Courtesy Of Neon
JAIL TALES Koné plays a newcomer to a dreaded prison who must spin stories to survive in Lacôte s gritty fable. Our streaming entertainment options are overwhelming and not always easy to sort through. This week, I watched a prison drama from Ivory Coast that was short-listed for the 2021 Academy Awards. An inventive blend of realism and fable,
Night of the Kings streams through the Vermont International Film Foundation s Virtual Cinema through April 15. Find more info at vtiff.org.
The deal In most prisons, the warden s word is law. In Abidjan s notorious La MACA prison, we re told, the inmates themselves choose their king. For years, that has been Blackbeard (Steve Tientcheu), but now illness has painted a target on his forehead. Tradition requires an ailing king to surrender his throne and his life, but Blackbeard won t go down without a f
Christal Brown (left) and Lida Winfield in Same but Different
1. Compare and Contrast Christal Brown and Lida Winfield have a lot in common: They re both Vermonters, dance artists and Middlebury College faculty members. But in some things they contrast, including their race, geographical origins and experiences in education. Brown and Winfield team up in the dance and spoken-word duet
Same but Different, in which they explore their similarities and differences and comment on race, age and gender. A Q&A with the artists follows a free broadcast on Friday, April 2, at 7:30 p.m., presented as part of the Middlebury Performing Arts Series Spring 2021 Virtual Season.
Courtesy Of Briarcliff Entertainment
FALL FROM GRACE Fogel s documentary explores how Khashoggi (shown with Cengiz) went from being a Saudi insider to an alleged assassination victim. Our streaming entertainment options are overwhelming and not always easy to sort through. This week, the Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival and Vermont International Film Foundation present a new installment of their Split/Screen virtual cinema program, this one curated by MNFF. (Find more info and tickets at middfilmfest.org.) I watched
The Dissident, a ripped-from-the-headlines documentary about the murder of
Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Director Bryan Fogel also made the Oscar-winning sports-doping exposé
On TOSH (2018) published by City Lights Books:
TOSH is a memoir of growing up as the son of an enigmatic, much-admired, hermetic, and ruthlessly bohemian artist during the waning years of the Beat Generation and the heyday of hippie counterculture.
FILMS: Selected film and tv clips, and full length screening of
Aleph (1958-1976) Wallace Berman 7:43’ and a restored film by one Berman’s art world contemporaries. TRT 120 minutes.
BIO:
Tosh: Growing up in Wallace Berman’s World (2019).