FREE SCREENING Saturday, August 13th, 2:30-4:30 PM at the Ober Park Performance Room
After film discussion moderated by Bill Moyer of Backbone Campaign
via PBS.org:
Beverly May and Terry Ratliff grew up like kin on opposite sides of a mountain ridge in eastern Kentucky. Now in their 50s, the two find themselves in the midst of a debate dividing their community and the world: who controls, consumes, and benefits from our planet’s shrinking supply of natural resources?
While Beverly organizes her neighbors to stop a coal mining company from advancing into her hollow, Terry considers signing away the mining rights to his backyard — a decision that could destroy both of their homes. Their once-peaceful mountain community of Maytown finds itself in the center of a contentious battle over energy and the wealth and environmental destruction it represents.
As the world’s population soars, humankind must keep digging deeper and deeper down for the earth’s natural resources to feed our voracious appetite for energy — fighting wars over diminishing supplies of water, oil, and coal. But it is not only the earth itself that is rapidly changing and disappearing: as we excavate resources in ever-expanding areas, small communities are being flattened, taking with them our world’s diverse cultures, traditions, and lives.
Through a complex human story that cuts across environment, economics, public policy, and culture, the story of Beverly May and Terry Ratliff reveals the devastating impact of our energy consumption against an explosive backdrop: Appalachia’s centuries-old struggle over the black rock that fuels our planet.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Community Cinema Vashon presents: The Calling
FREE SCREENING Sunday, August 14th, 3-5PM at the Ober Park Performance Room
Father Mark of St. John Vianney will host a moderated discussion after the film, which will be followed by a potluck picnic in the park celebrating the end of the first season of Community Cinema.
(Note: this preview is for the 4 hour miniseries version. Some scenes/characters won't appear in the
1.5 hour version Community Cinema will be showing)
A look at young Americans — Christian, Jewish, Catholic, and Muslim — preparing to become the nation’s next generation of religious leaders, The Calling explores the forces that are drawing young people to serve their communities and their faith.
Embarking on life paths that demand tremendous personal sacrifice and commitment, these seminarians must uphold timeless truths in an era that values quick fixes and hot trends, and face a public that challenges the very relevance of their mission. A new look at an old job, The Calling takes viewers into the unknown world of seminaries to tell entertaining and compelling personal stories of how faith is lived today.
The Calling intercuts its characters’ stories from their first days of training, through years of study, and into their early practice as religious professionals. We follow them within and beyond the walls of their schools, confronting the sacrifices they’ve made to pursue this path. We see them debate theology and philosophy, learn to deliver sermons, perform their first weddings and funerals, and counsel people in crisis. We also experience them as young people at the crossroads of their lives, struggling with dating, partners, family, and other challenges of “coming of age.”
Father Mark of St. John Vianney will host a moderated discussion after the film, which will be followed by a potluck picnic in the park celebrating the end of the first season of Community Cinema.
(Note: this preview is for the 4 hour miniseries version. Some scenes/characters won't appear in the
1.5 hour version Community Cinema will be showing)
via ITVS.org:
A look at young Americans — Christian, Jewish, Catholic, and Muslim — preparing to become the nation’s next generation of religious leaders, The Calling explores the forces that are drawing young people to serve their communities and their faith.
Embarking on life paths that demand tremendous personal sacrifice and commitment, these seminarians must uphold timeless truths in an era that values quick fixes and hot trends, and face a public that challenges the very relevance of their mission. A new look at an old job, The Calling takes viewers into the unknown world of seminaries to tell entertaining and compelling personal stories of how faith is lived today.
The Calling intercuts its characters’ stories from their first days of training, through years of study, and into their early practice as religious professionals. We follow them within and beyond the walls of their schools, confronting the sacrifices they’ve made to pursue this path. We see them debate theology and philosophy, learn to deliver sermons, perform their first weddings and funerals, and counsel people in crisis. We also experience them as young people at the crossroads of their lives, struggling with dating, partners, family, and other challenges of “coming of age.”
These young people are charismatic and real, driven and self-reflective, confident and humble. They are seeking to reconcile the modern world and their faith through music and activism; balancing their egos and their desire to serve and blazing new paths to leadership while conserving age-old traditions.
project is that equal to the characters’ religious mission is their zeal
to serve their fellow human beings. What unified this group, which
is so varied in background, faith, and approach to their work, is their
call to make the world a better place. Similarly, the word “calling,”
which was once only understood to be a holy pursuit, is commonly
used today to describe a passion or compulsion, but usually from a
place of selflessness or giving.
And herein lies what I hope that viewers will take away from this
film. The Calling’s stories portray lives not so different from all of
ours. The characters are struggling to find their way in this complex
world, but they are making a stand for what they believe in. This
is not beyond or above any of us. All of us — atheist, agnostic and
religious, young and old— can connect to these stories and use them
to ask ourselves: What do I believe in? What questions do I want to
understand? What gives me passion? How can I give back? What is
my calling?"
— director Danny Alpert
The United States is one of the most religiously observant and spiritually diverse countries in the world, yet mainstream media has surprisingly underrepresented the significance of faith in our lives, and our pluralism has been explored almost exclusively in terms of race and culture. Documentaries that have been produced on faith often focus on single faiths, church scandals, fundamentalist extremists, or religion’s polarizing effect on society. The Calling underscores our spiritual common ground and offers intimate portraits that provide a fresh, nuanced portrayal of faith in America.
FROM THE FILMMAKER
"One of the many things I have learned in the years I spent on thisproject is that equal to the characters’ religious mission is their zeal
to serve their fellow human beings. What unified this group, which
is so varied in background, faith, and approach to their work, is their
call to make the world a better place. Similarly, the word “calling,”
which was once only understood to be a holy pursuit, is commonly
used today to describe a passion or compulsion, but usually from a
place of selflessness or giving.
And herein lies what I hope that viewers will take away from this
film. The Calling’s stories portray lives not so different from all of
ours. The characters are struggling to find their way in this complex
world, but they are making a stand for what they believe in. This
is not beyond or above any of us. All of us — atheist, agnostic and
religious, young and old— can connect to these stories and use them
to ask ourselves: What do I believe in? What questions do I want to
understand? What gives me passion? How can I give back? What is
my calling?"
— director Danny Alpert
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Community Cinema Vashon and DoVE Project present "Me Facing Life: Cyntoia’s Story"
Sunday, July 24th at Ober Park, 3-5PM
via ITVS.org
via ITVS.org
In 2004, Cyntoia Brown was arrested for murder. There was no question that a 43-year-old man is dead and that she killed him. What mystified filmmaker Daniel Birman was just how common violence among youth is, and just how rarely we stop to question our assumptions about it. He wondered in this case what led a girl — who grew-up in a reasonable home environment — to this tragic end?
Me Facing Life: Cyntoia’s Story explores Cyntoia’s life. The camera first glimpses her the week of her arrest at age 16 and follows her for nearly six years. Along the way, nationally renown juvenile forensic psychiatrist, Dr. William Bernet from Vanderbilt University, assesses her situation. We meet Ellenette Brown, Cyntoia’s adoptive mother who talks about the young girl’s early years. Georgina Mitchell, Cyntoia’s biological mother, meets her for the first time since she gave her up for adoption 14 years earlier. When we meet Cyntoia’s maternal grandmother, Joan Warren, some patterns begin to come into sharp focus.
Cyntoia wrestles with her fate. She is stunningly articulate, and spends the time to put the pieces of this puzzle together with us. Cyntoia's pre-prison lifestyle was nearly indistinguishable from her mother's at the same age. History — predestined by biology and circumstance — is repeating down the generations in this family.
Cyntoia is tried as an adult, and the cameras are there when she is convicted and sentenced to life at the Tennessee Prison for Women. After the verdict, Cyntoia calls her mom to tell her the news.
In the end, we catch up with Cyntoia as she is adjusting to prison, and struggling with her identity and hope for her future.
Domestic Violence (DV) is a pattern of behavior in which a person abuses power in an attempt to gain control over another person. DV is a community issue. It exists on Vashon and is likely under-reported. What does a survivor look like? Look around you. Survivors are lawyers and shop clerks, housewives and teens. Anyone, from any background, at any age, can find themselves in a situation where they feel threateded. You are not alone.
Need immediate help? Click here.
There is a newly formed organization committed to acting as a conduit for our community to access domestic violence services primarily located off-island. The DoVE Project, a program of Vashon Youth and Family Services (VYFS) is committed to assisting DV survivors in utilizing existing resources. Through the DoVE Project, a survivor can gain access to a support-group, get help with legal procedures and speak to an advocate.
