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Anthropologist Margaret Mead is rumored to have said, “Always remember that you are absolutely unique…just like everyone else,” and judging by the distinctive stories on offer at the Margaret Mead Film & Video Festival (November 11 to 14, 2010), the programmers indeed remembered.
Not that you won’t find shared themes amidst all that diversity.
Marking its 34th year, the Mead will once again spotlight global documentaries under the auspices of Manhattan’s American Museum of Natural History. According to Artistic and Festival Director Ariella Ben-Dov, many of this year’s selections show communities coalescing around a critical challenge, even one that threatens their way of life.
The Opening night film is Plug & Pray/Von Computern und anderen Menschen, directed by Judith Malek-Mahdavi and Jens Schanze. The film advances Joseph Weizenbaum, a pioneer of artificial intelligence who questions the scientific assumptions that technology can trump biology.
You can find everything in New York City, as the cliché goes, but until now – with the November 3 to 9, 2010 launching of DOC NYC -- it has lacked a major documentary film festival. (The 90s saw DocFest, but it’s been a while.) If Durham, North Carolina can have a Full Frame and if Missoula, Montana can have a Big Sky, surely the greatest city on earth can have a five-day salute to non-fiction cinema.
At least that’s what artistic director Thom Powers and executive director Raphaela Neihausen reasoned when this programming pair decided to expand their weekly IFC Center series, Stranger Than Fiction, into a festival format.
The 31st Valencia International Film Festival (Mostra de Valencia) begins this Friday and runs for over a week, from October 15-23, 2010. This city on the coast of the Spanish Mediterranean is home to a host of arts centers and museums, constructed over the last 20 years in a concerted effort to widen its worldwide appeal.
This year, the festival highlights action and adventure films, and among the special events is a tribute to Wolfgang Peterson whose films screening in this retrospective are: