2001 ASN World Convention: Film Lineup
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Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 06:05:35 +0200 (EET)
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Subject: 2001 ASN World Convention: Film Lineup
From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Original sender: Dominique Arel <[email protected]>
2001 ASN World Convention: Film Lineup
FILM LINEUP OF THE 2001 ASN WORLD CONVENTION
For the complete preliminary program, registration form and general
information on the convention, please consult our web sites at
http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Watson_Institute/ASN/ or
http://asn.uno.edu
For the second consecutive year, the ASN World Convention will be
screening brand new documentaries on themes related to the
post-Communist world. This year's lineup includes A TRIAL IN PRAGUE,
about the infamous Slansky trial in 1952 Czechoslovakia; GULAG: ENEMY
OF THE PEOPLE, a masterful three hour history of the Gulag
Archipelago; CROATIA 2000 - A WINTER TO REMEMBER, a behind-the-scenes
look at Croatia's recent election; THE PUNISHMENT, on the bombing of
Serbia during the Kosovo War; WAR IN THE LAND OF THE MUJAHEDDIN, set
in makeshift hospital located in the Afghan war zone; GOOD KURDS, BAD
KURDS, on the plight of Turkish Kurds; NEXT YEAR IN LERIN, on the fate
of Greek and Slavic Macedonian children taken from Greece in 1948; as
well as a new documentary on ABKHAZIA; archival footage from UKRAINIAN
AMERICANS in the 1960s; and recent short films from CINEMA VERITE
INTERNATIONAL. All screenings will be followed by a discussion with
the audience. One or two films, including one on the former
Yugoslavia, may be added to the program.
The ASN Convention runs from 5-7 April 2001 at Columbia University,
International Affairs Building, and will feature a hundred panels, in
addition to the films.
We look forward to seeing you at the convention,
Dominique Arel ([email protected])
Program Chair
THURSDAY 5 APRIL, 3.15 PM
New documentary on ABKHAZIA by director Dodge Billingsley, whose film
IMMORTAL FORTRESS: A LOOK INSIDE CHECHNYA'S WARRIOR CULTURE screened
at the 2000 ASN Convention.
THURSDAY 5 APRIL, 5.30 PM
Croatia 2000 - A Winter To Remember
Croatia 2001 (104 min), directed by Rajko Grlic and Igor Mirkovic
Contact: [email protected], www.croatia2000
This is a feature-length documentary film about dramatic political
events that occurred in the period between the death of Croatian
president Franjo Tudman and the victory of Stipe Mesic at the
presidential elections. Incessantly following the most influential
figures in Croatian political life, our cameras witnessed the moments
of their biggest battle, their greatest victory and crushing defeat,
the days of great strain, passion and political combat. This is, by
all means, the most ambitious documentary project ever filmed in
Croatia. It is the first documentary film ever distributed in Croatian
theaters. After its premier on January 18, 2001 the film is still
playing and is right now third on the Croatian box office list.
Branka Peuraca (Fletcher School of Law, Tufts U, USA) will lead the
discussion following the screening.
FRIDAY 6 APRIL, 9 AM
Gulag: Enemy of the People
UK 1999 (180 min), directed by Angus Macqueen, for the BBC.
Contact: Iris Maor ([email protected])
A moving investigation of the Soviet gulags, which held dissenters,
political prisoners and often completely innocent people. It uses
extensive interviews with guards and the guarded and even pre-war
documentary footage. The jury of the International Documentary
Association regarded this 3-hr film as 'magisterial', 'extraordinary',
even 'magnificent' as it brought to television a graphic account of
one of the most notorious examples of inhumanity in the 20th century
which 'we thought we all knew about - and proved that we didn't'.
William Rosenberg (U of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA) and Jennifer Syron
(Columbia U, USA) will lead the discussion following the screening.
The first 90 min of the film will screen betwen 9-10.30, followed by a
30 min. discussion. The second 90 min will screen 11.15-12.45, with
another 30 min discussion.
FRIDAY 6 APRIL, 2.15 PM
The Social and Cultural Life of the Ukrainian Community in the 1960s
USA: Archival Footage
Ukraine 2001 (50 min), directed Natalia Chechel ([email protected])
Featuring unique and unseen archive footage from 1960s on the cultural
and social life of the Ukrainian community in New York City with Josyp
Hirniak and sculptor Mykola Chereshnevsky. The story of the personal
and artistic life of one of the key actors of the twentieth-century
theater provides an excellent window on the history of the Ukrainian
state, the Ukrainian and American culture, and the American immigrant
experience. This archive footage will suggest that the Ukrainian
community has been addressing not only the economic issues and
security/foreign policy concerns, but the cultural and identity
problems, in the past and present.