For more information, a report prepared by Shirk Grant Writing Services here identifies the issues.
If you'd like to view some pictures from the benefit at the Red Bike, click here to view them
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
"Schooling the World: The White Man's Last Burden"
Free screening
Saturday, June 18th 6PM at Cafe Luna
The film, by Emmy and Writers Guild award winning film and television writer/director Carol Black ("The Wonder Years") poses an almost heretical challenge to the long-unquestioned assumption that the western model of education and schooling improves lives wherever it goes. The movie has generated powerful, often emotional, response from its October debut at the Vancouver International Film Festival to its recent showing in Washington, D.C. at the National Geographic All Roads Film Festival.
“Every teacher and prospective teacher should watch and discuss 'Schooling the World,'” said Bill Bigelow of Rethinking Schools. And Dr. Madhu Suri Prakash, Professor of Education Philosophy at Penn State University called it “a film of profound insights and the quest for hope in the thick of much violence by mainstream cultures against the marginalized and the silenced peoples of the world,” characterizing the film as “challenging, courageous and thought provoking.”
"Schooling the World" joins the past year's spate of education-themed documentaries like "Waiting for Superman" and "Race to Nowhere.” Says producer Neal Marlens ("The Wonder Years"), “‘Waiting For Superman’ and ‘Race to Nowhere’ demonstrated the immense problems in our schools; “Schooling the World” shows what happens when we export those problems overseas.”
Black pointed to the recent allegations surrounding “Three Cups of Tea” author Greg Mortenson and his Central Asia Institute as “an opportunity to look at some of these issues more closely. People are rightly upset about Mortenson’s fabrications, but the larger fiction which goes unquestioned is his romanticized portrayal of education as a panacea for all the world’s ills, a silver bullet that in one clean shot can end poverty, terrorism, and the oppression of girls and women around the world.” Black said. “The reality is that the modern school is no silver bullet, but an extremely problematic institution which has proven highly resistant to fundamental reform. No system that discards millions of normal, healthy kids as failures – many of them extremely smart, by the way – will ever provide a lasting or universal solution to anything.”
The movie has been widely lauded for its breathtaking visual beauty and was shot largely on location in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, India.
http://schoolingtheworld.org/
Saturday, June 18th 6PM at Cafe Luna
The film, by Emmy and Writers Guild award winning film and television writer/director Carol Black ("The Wonder Years") poses an almost heretical challenge to the long-unquestioned assumption that the western model of education and schooling improves lives wherever it goes. The movie has generated powerful, often emotional, response from its October debut at the Vancouver International Film Festival to its recent showing in Washington, D.C. at the National Geographic All Roads Film Festival.
“Every teacher and prospective teacher should watch and discuss 'Schooling the World,'” said Bill Bigelow of Rethinking Schools. And Dr. Madhu Suri Prakash, Professor of Education Philosophy at Penn State University called it “a film of profound insights and the quest for hope in the thick of much violence by mainstream cultures against the marginalized and the silenced peoples of the world,” characterizing the film as “challenging, courageous and thought provoking.”
"Schooling the World" joins the past year's spate of education-themed documentaries like "Waiting for Superman" and "Race to Nowhere.” Says producer Neal Marlens ("The Wonder Years"), “‘Waiting For Superman’ and ‘Race to Nowhere’ demonstrated the immense problems in our schools; “Schooling the World” shows what happens when we export those problems overseas.”
Black pointed to the recent allegations surrounding “Three Cups of Tea” author Greg Mortenson and his Central Asia Institute as “an opportunity to look at some of these issues more closely. People are rightly upset about Mortenson’s fabrications, but the larger fiction which goes unquestioned is his romanticized portrayal of education as a panacea for all the world’s ills, a silver bullet that in one clean shot can end poverty, terrorism, and the oppression of girls and women around the world.” Black said. “The reality is that the modern school is no silver bullet, but an extremely problematic institution which has proven highly resistant to fundamental reform. No system that discards millions of normal, healthy kids as failures – many of them extremely smart, by the way – will ever provide a lasting or universal solution to anything.”
