ScreenFish

where faith and film are intertwined

disabilities

Unstoppable Shorts at Slamdance 2023

by Leave a Comment

Shorts are always an important part of any film festival. That is really true for Slamdance, which often features filmmakers who are working with very limited resources. But those short films often demonstrate as much power and skill as longer films. Often even more so because they are so compact. One of the sections for shorts as Slamdance each year is called “Unstoppable”. These films are about overcoming the obstacles of life—often physical or emotional disabilities. Some such films are about those disabilities, others by filmmakers who are overcoming their own obstacles. Here is a sampling of this year’s Unstoppable shorts. These and other films can be seen at https://slamdance.com/festival .

Queen Moorea (27 minutes, directed by Christine Fulgate). A documentary about a young woman who is chosen homecoming queen at the high school in spite of being born with a genetic syndrome that involves learning disabilities and deformity. She and others with similar issues strive to lead normal lives, but they struggle in a world that often doesn’t see past their disabilities.

A Black Saturday (9 minutes, directed by Tori Sampson). A slice of life that looks at two children for whom Saturday is a time of both fun and obligation. It is a sweet look at innocence and the love of family.

Charley and the Hunt (15 minutes, directed by Jenn Shaw). The story of a girl with a vivid imagination who must go on a “dangerous” treasure hunt to recover her deaf mother’s lost bracelet.

My Eyes Are Up Hear (14 minutes, directed by Nathan Morris). Comic film about a young woman with physical deformities that wakes up in a man’s apartment after a wild night. She sets out to get the morning after pill. He wants to help. She wants to be independent. It develops into a mini-romcom. The film challenges our idea about disabilities and sexuality.

Just Right (16 minutes, directed by Camille Wormser). This is a comic look at what it is like to live with severe OCD. (Wormser, who also stars, has severe OCD.) When the central character decides to go somewhere with her roommate, she is on the clock to be ready on time, but there are so many things that have to be done in just the right way.

Slamdance 2022 – Unstoppable lives

by Leave a Comment

Slamdance is intentional about inclusiveness. That is especially evident through their “Unstoppable” sections for both feature films and shorts. These films are built around the way people face struggles in life—often because of various disabilities—and find meaning in lives that many would find impossible. Today I’m going to look at some of the Unstoppable films. A reminder: You can still watch these films with a $10 festival pass through February 6.

Poppy, from director Linda Niccol, is the story of a young woman with Down Syndrome who wants to become an auto mechanic. Her brother, who runs a garage where she helps out, is reluctant to take her on as an apprentice. The brother is filled with guilt over the accident that killed their parents, and is spiraling into alcoholism. Meanwhile, Poppy is falling in love with a local busker. The key here is that Poppy is really a normal teenager. Certainly, Down Syndrome is a part of who she is, but that is really only one part of her, as we see. The various problems that arise in the film are cleared up a bit to easily, but it makes for a pleasing story that reminds us that there is always more to someone than how we first see them.

Straighten Up and Fly Right, directed by Kristen Abate and Steven Tenenbaum, shows us how much of a struggle life can sometimes be. A woman with Ankylosing Spondylitis, a crippling form of arthritis, spends her life hunched over, always looking at the ground. She is in pain that she treats with pills and weed. She walks dogs for a living. She is depressed and resentful. When she is sent to a new client, she discovers someone as bent over as she. Through this, and some other encounters with people who are kind (or learn to be), she begins to grow and to see herself as having value for who she is. This is a story that asks us to consider how the world sees people—how we see people who are different.

Among the Unstoppable shorts, I found what may be the real diamond of the festival: Freebird (6 minutes), directed by Michael Joseph McDonald, Joe Bluhm, and Nick Herd. This is an excellent example of what a short film can be. In those few minutes, this animated film shows us 45 years in the life of a man with Down Syndrome. This animated film is touching, emotionally satisfying, and challenging without being confrontational. It reminds us that people are of value not for what they can or cannot do (and as we see, many people with disabilities are capable of great things). Their real value is simply that they are. The Jordan Hart song “Freedom” that provides the music of the film serves to tie it all together.

