Please Note: Schedule is subject to slight changes. When in doubt, please call 434-9236 for more information.
FRI, Sept. 16 @ 8pm:
Opening Reception & Cabaret
@ the Bomb Shelter, 10145 104 St. - Downstairs
FILM: Whirl-Mart
by Breathing Planet
2003, 5 min.
Whirl-Mart Ritual Resistance is a participatory experiment. It is art and action. It came into being in 2001 as a response to Adbusters magazine's call for foolish action. What began as a single happening in Troy, NY has over the course of a year evolved into a ritual activity that is performed across the U.S., and known around the world. It is a ritual during which a group gathers and silently pushes empty carts through the aisles of a superstore. Whirl-Mart utilizes tactics of occupation and reclamation of private consumer-dominated space for the purpose of creating a symbolic spectacle. See http://www.breathingplanet.net/whirl/
FILM: Why is this commercial?
by R Room http://www.rroom.org
Canada, 2000, 3 min.
In the summer of 2000, R Room produced and directed a video for California's prolific pioneers of sampling and copyright infringement, Negativland. The band had been approaching artists from around North America to create original videos for songs from any of their previous releases, and R Room chose the "Why is this commercial?" track from the 1997 Dispepsi album, an anti-pop album attacking corporate cola. Music by Negativland. Intro by Patootihed/R Room.
FILM: Liquid Candy
by R Room
Canada, 1999, 6 min.
This video is cut from television, movies, and R Room's own video and graphics, and explores consumer choices in a conglomerate dominated market flooded with sugary options where cola is king and kid's are the victims. Beats by Patootihed.
FILM: Unhappy Meal
by R Room
Canada, 1999, 7 min.
This is a disturbing and visually-stunning look at McDonald's, shot on digital video and film. R Room's visual and graphical style come together in one of their wildest videos yet, featuring their very own Evil Ronald. Set to music, Unhappy Meal is more a humorous visual metaphor than hard-hitting, behind-the- scenes journalism, but the message is the same: People have genuine concerns about certain issues, and when corporations control the media, there is no discussion, only advertising. Beats by Patootihed.
* See the full R Room bio under the Sept. 23 Vitamins film screening.
SUN, Sept. 18 @ 10pm:
@ Metro Cinema, Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre (9828 101A Ave.)
FILM: OUTFOXED: RUPERT MURDOCH'S WAR ON JOURNALISMhttp://www.outfoxed.org
Director/Producer: Robert Greenwald
USA (2004) 77 min.
This acclaimed documentary examines how media empires, led by Murdoch's Fox News, have been running a "race to the bottom" in television news. The film provides an in-depth look at Fox and the dangers of ever-enlarging corporations taking control of the public's right to know. Media experts, former Fox news producers, reporters, bookers and writers provide context and guidance in this exposé of Fox's right-wing agenda and it's effects on society.
MON, Sept. 19 @ 10pm:
@ Metro Cinema, Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre (9828 101A Ave.)
FILM: MOVE
http://www.movefilm.org
Directors: Benjamin Garry & Ryan McKenna
USA (2003) 53 min
This simultaneously fascinating and incendiary documentary covers the full controversial history of the
radical movement, MOVE, created by John Africa in the 1970s Philadelphia, and up to the present day. The story is analyzed by its neighbors, Philadelphia journalists and other outside opinions, and told through interviews with actual MOVE members, supporters, and the MOVE 9 - political prisoners who are currently serving 100 years each despite a clear lack of evidence. Racism runs rampant in this heartbreaking contemporary account of state violence. Narrated by Howard Zinn.
Showtimes
TUES, Sept. 20 @ 1pm:
@ University of Alberta: Tory Breezeway 2
WED, Sept. 21 @ 8:15pm:
@ Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre (lower level)
FILM: CRAPSHOOT: THE GAMBLE WITH OUR WASTES
http://www.bullfrogfilms.com/catalog/craps.html
Director: Jeff McKay, a National Film Board of Canada Production
Canada, 2004, 52 min.
A hazardous mix of waste is flushed into the sewer every day. The billions of litres of water-combined with unknown quantities of chemicals, solvents, heavy metals, human waste and food-where does it all go? And what does it do to us? From ancient times, countries have chosen the sewer to get rid of household and industrial waste, yet the contaminants we flush resurface in our food chain. Fish swim through waste water dumped into rivers, while sewage sludge is spread on farmland as fertilizer. Filmed in Italy, India, Sweden, the United States and Canada, this bold documentary questions whether the sewer is actually compounding our waste problems. While scientists warn of links between sewage practices and potential health risks, activists, engineers and concerned citizens challenge our fundamental attitudes to waste. Does our need to dispose of waste take precedence over public safety? What are the alternatives?