The movie has been widely lauded for its breathtaking visual beauty and was shot largely on location in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, India.
http://schoolingtheworld.org/
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Community Cinema Vashon presents "Two Spirits"
June 5th, 3-5 PM at Ober Park performance space
Two Spirits interweaves the tragic story of a mother’s loss of her son with a revealing look at the largely unknown history of a time when the world wasn’t simply divided into male and female and many Native American cultures held places of honor for people of integrated genders. Powerful and moving, Lydia Nibley’s Two Spirits explores the life and death of Fred Martinez and the ancient Native American two-spirit tradition.
Fred Martinez told his mother he felt as if he was both a boy and a girl, and she explained that this is a special gift, according to traditional Navajo culture. But the place where two discriminations meet is a dangerous place to live, and Fred became one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern history when he was brutally murdered at sixteen. Between tradition and controversy, and freedom and fear, lies the truth—the bravest choice you can make is to be yourself.
Two Spirits explores issues of national concern including the bullying and violence commonly faced by LGBT people, and the epidemic of LGBT teen suicide, and reveals the range of gender expression that has long been seen as a healthy part of many of the indigenous cultures of North America, and of Navajo culture in particular.
The Navajo believe that to maintain harmony, there must be a balanced interrelationship between the feminine and the masculine within the individual, in families, in the culture, and in the natural world. For the first time on film, Two Spirits tells stories from the Navajo tradition of four genders. The first gender is the feminine woman. The second is the masculine man. The third is the male-bodied person who has a feminine essence—nadleehi. The fourth is the female-bodied person who has a masculine essence—dilbaa.
In Navajo, nadleehi means “one who is transformed," and as the film traces the ramifications of Fred’s murder, it also shows the transformation being undertaken by Native activists who are working to restore the rich heritage of two-spirit people and to claim their place within their tribal communities.
“The film team is working with over sixty organizations nationwide to have six million people see the film and to help expand the national conversation about gender,” says the director of Two Spirits, Lydia Nibley.
Lois Vossen the producer and founder of Independent Lens explains, “Two Spirits is an important film that tells a modern story with deep historical roots and does so in a way that is surprising and striking. It’s a film that shows humankind at both our best and worst. It’s gut-wrenching at times, but also hopeful and very engaging.”
To learn more about the film, and the issues involved, visit the companion website for Two Spirits at www.pbs.org/independentlens/two-spirits. Get detailed information on the film, watch preview clips, read an interview with the filmmaker, and explore the subject in depth with links and resources. The site also features a Talkback section where viewers can share their ideas and opinions.
Two Spirits interweaves the tragic story of a mother’s loss of her son with a revealing look at the largely unknown history of a time when the world wasn’t simply divided into male and female and many Native American cultures held places of honor for people of integrated genders. Powerful and moving, Lydia Nibley’s Two Spirits explores the life and death of Fred Martinez and the ancient Native American two-spirit tradition.
Fred Martinez told his mother he felt as if he was both a boy and a girl, and she explained that this is a special gift, according to traditional Navajo culture. But the place where two discriminations meet is a dangerous place to live, and Fred became one of the youngest hate-crime victims in modern history when he was brutally murdered at sixteen. Between tradition and controversy, and freedom and fear, lies the truth—the bravest choice you can make is to be yourself.
Two Spirits explores issues of national concern including the bullying and violence commonly faced by LGBT people, and the epidemic of LGBT teen suicide, and reveals the range of gender expression that has long been seen as a healthy part of many of the indigenous cultures of North America, and of Navajo culture in particular.
The Navajo believe that to maintain harmony, there must be a balanced interrelationship between the feminine and the masculine within the individual, in families, in the culture, and in the natural world. For the first time on film, Two Spirits tells stories from the Navajo tradition of four genders. The first gender is the feminine woman. The second is the masculine man. The third is the male-bodied person who has a feminine essence—nadleehi. The fourth is the female-bodied person who has a masculine essence—dilbaa.
In Navajo, nadleehi means “one who is transformed," and as the film traces the ramifications of Fred’s murder, it also shows the transformation being undertaken by Native activists who are working to restore the rich heritage of two-spirit people and to claim their place within their tribal communities.
“The film team is working with over sixty organizations nationwide to have six million people see the film and to help expand the national conversation about gender,” says the director of Two Spirits, Lydia Nibley.
Lois Vossen the producer and founder of Independent Lens explains, “Two Spirits is an important film that tells a modern story with deep historical roots and does so in a way that is surprising and striking. It’s a film that shows humankind at both our best and worst. It’s gut-wrenching at times, but also hopeful and very engaging.”
