Local independent film fans jonesing for the return of Cinema 320 can check out the Frances Perkins Branch of the Worcester Public Library’s “Fourth Friday Films,” a rich assortment of some of the best unseen films from around the world. The line-up through April 2008 is as follows:
Friday, December 28 @ 7:00 PM
THE WAY I SPENT THE END OF THE WORLD
Bucharest 1989 – Last year of Ceausescu’s dictatorship. Eva, 17, lives with her parents and her 7 year-old brother Lalalilu. One day at school, Eva and her boyfriend accidentally break a bust of Ceausescu. They are forced to confess their crime before a disciplinary committee. Eva is expelled from school and transferred to a reformatory establishment. There she meets Andrei and decides to escape Romania with him. Lalalilu is more and more convinced that Ceausescu is the main reason for Eva’s decision to leave. So, with his friends from school, he devises a plan to kill the dictator. (Drama; Romania; 106 minutes)
Friday, January 25 @ 7:00 PM
DREAMS OF DUST
Mocktar, a Nigerian peasant, comes looking for work in Essakane, a dusty gold mine in Northeast Burkina Faso, Africa, where he hopes to forget the past that haunts him. In Essakane, he quickly finds out, the gold rush ended twenty years before, and the inhabitants of this wasteland and strange timelessness manage to exist simply from force of habit. The beautiful Coumba, however, is still courageously struggling to raise her daughter after the death of her family. Mocktar will soon be fighting not only to survive, but also to provide a better future for this mother and her child. (Drama; Burkina Faso/Canada/France; 86 minutes)
Friday, February 22 @ 7:00 PM
ADAM’S APPLES
Ivan is an insanely optimistic preacher who takes in convicts to help around the remote, rural church he ministers to. His current charges are a psychotic Saudi immigrant addicted to robbing gas stations and an alcoholic tennis pro convicted of sexual assault. His newest “helper” is Adam, a vicious neo-Nazi anxiously biding his time before he can return to hell-raising. Asked to set a goal for his stay, Adam sarcastically answers that he’d like to bake a cake. Ivan cheerfully takes that statement at face value and puts him in charge of the parish’s pride and joy: the only apple tree in the vicinity. Grasping the extent of Ivan’s crazed, preternatural determination to look on the bright side of everything - Adam immediately decides to shake him out of his rose-colored stupor. (Dark Comedy; Denmark; 94 minutes)
Friday, March 28 @ 7:00 PM
HER NAME IS SABINE
An intelligent, moving and beautiful portrait of Sabine, a 38-year-old autistic woman, filmed by her sister, the famous French actress Sandrine Bonnaire. Through personal footage filmed over a period of 25 years, it is revealed that Sabine’s growth and many talents were crushed by improper diagnosis and an inadequate care structure. After a tragic five-year stay in a psychiatric hospital, Sabine finally finds a new lease on life in a home together with other young people living with similar mental and emotional illnesses. This very intimate film also sends an urgent message to a society that still does not know how to properly take care of its citizens with physical and psychological disabilities. (Documentary; France; 85 minutes)
Friday, April 25 @ 7:00 PM
ARRANGED
Ditmas Park, Brooklyn. A young Orthodox woman, ROCHEL MESHENBERG, is about to begin her first year as a special education teacher at the local public school. She is also about to embark on what her father and mother call the “most exciting time of her life” – the process of finding a husband via the time-tested method of using a “shadchen,” or matchmaker.
As the school year gets underway, Rochel meets NASIRA KHALDI, a Muslim woman of Syrian descent. Nasira is also a first-year teacher. The two young women – Rochel in long skirt and conservative blouse, Nasira in headscarf – stand out in this public school context. The principal, a secular Westchester Jew, is forever reminding them that although they are some of her smartest, most gifted teachers, they are also stunted by their outmoded customs, religions, and by their patriarchal worldviews. She tells them of her experiences in the women’s movement and her desire to see them reach their full potentials.
As the school year progresses, Rochel and Nasira realize they share much in common, not least of which is that they are both going through what the outside world would call “arranged marriages.” As their friendship deepens, they are exposed to their respective worlds. They prepare for school at one another’s houses, meet one another’s families, and discuss commonalities and differences.
Meanwhile they are also both meeting potential spouses. Rochel is having no luck. The shadchen is pairing her with men who, although they have good jobs or prospects, don’t match her in intellect, curiosity in the world, or humor. The men presented to Nasira by her family are also not her equal. Rochel begins to question whether this age-old practice is going to work. Nasira has greater faith, as she views her parent’s loving union as such a success.
With the family pressure too great, and the dates continuing to go badly, Rochel storms from the house. She visits an estranged cousin, who left the faith years ago, and is exposed to what a secular life might be. Meanwhile Nasira, concerned at her friend’s state, and having met a promising prospect herself, does the unthinkable. She manipulates the Orthodox matchmaking system on behalf of her friend. The gamble pays off.
As the school year draws to an end, these two women have found their future spouses. They have also developed a friendship that transcends their insular Brooklyn communities and the religions that seem so at odds in the broader world. They share a friendship that will endure as they move on to become wives and mothers, and continue to be modern women with deep religious convictions.
(Drama; USA; 89 minutes)
The Frances Perkins Branch Library is located at 470 West Boylston St., Worcester, and can be reached by phone at (508) 799-1687.