TUES, Sept. 20 @ 7pm:
@ Metro Cinema, Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre (9828 101A Ave.)
48 SHORT FILMS!: THE ONE MINUTE FILM & VIDEO FESTIVAL
http://www.minutefilmfest.com
Producer: Meredith Dault
Canada/International (2003) 60 min.
The One Minute Film and Video Festival is an opportunity for filmmakers, from professional to amateur, to
create and screen new work, based around the common theme. This is a programme of 48 films of exactly one-minute each in length, on the theme of "neighbours". Now entering its third year in Toronto, the festival puts a premium on creativity, and pieces ranging from the thoughtful to the hilarious are sure to make this programme a favourite of independent film lovers.
TUES, Sept. 20 @ 8:15pm:
@ Metro Cinema, Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre (9828 101A Ave.)
FILM: TRUTH MERCHANTS
http://www.metrocinema.org/film_view?FILM_ID=774
Directed by: Kevin McMahon
Canada (1998) 45 min.
No major corporation or government body is without them. PR flaks are the sultans of spin, and in a
media-driven age they exert enormous power. Part propaganda, part theatre and part advertising, they have become simultaneously required and reviled players in the shaping of public opinion. Featuring media critic Rick Salutin, news anchor Peter Mansbridge, and other Canadian print and TV journalists, Truth Merchants remains an interesting window into questionable Canadian media practices.
TUES, Sept. 20 @ 9:15pm:
@ Metro Cinema, Zeidler Hall, Citadel Theatre (9828 101A Ave.)
FILM: ORWELL ROLLS IN HIS GRAVE
http://www.orwellrollsinhisgrave.com - introduced by R Room's video short
CCNN (Corporate Controlled News Network)
Directed by: Robert Kane Pappas
USA (2004) 108 min.
Mind being controlled? Orwell Rolls in his Grave is the consummate critical examination of the Fourth
Estate, once the bastion of American democracy. Asking whether America has entered an Orwellian world of doublespeak where outright lies can pass for the truth, Pappas explores what the media doesn't talk about: ITSELF. This fascinating documentary reminds us that 1984 is no longer a date in the future.
CCNN (Corporate Controlled News Network)
Directed by: R Room; Beats by Patootihed.
Canada, 2001, 12 min.
An audio/video assault on corporate run news. This video is a humorous look at how ad-saturated our evening newscasts are whether it be through the commercial breaks or the actual newscasts themselves. It's not about what side of the story the news is on anymore. It's about what story is on the news.
* See the full R Room bio under the Sept. 23 Vitamins film screening.
Showtimes
WED, Sept. 21 @ 7pm:
@ Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre (lower level)
TUES, Sept. 27 @ 1:15pm
@ University of Alberta, Tory Breezeway 2
Screens with FILM SHORT: Unhappy
Meal
FILM: SWEET MISERY: A POISONED WORLD
http://www.docworkers.com / http://www.soundandfury.tv
Directed by: Cori Brackett
USA, 2004, 60 min.
A close examination into what many consider to be a "hoax": aspartame toxicity. This documentary attempts to look at what is 'definitively' known about aspartame and discovers that the label "hoax" in this case is a dangerous misconception. In a journey through interviews with various doctors, lawyers, activists and victims, narrator Cori Brackett discovers symptoms to a much larger problem: Our institutions designed to protect the public from harmful substances have failed us. In a poisoned world, victims are found throughout the country and are finally given a voice. A close examination of the process for approving aspartame by the FDA leads to earlier examples of revolving door activity and how powerful corporations are influencing once trusted institutions. Today, resistance to aspartame continues, as a portrait of this poisoned world also offers hope and remedy.
See http://www.mercola.com/forms/sweet_misery.htm and http://www.dorway.com/possible.html for good background info. Supported in-kind by http://boilingfrog.ca
Showtimes:
WED, Sept. 21 @ 9:30pm
@ Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre (lower level)
TUES, Sept. 27 @ 12:00pm
@ University of Alberta, Tory Breezeway 2
WED, Sept. 28 : 12:00pm
@ Stanley A. Milner Library, Centennial Room (lower level)
FILM: HOLES IN HEAVEN?
http://www.haarp.com
Directed by: Wendy Robbins
USA, 2002, 60 min.
