PROGRAM NOTES
MARCH - APRIL - MAY 2008




MARCH 28 - APRIL 10 (TWO WEEKS):
TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE
MARCH 28 - APRIL 3: 4:15, 6:30, 8:45
APRIL 4 - 10: 3:15*, 5:30, 7:45 *NOTE: NO 3:15 MATINEE FRIDAY APRIL 4
“We also have to work through...the dark side...it’s going to be vital for us to use
any means at our disposal, basically, to achieve our objective.”
- Vice President Dick Cheney to Tim Russert on “Meet the Press” (September, 2001)
Dir. Alex Gibney - 2007 - 106m
The Academy Award winner for Best Documentary 2007 premieres at the Guild Cinema! From the director of Guild hit ENRON: THE SMARTEST GUYS IN THE ROOM, Alex Gibney’s TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE is a gripping investigation into the reckless abuse of power by the Bush Administration. By probing the homicide of an innocent taxi driver at the Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, the film exposes a worldwide policy of detention and interrogation that condones torture and the abrogation of human rights. This disturbing and often brutal film is the most incisive examination to date of the Bush Administration’s willingness, in its prosecution of the “war on terror,” to undermine the essence of the rule of law. The film asks and answers a key question: what happens when a few men expand the wartime powers of the executive to undermine the very principles on which the United States was founded? Incorporating rare and never-before-seen images from inside the Bagram, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay prisons, and interviews with former government officials such as John Yoo, Alberto Mora and Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, interrogators, prison guards, New York Times reporters Tim Golden and Carlotta Gall (who wrote the first stories about the homicides in Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan) and the families of tortured prisoners, the film dissects the progression of the Administration’s policy on torture from the secret role of key administration figures, such as Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales and others to the soldiers in the field. This increasingly shocking information is conveyed gradually via facts, not as heart-tugging “message” filmmaking - the result is an astounding, complex indictment of a government and its policies, as well of as the officers who escaped scrutiny while subordinates were prosecuted. In the face of thousands of prisoners passing through the system, an astonishing number of admitted homicides, and a hastily drafted law – the Military Commissions Act – that grants immunity to government officials for crimes against humanity while denying the fundamental right of habeas corpus to others, TAXI TO THE DARK SIDE forces us to ask why, in the face of so much evidence of the ineffectiveness of cruelty as a means of obtaining information, we sought to insist on its use?
View a trailer here: http://www.taxitothedarkside.com/



MARCH 28 & 29 (FRI & SAT): 11:00 PM
Alibi Midnight Movie Madness Presents
TEETH
All Seats $7
Dir. Mitchell Lichtenstein - 2007 - 88m
High school student Dawn works hard at suppressing her budding sexuality by being the local chastity group's most active participant. Her task is made even more difficult by her bad boy stepbrother Brad's increasingly provocative behavior at home. A stranger to her own body, innocent Dawn discovers she has a toothed vagina when she becomes the object of violence. As she struggles to comprehend her anatomical uniqueness, Dawn experiences both the pitfalls and the power of being a living example of the vagina dentata myth. One might expect a movie with this concept to be broad, stupid, campy "Troma" material all the way. But in the hands of writer/director Mitchell Lichtenstein and a stellar cast, TEETH (against all odds) ends up being one of the most witty, intelligent and darkly insightful looks at young womanhood in years.



APRIL 4 & 5 (FRI & SAT): 10:00, 12:00 MIDNIGHT
FUGUE STATE
Dir. Tim McClelland - 2007 - 96m
After an outbreak of the Amnesia Plague, civilization is reduced to violent chaos. Luis, a security guard, escapes the city and travels across the desert in search of his wife, Cassandra. He finds her in the care of a makeshift "Family," all of whom seem to be infected by the disease, but none willing to admit it. Cassandra cryptically says she has been waiting for Luis to arrive, but seems to have no memories of him or the past at all. Luis tries to lead Cassandra out of her fugue, but is his own memory as reliable as he thinks?
View a trailer at www.fuguestatethemovie.com