In My Brother Is Deaf (11 minutes) by Peter Hoffman Kimball, is a brief story of a family dealing with a child who is deaf, as told by his five year old big brother. It is more than learning sign language or the idea of cochlear implants. It really boils down to that they want to be able to tell the child they love him, and they want him to be able to share himself.

Jamiesonshine (5 minutes), from Phoebe Jane Hart and Jamieson Hart¸ takes us into the world of schizophrenia. Phoebe Hart tells the story of dealing with her brother Jamieson who struggles with the dark world of schizophrenia. It is a story that is told with love, but it is a love that carries a great deal of pain.

All of these films are currently playing at Slamdance 2022.

Slamdance 2022 – Sampling shorts

by Leave a Comment

One of the parts I love about film festivals is the chance to watch shorts. Slamdance Film Festival has so many to choose from. I dipped into three of the short films sections for just a sampling of each.

Animation shorts:

Sensual Pill (4 minutes), by director Sam 3, is a fast-paced trip all over our planet using time-lapse satellite photography and Google Earth. It is a wonderful job of editing to give us a chance to see bits of our home, even if the frenetic pace doesn’t let us focus on any one thing for long.

(Cathedral) (7 minutes), by director James Bascara, is a computed animated journey through a canyon as we follow a seemingly unending trail of ants.

Crumbs of Life (7 minutes), by director Kararzyna Miechowicz, is a surreal story of a woman and her yeti-like mate, a TV reporter who grows a life-draining growth after being spat on by a pony. Yeah, it’s strange, but oddly engaging.

Open One’s Mouth (5 minutes) by director Akane Murata, is all about the art. There is neither plot nor characters. This is more a work of modern art than surrealism.

Documentary shorts:

No Soy Óscar (15 minutes), from director Jon Ayon, is a look at the US-Mexico border area. Ayon, a first-generation Latinx father, is fascinated by a news story of Óscar Alberto Maritínez Ramírez and his 23 month old daughter who drowned together in the Rio Grande. He travels to various points of the border, only identifying them by the name of the indigenous peoples who never ceded the land that is now divided into two nations.

Gladiolus (6 minutes), from director Azedeh Navai, is a very brief overview of how the flower came to be popular in Iran since 1950, becoming a symbol of celebration, and then later, a popular decoration for graves.

Telos or Bust (12 minutes), from director Brad Abrahams, is a look at some of the people of small town Mt. Shasta, California, and their beliefs about the spiritual and metaphysical nature of the mountain they believe is the location of a portal to an underworld filled with immortals. Lots of New Age spirituality here, but very interesting people.

A Table Is as Good as Nine Lives (12 minutes), from director Christina Leonardi, uses home movie footage and narration by elder family members to create a piece of oral history spanning several generations.

Unstoppable shorts (featuring stories [either narrative or documentary] of people facing the hurdles of life):

Signs and Gestures (13 minutes), from director Itandehui Jansen, is a feel good story of a young blind woman who is going to meet a man from a dating app. She hasn’t mentioned on her profile that she’s blind. When she arrives, there is another problem, he never mentioned that he only spoke sign language. Can love bloom?

Ipseity – Marisa’s Story (5 mintues), from director Nicholas Stachurski, is the story of a young mother who gives us much of what we might call beauty. When she was 18 she lost all her hair to alopecia. Now, because she has the BRCA breast cancer gene, she has opted for mastectomy. Just as she felt she found a new beauty when she lost her hair, she now expects that her life will find new value after her surgery.

Imperfect – But aren’t we all?

by Leave a Comment

“. . . The assumption when folks see my chair is that I won’t be able to do things before they assume I will be able to do things.”

Acting is a very demanding profession. Actors become another person in the eyes of the audience. It is challenging. Even more so when part of who you are as a person is the label “disabled”. Imperfect, from directors Regan Linton and Brian Malone, is a behind the scenes look at the Phamaly Theater Company’s 2019 production of Chicago—a production that features actors living with disabilities.