Are we making Holes in Heaven? H.A.A.R.P. (High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program) is a controversial high frequency radio transmitter, or "ionospheric heater," which is believed to be descended from the works of Dr. Nicola Tesla and is operated by the U.S. Navy/Air Force and Phillip Laboratories in remote Gakona, Alaska. Using HAARP, our military plans to focus a billion-watt pulsed radio beam into our upper atmosphere, ostensibly for ionospheric research. This procedure will form extremely low frequency waves and send them back to the Earth, enhancing communications with submarines and allowing us to "see" into the Earth, detecting anything from oil reserves to underground missile silos. However, several researchers claim HAARP poses many dangers, including blowing thirty-mile holes in the Earth's upper atmosphere. They also warn of possible disruption of the subtle magnetic energies of our Earth and ourselves. Narrated by Martin Sheen, the film investigates HAARP, its history and implications, and examines the dangers and benefits of high and low frequencies and of electromagnetic technology. Holes in Heaven? strives to give a fair and accurate appraisal of HAARP, and brings before the public, vital information about a project which could have a dramatic effect upon our entire world.
Supported in-kind by http://boilingfrog.ca
FRI, Sept. 23 @ 7pm
@ the Red Strap Market, 10305 97 St. (Upstairs)
DIY or Die: How to Survive as an Independent Artist (Feature)
Directed by: Michael Dean
USA, 2003, 60 min.
"D.I.Y. or DIE" celebrates Underdog. A collection of portraits and profiles from a fascinating group of underground icons and overlooked unknowns working in various media including print, film, graphic art, performance art, and music. The two-dozen interviewees are all true mavericks that operate outside of any "studio system", are beholden to no one, and produce influential and quality art regardless of a continuous paycheque. Features such underground luminaries as: Ian MacKaye (Fugazi), Lydia Lunch, Mike Watt (Minutemen), j Mascis (Dinosaur jr.), Jim Rose (Jim Rose Sideshow), Jim Thirlwell (Foetus), Richard Kern (Filmmaker), Ron Asheton (Stooges), Madigan Shive (Bonfire Madigan), Dave Brockie (Gwar) and more.
Boyband Mayhem (Intro Video)
Directed by: John Richardson (R Room Collective), music by WIRES MYERS
Canada, 2004, 7 min.
R Room's latest short is 7 minutes of real frantic boyband fan interviews, cut to the beats of Wires Myers.
The Vitamins (Feature)
Directed by: John Richardson(R Room Collective) and Jason Wagner
Canada, 2004, 60 min.
Imagine a world where Boybands can sing mediocre love songs and young fans, their parents, and grandparents will love it no matter what. Envision music stations everywhere playing boyband videos on a hourly basis and fans dishing out their cash for CD after CD. Wait-that is the world we live in. THE VITAMINS take boyband culture to a new level with offensive songs , ridiculous cross promotions, and fans that will do anything to meet them. THE VITAMINS is a conscious video with a hilarious spin on the TV and music industry featuring 7 music videos, press conferences, and behind the scenes footage of the world's most outrageous and offensive new boy band.
R Room is a multimedia collective which constantly redefines itself. It's members are involved in graphic design, photography, film and video making, and come together regularly to take back some of the media space ruled by corporate interests. R Room is determined to reorganize the corporate media it receives and rebroadcast it in more interesting forms. Record. Rewind. Reassemble. The corporate version plus subversion equals R version. At it's simplest level. R Room reconfigures commercials, billboards, and any other corporate messages into more positive and/or humorous forms to entertain and inform our community. when we can we grab a video camera and create something that talks back to the thousands of commercial images that attack us daily. the end result is satisfaction and hopefully a strong reaction. In 1998 while on a satellite recovery mission, R Room noticed that the North American Great Lakes appeared to spell "TV" when viewed from space. This epiphany led R Room to further space exploration in search of a true purpose. Their search involved thousands of light years, millions of dollars, immeasurable amounts of illicit drugs and a giant government cover-up. After exhausting their suppliers and finding nothing of interest in space, they returned and traded their shuttle for a brand new computer and some video editing equipment. R Room vowed to record, log and review thousands of hours of television. They pledged to re-edit this footage into new combinations using their own video and graphics to change its meaning and force a reaction. they believe that these actions, and the actions of like-minded digital pioneers, will take the video revolution into the 21st century and beyond, and reclaim the "T.V." for Earth and it's people.
http://www.rroom.org
SAT, Sept. 24 @ Noon - 5 pm:
"Charity Bizarre"
Small Press, Fair Trade
& Social Justice Fair
@ the Red Strap Market (lower level off main floor)
1 pm: FILM: Sweating For a T-Shirt
Global Exchange
1998, 20 min.
