ONLINE TICKETS

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15 – 7:30 PM
TUESDAY, JUNE 21 – 7:30 PM
MONDAY, JUNE 27 – 7:30 PM
THURSDAY, JUNE 30 – 10:00 PM

Seen on their own, FOR PERSONAL REASONS (1973) and THE INVISIBLE PEOPLE (1972) remind us of the axiom, the more things change, the more they stay the same. While colored by different contexts, Black liberation and abolition today like then remain of high concern and importance. Anti-blackness and exclusion along racial lines today, like then, inform constructs of the nation.

Seen side by side the films highlight several motifs, of stark note are the ways in which Madubuko Diakité explores and immerses himself in the local in which he finds himself at the time. In both films we are introduced to the respective locals, New York and Lund, Sweden, through the lenses and experiences of two different Black men. In FOR PERSONAL REASONS, in the early 1970s a young Black man stumbles upon a Black Panthers protest in Brooklyn. He says, “…[t]hey were saying a lot of the things I had been thinking, about how freedom fighters and people from all over the world are fighting the same thing, imperialism, oppression.” While in THE INVISIBLE PEOPLE we encounter the plight of international students in Lund in the early seventies, who today, like then, face similar bureaucracy, exclusion and discrimination along racial lines. When one of the interviewees describes practices of institutionalized discrimination, noting how admissions to some fields of study are conducted along racial and national lines, recent events come to mind.

Watching the films in light of recent world events, including the discrimination Black people faced at the Ukrainian and Polish borders, one is reminded that anti-blackness is deliberate and continually structures the world, then and now. Immersed in the then, we are reminded now that while the struggle against imperialism and oppression starts and sprawls out from our respective locals, it is importantly, also an international one.

FOR PERSONAL REASONS
dir. Madubuko Diakité, 1973
23 min. United States.
In English.

Focusing on the Civil Rights Movement and a 1970 protest in New York, FOR PERSONAL REASONS was inspired by the Black Panthers and Malcolm X. An innovative mix of fact and fiction—a kind of critical fabulation—it juxtaposes militant speech with avant-garde jazz. The film won an Honorable Mention at the Grenoble Film Festival in 1973.

THE INVISIBLE PEOPLE
(DET OSYNLIGA FOLKET)
dir. Madubuko Diakité, 1972
30 min. Sweden.
In Swedish with English subtitles.

Diakité’s unique historical document, made together with Gary Engman and Nordal Åkerman, records the precarious living conditions of foreign students, immigrants, and in particular the African diaspora in southern Sweden in the 1970s.

* The new 2021 scan and subtitling of THE INVISIBLE PEOPLE was made possible by CinemAfrica, Story AB, Simon Klose, Rafaela Stålbalk Klose, Christian Rossipal, and the Afro-Swedish History Week (The Museum of Ethnography). The new 2021 scan of FOR PERSONAL REASONS was made possible by Nonami Film and Simon Klose, with Christian Rossipal as preservation consultant. The new 2022 scan of DREAMS OF G was made possible by Simon Klose, Christian Rossipal and Mansa Musa AB.

Special thanks to Cristian Rossipal, Inney Prakesh and Madubuko Diakité.

In Hong Kong cinema, the “Category III” label is the rough equivalent of an “X” rating in the United States – no one under 18 admitted. More than identifying extreme content, however, the classification denotes a certain sensibility in HK cinema since the late 1980s – an impulse to not only repulse but also to do so in the most confounding, counter-logical manner possible (usually in quivering acres of latex and gallons of profuse goop). While Category III classics like RIKI-OH and THREE… EXTREMES are better known to American audiences, Spectacle is proud to plumb the depths of dubious morals and devil feti to present a selection of lesser-known features from the genre.

DEVIL FETUS 2
dir. Tom Lau Moon-Tong, 1984.
101 mins. Hong Kong.
In Cantonese with English subtitles.

FRIDAY, MAY 6 – MIDNIGHT
SATURDAY, MAY 14 – MIDNIGHT
FRIDAY, MAY 27 – MIDNIGHT

Content Warning: sexual assault, abortion

The sequel to the legendary DEVIL FETUS finally delivers on the fetus its predecessor failed to deliver, retaining at the same time the wildly elliptical plot that begins with a horny, malevolent piece of thrift-store art and ends with our protagonists in various states of wet delamination. A sleazy photographer contends with the fallout of a drunken liaison between one of his models and an animate statue of a demon in his art collection. Birthed upon an autopsy table, the titular fetus proceeds to make things generally miserable for our protagonist, unleashing vomiting monks, kitchen accidents and other unsavory terrors from the Category III wheelhouse. As perverse and unpredictable as DEVIL FETUS with a few surprisingly eerie and artful set-pieces that elevate the proceedings above a straightforward repetition.

BLOOD RITUAL
dir. Yuen Ching Lee, 1989
92 mins. Hong Kong.
In Cantonese and Mandarin with English subtitles.

