Indie Institution Tributes
Skylight
Director Pamela Yates
Creative Director Pamela Yates and Executive Director Paco de Onis will join us to celebrate 30 years of Skylight’s commitment to producing artistic, challenging, and socially relevant work. Skylight combines the storytelling arts with media strategies to strengthen human rights and seek justice around the world.
QUOTATION Pamela Yates
The Resistance Saga is a high-profile project designed to galvanize audiences to fight back when society is faced with authoritarianism and demagogues. The arts play a crucial role in creating, strengthening, and communicating narratives of nonviolent resistance. Indigenous peoples all over the Americas have set the example of long-term courage and strategic resistance against daunting odds.
Witness Guatemala’s indigenous Mayan population in its fight for self-determination over three decades in these three powerful documentaries:
The Resistance Saga
When the Mountains Tremble (1983)
Thursday, April 6, 3:30p, Friday, April 7, 12:30p, Sunday, April 9, 9:40a | Varsity
Granito: How to Nail a Dictator (2011)
Friday, April 7, 6:30p, Saturday, April 8, 12:30p, Sunday, April 9, 12:10p | Varsity
Saturday, April 8, 3:30p | Historic Ashland Armory
Friday, April 7, 10-11:30am | Ashland Springs Hotel
Zeitgeist Films
Nancy Gerstman, Co-Founder Zeitgeist Films
In 1988, Nancy Gerstman and Emily Russo, who had both worked for major distribution and exhibition companies such as Landmark Theatres and First Run Pictures, joined forces to launch their own company, Zeitgeist Films. They knew a few indie filmmakers personally, including Todd Haynes. Zeitgeist went on to be the first distribution company to release the first films by Haynes, Atom Egoyan, Christopher Nolan, Francois Ozon, The Quay Brothers, and Guy Maddin. Zeitgeist’s current roster of filmmakers and releases focuses on world cinema and documentaries and includes AIFF films Manufactured Landscapes (2007), Last Train Home (2010), and Court (Varsity World Film Week 2015). Six Zeitgeist films have been nominated for Academy Awards and one, Nowhere in Africa, won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Nancy Gerstman will join us for a screening of Zeitgeist’s latest documentary along with the film’s director, Daniel Raim.
Harold and Lillian: A Hollywood Love Story
Sunday, April 9, 9:30a | Historic Ashland Armory