This is a well-produced documentary and call to conscience and action. It centers on college students enjoying their latest T-shirts oblivious to the exploited workers in Honduran maquilas or clothing factories where garments are produced. The workers sew and work at a furious pace to meet quotas of 300 garments a day for wages of $3 a day. The documentary turns on efforts by the producer Medea Benjamin and her daughter, Arlene, trying to get to see conditions inside a Honduran clothing factory. They are fended off by the owners' agents. (Despite that, they managed to shoot high-quality footage of workers frantically striving to meet their quotas.) Workers who seek to unionize are threatened with jail or simply fired. There are no health benefits; children leave school to work and are then too exhausted to continue at night schools that they can't afford anyway. The video ends with scenes of protests against the sweatshops by U.S. union organizers and students. From one spokesman we learn that a cap that sells for $20 at a college store yields but eight cents for the person who sewed over it. We also hear of some encouraging actions by colleges such as Brown University that have committed to doing no business with exploitive factories.
2 pm: FILM: Mickey Mouse goes to Haiti
Nat'l Labor Committee
1996, 19 min.
Focuses on workers in Haiti who were making 28 cents per hour to produce clothing that Disney sells in the U.S. These workers earn too little to buy food, to build decent housing, or to have any hope of escaping the terrible poverty that is nearly unimaginable to the consumers who buy the clothes they make. Points out that twenty thousand workers in Haiti are employed as contract garment workers for U.S. corporations. In this moving film, several workers risk being fired to describe their inhuman working and living conditions. Throughout the film, they urge viewers to encourage Disney to provide a living wage, support, and benefits to their workers in Haiti. A sensitive portrait of the result of corporate exploitation of workers in developing nations. Good quality of information. Fair quality of production. Age level: Jr. High and older.
3 pm: FILM: Betrayed: The Story of Canadian Merchant Seamen
by Elaine Briere
2004, 56 min.
Although Canada is surrounded by three oceans, there is not a single deep-sea ship flying the Canadian flag today. Sixty years ago, Canada had the 4th-largest merchant fleet in the world. Canadian ships brought vital supplies to Allied Forces in Europe during World War II. The men sailing those ships were war heroes who suffered terrible losses. Their union, The Canadian Seaman's Union (CSU), brought the 8-hour day, sick leaves and pay increases to an industry known for low wages and brutal working conditions. After the war, when the Liberal government of Louis St. Laurent began to privatize the merchant
fleet, the CSU strongly opposed the sell-off. The Canadian government and shipowners initiated a campaign to discredit the CSU. It was a time of fear, confusion and betrayal. This documentary tells the little-known struggle of merchant seamen to save the merchant fleet and their livelihood. It traces the history of Canadian shipping from the international strike of 1949 to the globalization of coastal shipping in Australia by Canada Steamship Lines - owned by the family of Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin.
SUN, Sept. 25 @ Noon - 5 pm:
"Charity Bizarre"
Small Press, Fair Trade
& Social Justice Fair
@ the Red Strap Market (lower level off main floor)
1 pm: FILM: Something To Hide
Nat'l Labor Committee / Crowing Rooster
1999, 25 min.
Today in the global economy, corporations hide their production around the world behind locked factory gates, armed guards and 15-foot high concrete walls topped with razor wire. The companies refuse to release to the American people the names and locations of the factories they use. What are they trying to hide? In this film US students visit El Salvador's maquilas. A good resource for university-based campaigns. Produced by the NLC and United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS).
2 pm: FILM: After Cancun: Free Trade or Fair Trade
Jeremy Wright
2004, 30 min.
After Cancun features Maude Barlow, Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, giving a full 'behind the scenes' account of why the Trade Talks collapsed at Cancun, and contrasted in the video with the views of Pierre Pettigrew, the then Minister for Trade. The fundamental differences between "Free" Trade" and "Fair Trade" are discussed with examples drawn from the Cancun Fair Trade Fair, and features Chantal Havard, Transfair Canada; Jeff de Jong, Cocoa Camino; and Nicole McGrath, Peridar.