To learn more about the film, and the issues involved, visit the companion website for Two Spirits at www.pbs.org/independentlens/two-spirits. Get detailed information on the film, watch preview clips, read an interview with the filmmaker, and explore the subject in depth with links and resources. The site also features a Talkback section where viewers can share their ideas and opinions.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Community Cinema Vashon presents "Welcome to Shelbyville"
Sunday, 5/22 from 3-5p at the Ober Park Performance Room, free of charge
The second in a program of Community Cinema Vashon's free monthly screenings and moderated discussions of documentaries from the Emmy Award winning PBS film series Independent Lens is brought to you courtesy of We All Belong, a project of Welcome Vashon.
Set in the heart of America's Bible Belt,
"Welcome To Shelbyville" focuses on a small Southern town as they grapple with rapid demographic change and issues of immigrant integration.
The film captures the complexity of the African American, Latino, white, and Somali subjects as their lives intertwine against the backdrop of a crumbling economy and the election of a new president. In a year of historic change, one town in the Heartland questions what it means to be American.
For further information, contact Jane Berg - jane.e.berg@gmail.com or 206-567-4532
Mark your calendars for June 5th and join in the Vashon Premiere of "Two Spirits", at the Ober Park Performance Room from 3pm-5pm.
Future dates of the free summer film and discussion series are July 24, August 14, and September 11 at the Ober Park Performance Room, 3pm-5pm.
www.communitycinema.org
The second in a program of Community Cinema Vashon's free monthly screenings and moderated discussions of documentaries from the Emmy Award winning PBS film series Independent Lens is brought to you courtesy of We All Belong, a project of Welcome Vashon.
Set in the heart of America's Bible Belt,
"Welcome To Shelbyville" focuses on a small Southern town as they grapple with rapid demographic change and issues of immigrant integration.
The film captures the complexity of the African American, Latino, white, and Somali subjects as their lives intertwine against the backdrop of a crumbling economy and the election of a new president. In a year of historic change, one town in the Heartland questions what it means to be American.
For further information, contact Jane Berg - jane.e.berg@gmail.com or 206-567-4532
Mark your calendars for June 5th and join in the Vashon Premiere of "Two Spirits", at the Ober Park Performance Room from 3pm-5pm.
Future dates of the free summer film and discussion series are July 24, August 14, and September 11 at the Ober Park Performance Room, 3pm-5pm.
www.communitycinema.org
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Transition Vashon presents: The Power of Community
Saturday, May 14, 2011 - program begins at 6:00 pm
At Vashon Lutheran Church, 18623 Vashon Hwy. - just south of town
Free (with donations welcome to defray expenses)
The Power of Community: How Cuba survived Peak Oil
directed by Faith Morgan, and released 2006
~ fifth in the series FILMS FOR TRANSITION 2011
"The Power of Community" is a dynamic documentary about the experience of the Cuban people in early 1990's, the "Special Period" after the breakup of the Soviet Union and the sudden decline of petroleum imports to Cuba. The nation lost over half of its oil imports, and 85 percent of its international trade economy. Their food production, food distribution, transportation, health care, housing construction, factories, and other sectors all had to be re-invented. Cuba survived by allocating land to the people to grow most of their food locally, engineering alternative construction methods, and shifting to more sustainable energy sources - such as powering household radios with tiny solar panels. The interviews and archival newsreels in this film demonstrate the grassroots ingenuity and local innovations that were critical to helping the people survive. The shift in the country's economic mindset, from international consumption to local sustainability, was implemented in both urban and rural neighborhoods with organic gardens and modes of transport.
The originator of the Transition Town movement, Rob Hopkins, has commented, "Peak Oil could be the opportunity for a huge renaissance for local agriculture, for community, for sustainable manufacturing, and for biodiversity." The Power of Community documentary about the Cuban experience over a period of seven years is a case study in what it can take for a nation to co-create such a rebirth for our families and towns.
We believe that Vashon will be able to bring forth such a rebirth. It will require that we apply ourselves to learn the basic lessons ~ about re-skilling, sharing good ideas, simplifying and re-tooling in many ways, and moving forward together. Let's build a resilient power of community on Vashon!
Please tell one friend about the movie. We hope to see you on May 14.
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