APRIL 11 - 17 (FRIDAY THROUGH THURSDAY): 4:30, 6:15, 8:00* *NOTE: NO 8:00 SHOW TUESDAY APRIL 15
PARANOID PARK
Dir. Gus Van Sant - 2008 - 78m
Paranoid Park is a swooping skateboarding free zone where young men learn to fly. It’s also the title of Gus Van Sant’s most recent film, a haunting, voluptuously beautiful portrait of a teenage boy who, after being suddenly caught in midflight, falls to earth. Like most of Van Sant’s films, PARANOID PARK is about bodies at rest and in motion, and about longing, beauty, youth and death, and as such as much about the artist as his subject. It is a modestly scaled triumph without a false or wasted moment. The boy in PARANOID PARK, Alex (the newcomer Gabe Nevins), lives and skates in Portland, Ore., where one evening he is implicated in the brutal death of a security guard. In adapting the young-adult novel by Blake Nelson, Van Sant has retained much of the story — a man dies, Alex writes it all down — but has reshuffled the original’s chain of events to create an elliptical narrative that continually folds back on itself. Shortly after the film opens, you see Alex writing the words Paranoid Park in a notebook, a gesture that appears to set off a flurry of seemingly disconnected visuals — boys leaping through the air in slow motion, clouds racing across the sky in fast — that piece together only later. With his on-and-off narration and pencil, Alex is effectively shaping this story, but in his own singular voice. (“I’m writing this a little out of order. Sorry. I didn’t do so well in creative writing.”) Although you regularly hear that voice — at times in Alex’s surprisingly childish, unmodulated recitation, at times in dialogue with other characters — you mostly experience it visually, as if you were watching a still-evolving film unwinding in the boy’s head. Mr. Van Sant isn’t simply trying to take us inside another person’s consciousness; he’s also exploring the byways, dead ends, pitfalls and turning points in the geography of conscience, which makes the recurrent image of the skate park — with its perilous ledges, its soaring ramps and fleetingly liberated bodies — extraordinarily powerful. Gus Van Sant has always made a home for lost boys, from River Phoenix’s wanderer in MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO to the ghostly Kurt Cobain figure who roams through LAST DAYS, those downy, itinerant beauties whose words stick to their tongues and whose pain seems as bottomless as their eyes. In some respects Paranoid Park represents adulthood; the critic Amy Taubin has provocatively suggested to Van Sant that the film’s subtext is that of a gay initiation. (He didn’t disagree.) Both readings are ripe for the picking. But what strikes me the hardest about PARANOID PARK is the intimacy, the love — carnal, paternal, human — of Van Sant’s expansive, embracing vision. No one is ever really ready for Paranoid Park, but neither do you have to go there alone. - Manohla Dargis, THE NEW YORK TIMES
View a trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdK4ut4QLsU



APRIL 11 & 12 (FRIDAY & SATURDAY): 9:45 PM START!
Alibi Midnight Movie Madness Presents
1960’s JAPANESE GRINDHOUSE double feature!
Two films for the price of one - $7 all seats
THE BITE - Dir. Hiroshi Mukai - 1965 - 62m
Directed by Hiroshi Mukai (TOKYO DEEP THROAT), this rarely-screened Japanese exploitation gem takes a scandalous peek into the steamy life of a hot young gigolo. Watch as he seduces beautiful Japanese girls then makes love to them as they are secretly watched by the rich clients of his high society madam. When a parent falls ill and will die without an operation, he must resort to every dirty secret in his bag of tricks to raise the money. THE BITE will excite the senses with steamy sex, clever twists and unexpected turns.
SLAVE WIDOW - Dir. Mamuru Watanabe - 1967 - 73m
An erotic soap opera from the director of TOKYO DESIRE, starring Mari Iwai as a widow forced to become the mistress of her late husband's creditor. Notable for its soft-core erotic sequences, which are successfully intense not because of any explicitness (the nudity is very tame), but thanks to their focus on the woman's ecstasy (surprising even herself) and the shadowy closeups of merging flesh. An interesting Eastern counterpoint to Joe Sarno's American contributions to the genre of the same era.



APRIL 18 - 21 (FRIDAY THROUGH MONDAY): 4:30, 6:30, 8:30
ACADEMY AWARD NOMINATED ANIMATED SHORTS 2007
Part One of our annual Oscar Nominated Shorts series, presenting the animated entries:
I MET THE WALRUS - Dir. Josh Raskin - Canada – 5m
In 1969, fourteen-year-old Jerry Levitan snuck into John Lennon’s hotel room with his tape recorder and persuaded him to do an interview.
MADAME TUTLI-PUTLI - Dirs. Chris Lavis & Maciek Szczerbowski - Canada – 17m
A timid woman boards a mysterious night train and has a series of frightening experiences.
MEME LES PIGEONS VONT AU PARADIS (EVEN PIGEONS GO TO HEAVEN) -
Dirs. Samuel Tourneux & Simon Vanesse - France – 9m
A priest tries to sell an old man a machine that he promises will transport him to heaven.
MY LOVE (MOYA LYUBOV) - Dir. Alexander Petrov - Russia – 27m - Russian with English subtitles In nineteenth-century Russia, a teenage boy in search of love is drawn to two very different women.
PETER & THE WOLF - Dirs. Suzie Templeton & Hugh Welchman - UK & Poland -
27m, Silent A young boy and his animal friends face a hungry wolf in Prokofiev’s classic musical piece. (TOTAL RUNNING TIME: 90m)