3 pm: FILM: Zoned for Slavery: The Child Behind the Label
Nat'l Labor Committee / Crowing Rooster
1995, 23 min.
(Translated to English, Kreyol, Spanish)
An investigation of very young working women in the Free Trade Zone in Honduras and consequences on their lives due to exploitation (below subsistence wages, lack of access to education, health hazards, forced contraception, denied freedom, harassment, etc.). A National Labor Committee (NLC) representative speaks about workers' actual wages, the cost of production (e.g.: 12 cents for a 20$ Gap shirt), the US tax support for free trade zones, and the pressure on companies to produce in free trade zones and the effect on American workers. The NLC representative looks at the wider economic impact of paying low wages (trading with people earning wages below the subsistence level is impossible). Detailed interviews with workers. Heated discussion with management as the representative gets caught asking workers questions without management's permission.
Screens with:
TUES, Sept. 27 @ 7pm:
@ Stanley A. Milner Library, Centennial Room (lower level)
FILM: WEAPONS OF MASS DECEPTION
http://www.wmdthefilm.com
Director: Danny Schechter
USA, 2005, 98 min.
There were two wars going on in Iraq - one was fought with armies of soldiers, bombs and a fearsome military force. The other was fought alongside it with cameras, satellites, armies of journalists and propaganda techniques. One war was rationalized as an effort to find and remove WMDs - Weapons of Mass Destruction; the other was carried out by even more powerful WMDs, Weapons of Mass Deception.
"A comprehensive and devastating critique of the TV news networks' complacency and complicity in the war on Iraq... brilliantly argued and scrupulously documented... a must see" -- Chicago Reader
WED, Sept. 28 @ 3pm
@ Stanley A. Milner Library, Centennial Room (lower level)
Film: BHOPAL: THE SEARCH FOR JUSTICE
( Reference: http://www.ottawastart.com/story/844 )
Directors: Peter Raymont and Linda Lee Tracey
Canada, 2004, 52 min.
On December 2, 1984, the release of poisonous methylisocyanate gas from the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, India killed tens of thousands of people and maimed hundreds of thousands more. It was, and remains, the world's worst industrial disaster. Twenty years later, amid charges of corruption, graft and greed, little compensation has been paid to the victims and their families. Bhopal is a sad, disgraceful testament to the absence of environmental and human justice. This documentary explores and analyzes the prospect for environmental and human justice in Bhopal. At stake is more than fair compensation for the many affected and afflicted - "Bhopal" has become a rallying cry and a test case for international environmental law and human rights.
WED, Sept. 28 @ 7pm
@ Stanley A. Milner Library Theatre (lower level)
Film: UNCOVERED: WHOLE TRUTH ABOUT THE IRAQ WAR
http://www.truthuncovered.com
will screen with other film shorts TBA and include Special Guest Speakers
Director: Robert Greenwald
USA, 2005, 56 min.
Uncovered chronicles the Bush Administration's determined quest to invade Iraq following the events of September 11, 2001. The film deconstructs the administration's case for war through interviews with U.S. intelligence and defense officials, foreign service experts, and UN weapons inspectors - including a former CIA director, a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia and even President's Bush's Secretary of the Army. Their analyses and conclusions are sobering, and often disturbing, regardless of one's political affiliations.
* RELATED NOTE: On September 24-26th 2005 there will be a massive mobilization in Washington, D.C. calling for an end to the war. http://unitedforpeace.org/article.php?list=type&type=91
THURS, Sept. 29 @ 7pm
@ Happy Harbor Comics - 10112 124 St. (Upstairs)
Firefly Space-Geek Film Night
OK, OK, we know, we know. Firefly is hardly "independent media or underground art". But our Happy hosts at Happy Harbor Comics felt this night was too important to pass up, what with the Firefly feature film being released on Sept. 30 and all. And we agree-lovers of indie art & underground comics also tend to be super anti-authoritarian space-lovin' geeks, so this evening is a celebration of all things space-wise, Joss Whedon, and Nathan Fillion (who, incidentally, is an Edmontonian, and who, incidentally, loves Happy Harbor). So join us for this evening of the top-fave 4 Firefly episodes-Browncoats unite!
