Judith Malina – MRQE

American Stories (V)

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

Belgian director Chantal Akerman avoids her usual “real time” technique in Histoires d’Amérique. The anecdotal nature of the subject matter compels Akerman to fragment her narrative, rather than offer it in one, uninterrupted continuum. Still, another Akerman trademark — permitting the “drama” to emanate from the actors rather than the situations — is very much in evidence. This informal history of Jewish life over the past 100 years is related in a series of eyewitness accounts, re-created by a group of largely unknown actors. Also known as American Stories, the Belgian/French Histoires d’Amérique began building an audience when it was shown at the Berlin Film Festival.

Radio Unnameable

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

The story of legendary New York City disc jockey Bob Fass who pioneered free expression on the airwaves with his long running FM program ‘Radio Unnameable’.

New York Memories

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

In this filmic memoir, German director Rosa von Praunheim returns to New York, a city he knew and loved in the woolly 1970s, to see what he might find and also to check in on the colorful protagonists of his 1989 documentary, Überleben in New York. Both a personal journey and a historical survey, New York Memories captures a transformed city by charting the shifting course of gay life, from Warhol Factory figures to the AIDS ravaged, within it.

Im Spiegel der Maya Deren

Mon, 25 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

Documentary about the life of avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren, who led the independent film movement of the 1940s.

The Deli

Mon, 25 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

The wacky goings-on at a NYC delia comedy starring Mike Starr, Ice-T and Michael Imperioli.

Household Saints

Tue, 26 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

A chronicle of three generations of Italian-American women struggling to get by in post-World War II New Yorks Little Italy.

Enemies: A Love Story

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

A ghostwriter finds himself romantically involved with his current wife, a married woman and his long-vanished wife.

China Girl

Sat, 30 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

Teenage lovers Tony (Richard Panebianco) and Tyan-Hwa (Sari Chang) tip the balance of power in New York’s Little Italy and Chinatown.

The Queen of Sheba Meets the Atom Man

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

New York plays itself, as Taylor Mead and Winifred Bryan regale in pas de deux among the trashcans and the towers. The Studiedly Goofy and the Monumentally Grand are joined in masterly pas de dont […] The awed couple do battle with the status quo and teach the world to dance on the head of a bin. Rice detects real dignity in Bryan and amazing grace in Mead as they essay solitary promenades through the parks, subways and streets of a wintery New York landscape. Photographed and directed by Ron Rice, edited and scored by Taylor Mead. Edward Leffingwell

Amore e rabbia

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 04:00:00 +0000

Five short stories with contemporary settings. In New York, people are indifferent to derelicts sleeping on sidewalks, to a woman’s assault in front of an apartment building, and to a couple injured in a car crash. A man, stripped of his identity, dies in bed with actors expressing his agony. A cheerful, innocent young man walking a city street in a time of war pays a price for this innocence. A couple talks about cinema while it watches another couple talk of love and truth on the eve of one character’s return to Cuba. Striking students take over a university classroom; an argument follows about revolution or incremental change.