The filmmaker will lead the discussion following the screening.
FRIDAY 6 APRIL, 4.30 PM
A Trial in Prague
USA 2000 (105 min), directed by Zuzana Justman
Contact: Gary Crowdus ([email protected])
At the height of the Cold War, an infamous political show trial took
place in Czechoslovakia. In 1952 fourteen leading Communists,
including Rudolf Slansky, the second most powerful man in the country,
were tried on charges of high treason and espionage. Although they
were innocent of these charges, they confessed, and the fourteen men,
eleven of whom were Jews, were all convicted. Through testimonies,
trial footage, archival films and extensive documentation, the film
tells the story of the trial and the paranoia of the period. Among the
people who appear in the film are Lise London, whose late husband
Artur (released from prison in 1956) wrote about the trial in a widely
published memoir "The Confession."
Zuzana Justman, the filmmaker, and Bradley Abrams (Columbia U, USA)
will lead the discussion following the screening.
SATURDAY 7 APRIL, 9 AM
Next Year in Lerin
UK 2000 (45 min), directed by Jill Daniels
Contact: Jill Daniels ([email protected])
The film tells the story of 28,000 Greek and Slavic Macedonian
children who were taken from Greece in 1948 without their mothers, by
the democratic Army to escape the Greek civil war and were dispersed
to orphanages throughout the socialist system oriented East European
countries.
Keith Brown (Watson Institute, Brown U, USA) will lead the discussion
following the screening.
SATURDAY 7 APRIL, 11.15 AM
The Punishment
Yugoslavia 2000 (91 min), directed by Goran Rebic
Contact: Andrea Holley ([email protected])
'The film primarily focuses on young people who don't identify with
these politicians and this country, who don't feel hatred towards
others, who don't consider Albanians to be racially inferior, who
don't have any problems with the fact that Croatia has become an
independent state.' Goran Rebic. In cityscapes and interviews, the
film tells of conditions in Belgrade immediately after NATO's bombing
campaign. Setting out to make a film about 'the other Serbia', Goran
Rebic listened to the people who aren't quoted in newspapers -
artists, schoolchildren, philosophers, human rights activists -
citizens opposed to the Milosovic regime but who cannot approve of
NATO's strategy either. Rebic doesn't think in terms of ethnic groups.
His protagonists don't speak for everyone; they are individuals, not
representatives. The Punishment is a cinematic essay about dissidence
and destruction, about the loss of hope and home.
James Gow (King's College London, UK) ) will lead the discussion
following the screening.
SATURDAY 7 APRIL, 2.15 PM
Good Kurds, Bad Kurds: No Friends but the Mountains
USA 2000 (79 min), directed by Kevin McKiernan
Contact: Andrea Holley ([email protected])
A war of national liberation or a war against terrorism? Filmmaker and
acclaimed freelance journalist Kevin McKiernan poses this question at
the outset of this stirring, provocative film lensed by legendary
cinematographer Haskell Wexler. It's all in how you define "good" and
"bad": "Good Kurds" are those in Iraq; they're Saddam Hussein's
victims whom we want to help. "Bad Kurds" are those waging an armed
insurrection against US ally Turkey; they're at the receiving end of
US weapons. McKiernan went to northern Iraq to cover the uprising
against Saddam. Just a few miles away, no one was covering the hidden
war in Turkey, so he decided to bring out the story. The film brings
sharp clarity to a complicated history while providing disturbing
insight into both US immigration and foreign policy.
SATURDAY 7 APRIL, 4.30 PM
War in the Land of the Mujaheddin
Italy 2000 (120 min), directed by Alberto Vendemmiati and Fabrizio
Lazzaretti
Contact: Giuseppe Petitto ([email protected])
In this journalistic report, a surgeon and a war correspondent decide
to join forces and set up a hospital in Afghanistan. The
fundamentalist Taliban now have the society firmly in their grasp.
Houses and schools have been burnt down, sons killed on the
battlefield and almost everybody is hungry. Women are beaten up in the
street if they are wearing sandals that show part of their legs, so
everyone is terrified of breaking the extremely strict rules of the
Taliban, another woman explains. Meanwhile, tanks have conquered the
mountains, soldiers are trigger-happy and the landscape is strewn with
mines, which are stepped on every day by countless innocent victims.
The documentary is interlaced with images from the operations and does
not spare the spectator. 'Jang' (which means 'war' in the language of
the Dari) contains a series of shocking scenes.
Barnett Rubin (Center on International Cooperation, NYU, USA) will
lead the discussion following the screening.
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