This is not a show that is done to give disabled people a sense of accomplishment. These are professional actors, some with years of experience, who come together over a number of weeks to put on performances of a very challenging musical. Phamaly, based in Denver, provides a unique venue for actors who may well be overlooked by other theaters.

Regan Linton (who co-directs the film) spent a year at Phamaly as the Artistic Director. She and all the actors each deal with various disabilities. There are those who have been paralyzed in accidents, people who are blind, people with MS, Parkinson’s, and cerebral palsy. There are people at various points on the autism spectrum.

This film takes us into the auditions, rehearsals, and eventually the performance of Chicago. Each step of the way also gives us a chance to meet some of these actors and help us see beyond their disabilities.

It’s important to note that the disabled are very underrepresented in films and TV. One study found only two percent of TV characters had a disability. Even when a character is disabled, they are rarely played by a disabled actor.  As a society we tend to make disabilities invisible—perhaps because we don’t want to think about what that would be like for ourselves. Such ableist attitudes push such people out of our thoughts, and thus out of our lives.

Slamdance film festival is active in giving voice to the disabled in their selection process. They include special “Unstoppable” sections (one for feature films, one for shorts) that focus on films by and about disabled people. Imperfect, is not in those sections, but is included in the documentary film section.

Imperfect is screening though the very affordable ($10 for a festival pass) Slamdance Film Festival from January 27 through February 6. Passes available at Slamdance.com.

Photos courtesy of Fast Forward Films.

See for Me – A Path in Darkness

by Leave a Comment

From director Randall Okita, See for Me tells the story of a blind young woman who must face off against a gang of intruders. But she isn’t quite alone. Her phone may be her salvation.

Sophie (Skyler Davenport) is heading off to a remote mansion to housesit. She has a very strong independent streak—to the point of rudeness. Her backstory, we learn, is that she was a very talented young skier until she lost her sight. Now, she takes housesitting jobs, where she augments her pay by theft. Yeah, she’s not the innocent young blind woman like we encountered in Wait until Dark. She has a friend who leads her through the house through her phone, as she searches out something to steal. Her friend says he doesn’t want to be involved in this anymore.

When she accidentally locks herself out of the house, she tries a new app, “See for Me”, that connects blind people with volunteers who will see through the phone to help them out. She connects with Kelly (Jessica Parker Kennedy), a veteran who spends her day playing multi-player shooting video games.

That night, Sophie wakes up to voices in the house. A gang of thieves has broken into what they thought was an empty house to rob a hidden safe. After calling 911, she is discovered. When the sheriff shows up, things begin to go downhill. Soon, Sophie must reach out to Kelly again, whose video gaming now takes on an aspect of life-or-death.

The key part of this thriller is Sophie’s seeming helplessness. For all her desire for independence, much of which is driven by ego and anger at what she has lost, when the time comes, she discovers she cannot get out of this situation on her own. She must rely on other people—not so much to save her, as to empower her in different ways. It is in that reliance that she has the chance to grow. But we’re not sure if she has grown enough.

See for Me is in theaters and available on VOD.

13 Minutes: The Storms of Life

by Leave a Comment

In Lindsay Gossling’s 13 Minutes, a natural catastrophe brings devastation to a community. But this isn’t your typical disaster movie that brings the survivors together to return to the way things were. Rather, this is really about the personal catastrophes that were already present in their lives.

Set in a rural Oklahoma town, we meet several people who are struggling in various ways. Rick and Tammy (Trace Adkins and Anne Heche) who are struggling to keep their family farm afloat. Their son Luke (Will Peltz) is a deeply closeted gay man. Maddy (Sofia Vassilieva) is facing a surprise pregnancy. Tammy, who also works at the clinic, strongly pushes her to keep the child. Her mother Jess (Thora Birch) is more pragmatic and suggests that Maddy has choices. Ana (Paz Vega) works at the local motel but has plans to buy a house so she and her fiancé Carlos (Yancey Arias), who is undocumented, can live the American dream. Brad (Peter Facinelli), the local TV weatherman, and Kim (Amy Smart), the local emergency response coordinator, have a hearing-impaired daughter, Peyton (Shaylee Mansfield).