APRIL 20 (SUNDAY): 12:00 NOON
Basement Films & UNM Dept. of Cinematic Arts Presents
EXPERIMENTS IN CINEMA 3.0 - Director Scott Stark in Person
Experiments in Cinema v.3.0 presents an afternoon of international experimental cinema from Singapore, Canada, China, Germany and New Mexico. Additionally, legendary experimentalist Scott Stark will present a program of his short films. Stark, born and educated in the midwest, has always been interested in aggressively pushing his work beyond the threshold of traditional viewing expectations, challenging the audience to question its relationship to the cinematic process; yet he also tries to build into the work elements of humor and incongruity that allow the viewer an entryway into the work while maintaining a critical distance.



APRIL 22 - 25 (TUESDAY THROUGH FRIDAY) 3:10, 5:45, 8:35
ACADEMY AWARD NOMINATED LIVE ACTION SHORTS 2007
Part Two of our annual Oscar Nominated Shorts series: the Live Action entries.
AT NIGHT - Dirs. Christian E. Christiansen & Louise Vesth - Denmark - 40m - Danish with English subtitles
Three young women share their problems while spending the holidays in a hospital cancer ward.
IL SUPPLENTE (THE SUBSTITUTE) - Dir. Andrea Jublin - Italy - 17m - Italian with English subtitles
The arrival of an unusual newcomer galvanizes the students in a high school classroom.
LE MOZART DES PICKPOCKETS (THE MOZART OF PICKPOCKETS) - Dir. Philippe Pollet-Villard - France - 31m - French with English subtitles
A pair of unlucky thieves find their fortunes have changed when they take in a deaf homeless boy.
TANGHI ARGENTINI - Dirs. Guido Thys & Anja Daelemans - 13m - Belgium - French with English subtitles
A man who must learn to dance the tango in two weeks asks an office colleague for help.
THE TONTO WOMAN - Dirs. Daniel Barber & Matthew Brown - UK - 36m
A cattle rustler meets a woman who is living in isolation after being held prisoner for eleven years by the Mojave Indians.
(TOTAL RUNNING TIME: 137m)



APRIL 25 & 26 (FRIDAY & SATURDAY):
PLEASE NOTE CORRECTED SHOWTIMES! FRIDAY: 11:00 / SATURDAY: 10:30
Alibi Midnight Movie Madness Presents
HEAVY METAL
All Seats $7



APRIL 26 & 27 (SATURDAY & SUNDAY): 1:30 PM
WEEKEND NON-FICTION
ABSOLUTELY SAFE
All Seats $5
Dir. Carol Ciancutti-Levya - 2007 - 90m
At a time when more women than ever are getting breast implants, fewer voices than ever seem to be asking “Why?” And fewer still are asking “Are they safe?” ABSOLUTELY SAFE takes an open-minded, personal approach to the controversy over breast implant safety. Ultimately, ABSOLUTELY SAFE is the story of everyday women who find themselves and their breasts in the tangled and confusing intersection of health, money, science, and beauty. At its heart, ABSOLUTELY SAFE is driven by the experience of the filmmaker’s own mother. Diagnosed in 1974 with breast tumors, Audrey Ciancutti underwent a double mastectomy with silicone-implant reconstruction surgery. A year later, her implants ruptured, and soon after, her health steadily declined. Like thousands of other women, Audrey believes her debilitating illnesses—joint pain, chronic fatigue, scleroderma-- are linked to her breast implants; however, most doctors and researchers deny this link. Among the debate by plastic surgeons, toxicologists, attorneys, implant manufacturers, whistle blowers, government officials and activists, ABSOLUTELY SAFE introduces more everyday women like Audrey who make choices about their breasts in our appearance-driven culture.
View a trailer here: http://www.absolutelysafe.com/trailer.html


