Resurrecting a Revolutionary Cinema: The Hour of the Furnaces
Sunday April 4th - 12PM - 6PM
16Beaver
16 Beaver Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY
On Easter Sunday we will present a daylong, open-ended, collaborative and community screening of Octavio Getino and Fernando Solanas' The Hour of the Furnaces. In organizing such an event the usual questions arise: what does a film about Argentina mean to us in the United States; what does a film from 1968 mean to us in 2010; and, more broadly, what is the function of a political film, a revolutionary cinema, in our contemporary cultural political and digitally mediated landscape.
The Hour of the Furnaces is historically seen as a benchmark, a landmark, of militant cinema; but with that it also becomes a remnant of a certain time and a place, a relic of a long-since-passed Zeitgeist. The danger comes from the potential of presenting a memorial service; that the ceremonial structure of such an event will be an acting out*, an anachronism.
The film's tone, scope, scale, and exhibition demands necessitate a certain theatricality. Furnaces has a 4-hour running time, and three distinct parts with built-in intermissions designed for audience participation and open discussion. We will discuss all of this with a focus on the present. Coffee, tea, bagels, and a simple brunch will be available throughout the day.
This screening was conceived and proposed by Rachael Rakes and her DocTruck series (and simultaneously but separately by filmmaker Libertad Gills). Red Channels quickly attached itself, and the 16 Beaver Group got involved to help organize and host the event. We will be joined by the UnionDocs Collaborative, and are supported by This is Forever and Cinema Tropical.
DocTruck and Red Channels are working together to produce a free limited edition zine/reader to be distributed on the occasion of the screening. It will feature writings by Jose Marti and Che Guevara (which gave the film its title); interviews with Fernando Solanas upon the release of the film; a dialogue between Solanas and Jean-Luc Godard; an essay from the Cahiers du Cinema (via Evergreen Review); the New York Times review of the film upon its commercial release; and the major theoretical piece the film inspired its creators to write, "Towards a Third Cinema." This will be the 6th zine released by DocTruck, and the first print publication by Red Channels.
On the Day's Food:
We will provide a base of Milk, coffee, tea, fruit, some bread and some spread. Please bring your favored light dish or your very very favorite fruit, can-be-eaten-raw vegetable, juice, bread, spread, cheese...
--The Hour of the Furnaces: Notes and Testimonies on Neocolonialism, Violence and Liberation - Octavio Getino & Fernando Ezequiel Solanas, 1968, 230 minutes
TOTAL RUNNING TIME: 230 minutes | Digital Projection
Tentative Schedule:
12:00 arrivals and introductions
12:30
--Neocolonialism and Violence - 85 minutes
2:30
--Act for Liberation - 111 minutes
5:00
--Violence and Liberation - 34 minutes
Co-presented by DocTruck, Libertad Gills, and the UnionDocs Collaborative
Co-sponsored by Cinema Tropical and This is Forever
(The film is available on DVD (2007) directly from Pino Solanas in Argentina (www.pinosolanas.com). This is the second screening we have presented in partnership with DocTruck, following November 21st's "Jackie Raynal: Realisation." This is the second program we have organized with the 16 Beaver Group, following October 7th's "Godard in USA.")
*The politics and dialogue surrounding Mark Tribe's Port Huron Project come to mind here. We screened an excerpt from his series, The Problem is Civil Disobedience: Howard Zinn 1971 (2007), on February 4th.