The Rooftop Films 2008 Summer Series

This thought-provoking narrative short is part of “The Americana Project,” a collaborative film that explores the various shades of the American identity from a global perspective. This prototypically New York interaction—between a foreign cabdriver and a harried American—follows some unexpected lines of discussion. (http://www.theamericanaproject.com/)

London (like many modern metropolises, as observed from our very rooftop) is a city in constant transformation—its skyline animated by “a ballet of cranes.” This gorgeous documentary traces those changes from the unique vantage of those at the top, while also exploring the impact of these powerful man-made structures on the drivers who operate them and spend most of their lives removed from the world they are building?

The music of flowers, bugs and leaves.

This gorgeous documentary witnesses that as one part of China builds rapidly, another part of China is torn down just as fast.

The beauty and melancholy of Latin America are intertwined in documentaries from Colombia and Peru. Venue: on the roof of El Museo Del Barrio Address: 1230 Fifth Avenue @ 104th Street (East Harlem) Directions: 6 to 103rd St. or 2/3 to 110th St. Rain: In the event of rain the show will be held indoors at the same location 8:00PM: Doors open 8:30PM: Sound Fix presents live music by Yerbbauena 9:00PM: Films Presented in partnership with: IFC.com , New York magazine , and El Museo del Barrio PROGRAM NOTES: La Corona y Alguna Tristeza (Short Films) Rooftop Films organized the first ever screenings on the roof of El Museo Del Barrio in 2007 and we are proud to return there this summer to present three more screenings atop their beautiful building. Since its founding in 1969, El Museo del Barrio has evolved into New York’s leading Latino cultural institution, having expanded its mission to represent the diversity of art and culture in all of the Caribbean and Latin America. Befitting the location, all of our shows at El Museo Del Barrio will highlight the work being done by Latino filmmakers and artists as well as issues relating to life in and around El Barrio. On July 11th, we will be presenting two profound and accomplished documentaries that display the alternately wistful and enthusiastic dreams of a few troubled citizens of Latin America. For better and for worse, the varied peoples of Latin America are bound by a common, turbulent history—that of colonization by the nations of Europe and cynical manipulation by the United States, twin afflictions which have stymied national and class unity and interfered with the potential for the men and women of the region to take pride in their lives and culture. Both of the documentaries in this program speak to these imprisoned hopes in different, but equally beautiful and uplifting ways: one is a brilliantly poetic sketchbook and travelogue about a trip through the mountains of Peru; the other an inverted success story about an annual beauty pageant in one of Colombia’s women prisons. The producers of these two films do not attempt to offer answers or propose solutions to the regions myriad problems, but neither do they exhibit lack of hope for the future. In the end, the willfulness of the subjects and the sheer beauty of these works make the same case for optimism: even in times of despair, we contain within ourselves the capacity to find some kind of loveliness within the struggle. Click on the films below to read descriptions, rate them, add them to your calendar, etc.

A visual exploration of generosity and addiction. Tony Gault returns to Rooftop, using old answering machine tapes and home movie footage to decipher his brother’s serenely troubled life.

Using brilliant and elliptical visual rhymes, startling audio cues, and seemingly disassociated images, Isabelle Prim creates a sense of dread and paranoia, yet also a propulsive energy and a sense of perpetual anticipation.

The contestants are accused murderers, guerrillas, and thieves. The winner will be crowned Queen, but she won't be invited on a press tour as a role model for young girls. Instead, she will be escorted back to her cell. Nominated for an Academy Award, La Corona documents the boisterous annual beauty pageants in El Buen Pastor, a women’s prison in Colombia. Every year the prison administration allows the various cellblocks to nominate one woman to represent them in the prison-wide competition, and the ensuing spectacle is so ostentatiously festive and irresistibly colorful that it is even covered by the national media. Colombian-born filmmaker Isabel Vega read about the pageants in an article and soon teamed with long-time collaborator Amanda Micheli to capture the uniquely Colombian event. Despite difficulties working with the warden, the filmmakers succeed in capturing the spirit of the affair and glimpses of the contestants’ complex motivations. Despite their hardships, the women rally around their nominees and show intense pride and loyalty to their cellblock communities, even in defeat.

Paralleling changes in the city of Philadelphia with those in her own life, Iranian-American filmmaker Sara Zia Ebrahimi explores her experiences living as an urban nomad, migrant and immigrant in the post-industrial landscape of Philadelphia neighborhoods.