APRIL 26 - 29 (SATURDAY THROUGH TUESDAY): 4:30, 6:30, 8:30
BOMB IT
Dir. Jon Reiss - 2007 - 93m
BOMB IT is a new documentary exploring the most subversive and controversial art form currently shaping international youth culture: graffiti. While some believe the roots of graffiti can be traced back to pre-linguistic cave markings and the innate human need for self-expression, graffiti remains a highly controversial issue. Graffiti raises important questions that delve deep into our contemporary social structure such as: Who has the right to express themselves? What is a canvas? Where should art take place? If public space is a forum for discussion, which voices will be heard? Using a myriad of original interviews from around the world as well as guerilla footage of graffiti writers in action, BOMB IT tells the story of contemporary graffiti from its roots in ancient rock paintings through Picasso to Latino placas through its notorious emergence as a visual adjunct to the rise of hip hop culture in 1970’s New York City, culminating in its current, varied and highly complex form. In 2006 we are as likely to encounter graffiti-influenced art in the Smithsonian as we are on an urban bus ride. How did this radical street art evolve into the ultimate signifier of urban cool? BOMB IT explores how graffiti has developed worldwide to encompass stenciling, postering, and any unsanctioned graphic “interference” in public space. The controversy surrounding graffiti is an integral part of the story: from anti-tagging groups, to the impact of New York City's infamous “Quality of Life” laws which directly targeted illicit writing, to the proliferation of these laws throughout the world. BOMB IT also shows how graffiti writers vary in their attitudes to gallery pieces, commissioned work and the effect "sanctioned' writing has on the roots of the art in guerilla tactics and its essentially subversive nature.
View a trailer here: http://bombit-themovie.com/trailer.php
ART ON FILM: Co-Presented with Albuquerque Art Business Association, abqARTS and Working Classroom.



APRIL 30 - MAY 2 (WEDNESDAY THROUGH FRIDAY): THE GUILD'S BIGGEST HIT EVER IS BACK!
1:30, 4:15, 7:00
LA VIE EN ROSE
Dir. Olivier Dahan - 2006 - 140m - In French with English Subtitles
A swirling, impressionistic portrait of an artist who regretted nothing, writer-director Olivier Dahan’s LA VIE EN ROSE stars 2007 Academy Award winner Marion Cotillard (A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT, A GOOD YEAR) in a blazing performance as the legendary French icon Edith Piaf. Perhaps finding her nearest American analogues in figures such as Judy Garland and Billie Holiday, the tragic story of the world-famous chanteuse is worthy of a 19th Century novel by Zola or Balzac. Born into abject poverty, surrounded by street performers, hookers, and pimps, Piaf’s magical voice made her a star on both sides of the Atlantic. From the mean streets of the Belleville district of Paris to the dazzling limelight of New York’s most famous concert halls, Piaf’s life was a constant battle to sing and survive, to live and love. LA VIE EN ROSE co-stars Gerard Depardieu, Emmanuelle Seigner, and Jean Paul Rouve.
View a trailer here:http://www.edithpiafmovie.com/



MAY 3 (SATURDAY): 3:30, 5:00, 6:30
ENCORE SCREENING!
OFF THE GRID
Dirs. Jeremy Stulberg and Randy Stulberg - 2008 - 70m
Gulf War vets, teenage runaways, the mentally ill and the socially disenchanted make up the population of the Mesa, a 16-square-mile patch of New Mexico that provided brother-sister directors Randy and Jeremy Stulberg fertile ground for their insightful study of an alternative American lifestyle. The inhabitants of the Mesa, an undeveloped, virtually unreachable expanse of sand and scrub brush, have a system and a code that prevent their small civilization from collapsing into total chaos. “Don't steal from your neighbor,” one Mesa-ite says. “Don't shoot your neighbor.” Which doesn’t seem so remote a possibility, given the number of guns on display and the propensity the residents have for firing them. The Stulbergs, whose film’s stunning look is a combination of good cinematography and a majestic New Mexican landscape, achieved marvelous access to what has to be a very closed and insular community, given where and how the inhabitants choose to live. The various characters come to vivid life as crises large, small and unresolved are explored, and the directors never pretend that what they’re portraying is utopia. OFF THE GRID is about a community that is more than a little in need of help, but has no inclination to ever ask for any. - John Anderson, VARIETY
View a trailer at: http://www.stillpointpictures.com/

