DocuClub in January: Wednesday, January 28, 7 p.m.
Our DocuClub for January screening will take place on Wednesday, January 28, 7 p.m., at The Tank, located at 354 West 45th Street (between 8th and 9th Avenues, near Times Square).
Our moderator will be independent producer, writer, and non-fiction filmmaker Pamela Cohn. She is currently researching and writing a book on international female non-fiction filmmakers, and covers nonfiction film festivals and blogs on non-fiction filmmaking at Still in Motion and other arts, media and film sites.
We will screen "The Hand of Fatima" by Augusta Palmer. A family road trip through rock history to the square root of the blues, this poetic documentary follows filmmaker and new mother Palmer from Mississippi to Morocco on a search for her rock critic father's ideal mystical family, the Master Musicians of Jajouka. Animated sequences based on the late Robert Palmer's writing for Rolling Stone lead his estranged daughter to the people William Burroughs called "the world's only 4000 year-old rock band." Encounters with Yoko Ono, Donovan, Anthony DeCurtis, and the elder Palmer's four wives pepper a journey that ends with The Master Musicians' indelible performances in their own village. These performances enable the filmmaker to read the truth between the lines of her father's mystical journey and to make peace with his all-consuming need for musical transcendence.
Augusta Palmer (Director, Writer) holds a Ph.D. in Cinema Studies from N.Y.U. She is the co-director of "If You Succeed" (2007), a verité documentary about a young entrepreneurial couple's struggle to create a business and save their failing marriage. The film screened at the Little Rock Film Festival and San Francisco DocFest in 2007. Palmer has written about film for indieWIRE and Filmmaker and has taught film studies at N.Y.U., Brooklyn College, and Sarah Lawrence College. The Hand of Fatima is her first feature as a solo director.
Chris Arnold (Producer, Editor) worked for 8 years at New York City's Downtown Community Television Center (DCTV) as an editor, producer, filmmaking instructor and program director. While at DCTV, he created and led ConnecTV, the first 3-year intensive television production and training program for people with disabilities in the U.S. In 2003, he co-founded Cultural Animal, LLC, an independent media production company, whose projects include the award winning verite documentary "If You Succeed," which Chris edited, co-directed, and co-produced.
"The Hand of Fatima" has received support from the New York State Council on the Arts and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council's Swing Space program. It was also featured at the 2008 IFP Documentary Rough Cut Lab.
Admission is free for current DocuClub members and $5 for non-members.
If you plan to attend, please RSVP to: docuclub@artsengine.net.
Membership is an annual $40 (until January 31; $50 thereafter), which includes free admission to all DocuClub events. To join or renew, please go to:
www.artsengine.net/store/#tools_consul
About DocuClub
DocuClub is Arts Engine’s monthly film screening series of works-in-progress documentaries. For more info, please go to: www.docuclub.org.
About The Tank
The Tank is a non-profit arts presenter whose mission is to provide a welcoming, creative, collaborative, and affordable environment for artists and activists engaged in the pursuit of new ideas. Through a wide range of low-cost, high-concept arts and public affairs programming, The Tank seeks to cultivate a new generation of audience for live performance, civic discourse, and the work of emerging artists.