SATURDAY, MAY 7 – MIDNIGHT
FRIDAY, MAY 20 – MIDNIGHT
SATURDAY, MAY 28 – MIDNIGHT

A hyper-violent cult thriller soldered to a light-hearted romantic comedy, BLOOD RITUAL is notable for the jarring ease with which it switches between these registers – deftly choreographed fight scenes rife with dismemberings inexplicably transition to screwball bits about failed driving tests and…severed fingers. The queasier bizarro version of Miami Vice, in which a pervasive mood of cultic paranoia is punctuated by instances of perplexing humor and synth-ballad breaks.

EYES OF THE LAND: HAWAI‘I SHORTS BY NA MAKA O KA ‘AINA
dirs. Joan Lander and Puhipau, 1981 – 2016
90 mins. Hawai’i.
In English.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 18 – 7:30 PM with Q+A
(This event is $10.)

ONE NIGHT ONLY!

ONLINE TICKETS

Documentary filmmaker Joan Lander presents a program of vital Hawaiʻi documentary shorts produced by herself and partner Puhipau (1937-2016) as the collective Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina (“The Eyes of the Land”).

Lander and Puhipau have been at the forefront of documenting Hawaiian culture and politics since the 1970’s with a kinship to DCTV, Black Mask, and Paper Tiger Television. This program of hand-picked shorts from Lander’s vast archive provides a commentary on the current issues facing Hawaiʻi.

Hawaiʻi-based filmmaker and Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina archivist Sancia Miala Shiba Nash will join in-person, with Joan joining the conversation remotely at Spectacle.

ALL HAWAIʻI STAND TOGETHER.
6 mins.

NA WAI E HO’ŌLA I NĀ IWI – WHO WILL SAVE THE BONES?
1988. 26 mins.

NO TELL ME GO
1984. 3 mins.

WAIMANALO EVICTION
1985. 37 mins.

This event is co-presented with Cinema Guild in conjunction with their theatrical release of Anthony Banua-Simon’s Hawai‘i feature documentary CANE FIRE at BAM May 20th – 26th.

SEEING RED: STORIES OF AMERICAN COMMUNISTS
dirs. Julia Reichert and Jim Klein, 1983
101 mins. United States.
In English.

FRIDAY, MAY 6 – 7:30 PM
FRIDAY, MAY 13 – MIDNIGHT
SUNDAY, MAY 15 – 5 PM
THURSDAY, MAY 26 – 10 PM

ONLINE TICKETS

Co-presented with DSA-Emerge.

SEEING RED tells the forgotten history of the U.S. Communist Party and the ordinary Americans whose lives were forever changed by their membership in it. Reichert and Klein compiled footage from over 400 interviews with former rank-and-file CPUSA members (many of whom had not spoken publicly about their involvement since the McCarthy hearings) to create a human portrait of 50 years of communist organizing. Idealistic youths who joined a vibrant organization in the 30s and 40s grew into adults confronted with surveillance and persecution in the 50s, not to mention the sobering revelation of Joseph Stalin’s crimes. Their thoughtful voices (including Pete Seeger’s!) articulately convey the all-encompassing fire that’s lit in a person through committing to movement work, without shying away from discussing their issues with the Party itself. SEEING RED is an invaluable film for leftist organizers and activists today.

With thanks to Julia Reichert.

———

Emerge is a caucus of NYC-DSA that has come together under the banner of communism. For us, communism is the goal as well as the process of full self-emancipation from capitalism and its attendant effects. Political education is a key part of our caucus life, and we believe that cinema is an important tool for leftist education, which can deepen our politics.

THE ABOMINABLE FREEDOM
dirs. Darrin Martin & Torsten Zenas Burns, 2006
41 mins. United States.
In English.

THURSDAY, MAY 5 – 10 PM
FRIDAY, MAY 13 – 7:30 PM
SATURDAY, MAY 21 – MIDNIGHT
FRIDAY, MAY 27 – 10 PM

ONLINE TICKETS

A hangover of 70s esoterica, THE ABOMINABLE FREEDOM documents the droll fallout of sexual and spiritual liberation: a collage of obsolete spiritualist practices conducted under the guidance of television mediums in tacky interiors. May the salvation promised by these dubious priests be recovered? The snowman, mascot of the thwarted utopia, withholds the answer. As per the filmmakers:

“Originally shot video and appropriated film weaves together a musical celebration of the flesh, an egg from the missing link holds a skeleton key to our educational future. On a parallel world, life coaches made of bone and fur activate televisual coursework including circular zooming studies, cryptid folklore, spectral-mating, and etheric birthing techniques. Manifest destiny eludes its colonial past and takes refuge deep in our pagan libidinal nature.”

This is presentation is part of an ongoing collaboration between Spectacle and the Queens-based art publisher Random Man Editions, which specializes in broadcasting various genres of the indescribable and documenting fringe practices across analogue and digital media. More information available at randomman.net.