MAY 8 - 11 (THURSDAY THROUGH SUNDAY): 3:45, 6:00, 8:15
COMMITTING POETRY IN TIMES OF WAR
Dir. stavros - 2007 - 114m
This new documentary is a poetic glance at a community’s creative response to a series of teacher firings, taking place in the context of police brutality and restrictive free speech zones - a nation at war abroad and with its people. When the bombs began to fall on Iraq in 2003, Albuquerque Youth Poetry Slam Team Coach, Bill Nevins, was suspended and later fired from his teaching job, while his outspoken High School Poetry Team was silenced. Nevins was the last of seven area educators removed by fearful administrations seeking to quell debate and expression by students. Days after Nevins’ removal, brutal police tactics on anti-war protesters emerged as the latest attempt at silencing these voices. Yet out of this fire arose a committed community of courageous poets, and musicians. They came together across the country and was dubbed Poetic Justice.  It defied the fear tactics of the day to support and model freedom of speech and stand with the fired teacher. The voices from Poetic Justice, and the resulting film, stand as a testament to our creative spirit and an affirmation of the power of our words - a path toward transformation and hope in these troubling times.
View a trailer here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwAMpgl7vz8



MAY 9 & 10 (FRIDAY & SATURDAY): 11:00 PM
Alibi Midnight Movie Madness Presents: THE ORIGINAL - IN 35MM!!
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD
All Seats $7
Dir. George Romero - 1968 - 95m
The original zombie horror classic has lost none of its power 40 years after initial release. An unexplained plague has resulted in the dead coming to life, and a small and disparate group of survivors find themselves holed up in a rural farmhouse, trying to fend off the onslaught of flesh-eating monsters while wrestling with their own inner demons. This is a recent 35mm print of this black and white classic, which was mainly seen in poor, grainy prints for decades.

MAY 10 & 11 (SATURDAY & SUNDAY): 2:00 PM
AlbuquerqueARTS and Albuquerque Art Business Association Present ART ON FILM
ALICE NEEL
All Seats $5
Dir. Andrew Neel - 2007 - 81m
Filmmaker Andrew Neel explores the life and art of his grandmother, celebrated American painter Alice Neel, in a lovingly crafted documentary that focuses on the same subjects of intimacy and family so prevalent in the work of his subject. A single mother whose defiance of convention fueled a dynamic creativity that helped her to overcome the limitations imposed on her as a female artist, Neel's life is explored not only through photographs and interviews with family members, art historians, and her own subjects, but by personal recollections that effectively allow the artist to tell her own unique story. With extensive access to Neel's archives granted exclusively to the filmmaker and footage of the painter shot by video artist Michael Auder, Alice Neel offers greater insight than ever into the woman whose remarkable portraits still possess the power to move and inspire.
View a trailer here: http://www.aliceneelfilm.com/trailer.html



MAY 12 - 14 (MONDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY): 4:30, 6:30, 8:30
PERSEPOLIS
Dirs. Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud - 2007 - 95m
In English and French, Persian and German with English Subtitles
PERSEPOLIS presents a deeply personal coming-of-age tale about finding one’s place in the world. Based on her bestselling graphic novel, Marjane Satrapi teamed up with underground comic book artist Vincent Paronnaud to co-direct this animated big screen adaptation. The result is an electrifying, heartfelt, and original portrait of a spunky girl who surmounts countless obstacles to grow into a wise young adult. Marjane (voiced by Chiara Mastroianni) is an innocent nine-year-old living in Iran, surrounded by a loving but incredibly protective mother (Catherine Deneuve) and father (Simon Abkarian). When Marjane’s uncle is killed in the Iran/Iraq war, her parents send her to school in Austria, where she can study in safety. The only trouble is that her Middle Eastern appearance frightens people, giving her a harsh lesson in racial prejudice. Satrapi and Paronnaud retain the stark, spare animated style of the graphic novels that inspired the film. This is a wise decision: the less specific they get in their visual presentation, the more universal their story becomes. PERSEPOLIS gives viewers several movies in one. It is equal parts coming-of-age story, history lesson, and an animated adventure tale.
View a trailer here: http://www.sonypictures.com/classics/persepolis/



MAY 15 - 18 (THURSDAY THROUGH SUNDAY):
NM FILMMAKERS SHOWCASE 2008
View the Complete Schedule Here
The Fourth Annual New Mexico Filmmakers Showcase is a non-juried, non-competitive series of open screenings designed to expose and celebrate the work of New Mexico filmmakers. The four-day event offers local directors, producers and screenwriters a chance to have their short or feature-length work shown publicly on the big screen at the Guild Cinema. All screenings will be free to attend and there is no entry fee to submit a film. Narrative, documentary, animated and experimental films will be accepted. For the second year, favorite films selected by the audience (and then by a panel of local filmmakers) will also be shown in three New Mexico cities in summer, 2008. Guests will also be able to meet the filmmakers at a gathering at Laru, located at 3413 Central Avenue NE in Albuquerque (three doors down from the Guild), from 6:00 to 7:00 on opening night, May 15. Visit www.nmfilm.com for more information.



Main Page