed Hector De Luna. "Stay that way," Pickett says. ** Watch “At the Death House Door” on IFC! **

Baby Cakes profound thoughts are recorded in another day’s diary: a trip to the park with a bag of banana chowder, a search for wizard turds, and a glimpse of the Brain Fuckler, just fuckling the shit out of people’s brains.

A lovelorn baby Cakes tells his diary, “When I was around her, I felt like a goblin made entirely out of wicked genitals.” We ask: who hasn’t felt that way about their dad’s girlfriend? www.superdeluxe.com/sd/artist/brad_neely

Baby Cakes is the brainchild of Austin comic artist Brad Neely ("Washington," Rooftop 7/4/07). He (Baby Cakes, not Brad), is a 30-year-old man-child who lives with his dad and imagines role playing games with the booby bunny. You’ll be seeing a lot of the Baby of Cakes this summer at Rooftop, so remember that “I don’t care what you are selling, just don’t absent-heartedly give up on me because I am yelling.”

The perfect film for Rooftop’s unique brand of cinema, this lovely documentary traces the evolution and decline of a particularly American craft: the motion picture projectionist. Once considered the most important link in the movie production chain, the projectionist has slowly fallen prey to the advancements of technology. Behind the Glass captures the stories and lives of these invisible showmen and women before they are relegated to the history books.

She craves adventure. He wants to settle down. In order to win her over, he tries to do something spontaneous. But she knows that “Adventures are as common as rooftops.”

When technology and nature collide, Bob Leporati uses the ancient art of falconry to clear the runways of JFK.