The first half of the film is spent allowing us to meet all these people and see the struggles they each must deal with in their day to day lives. There is a bit of background noise that bad weather is coming. It turns out that there is a massive tornado headed for the town. Soon, people are seeking shelter (or not) as it comes ever closer. After it hits, the devastation is total. Survivors must try to find loved ones and begin to deal with the massive emergency they all are facing.

The storm is something of a metaphor for the issues that people are facing in their lives. Each may be facing the loss not just of buildings, but of the world that defines them. The film doesn’t paint a rosy picture of a community that becomes stronger in the face of adversity. Rather this film shows that life’s trials are often very demanding, and may not resolve happily.

The film spreads itself a bit to thin by trying to include so many areas of personal struggle, including LGBTQ issues, abortion, immigration, disabilities, cost of medical care, and the family farming crisis. All of those issues are well worth looking at from a personal perspective. But the film never really resolves the many trials that the people are facing. Instead the film leaves us looking at a world that has been thoroughly destroyed. There is no vision of a rebuilding community. And there is very little vision of the rebuilding from the personal catastrophes that the characters have been living. Some of those issues are exacerbated by the natural disaster.

13 Minutes is playing in select theaters and coming to VOD in November.

Photos courtesy of Quiver Distribution.

Making Sense – Seeing the Disabled

by Leave a Comment

Making Sense, directed by Gregory Bayne, strives to make those with disabilities visible. The story is built around those disabilities, but also around the abilities that are also part of those lives. It does so not only with the story, but by using disabled actors in several of the roles.

Jules (Jessi Melton) leads a group of grad students who are trying to create a device to help deaf people “hear” through using their sense of touch. It is a passion project for Jules, whose sister is deaf (apparently through some fault of Jules, but that isn’t really clear). After a demonstration shows the project is failing, she is contacted by Dr. Amberger (Richard Klautsch) who has his own passion project—to connect various disabled people to find a “sixth sense” to find access to a greater awareness.

The film works with the concept of neuroplasticity—that when people lose a sense, their brains create new neuro-pathways to use other senses to fill in what is missing. For example, someone who is blind may be able to tell far more from their hearing than others. The film uses terminology like “sensory enlightenment” to speak of this.

Amberger is a mad scientist character. He tried to do this many years ago, but when it took a bad turn, he had to abandon the project. It also led to him being sought by the authorities. Now with health issues of his own, he sees this as his last chance. When Jules goes along with him to finish his project, she puts her own project in jeopardy. They recruit others (including Jules’s sister) each missing a particular sense. Amberger’s theory is that the way each has rewired their brain will open a pathway to that sixth sense.

Press notes for the film put an emphasis on the way disabilities are treated in society, and especially in the media. They note that fewer characters in films and TV have disabilities than in real life. And of those characters, very few are portrayed by people with those disabilities. Making Sense uses people with disabilities in those key roles. It should be noted that this kind of diversity is being called for in the industry.

This is a sci-fi film that struggles with the science involved. The premise really isn’t fully developed, nor is the plotline featuring the FBI agents in pursuit. The film does serve as a way of providing a visible presence of actors with disabilities.

Making Sense is available on VOD.

Photos courtesy of Freestyle Digital Media

Welcome to the 2021 Slamdance Film Festival

by Leave a Comment

Like festivals all around the world over this last year, Slamdance Film Festival is going digital. Over 100 films will be available to watch from February 12-25. Slamdance, as the name implies, skews a bit to the edgier side of independent films. But that doesn’t mean it’s all weird, all the time. There are some very interesting films that will be part of the online festival.

Naturally there are feature films, both narrative and documentary, with a wide range of subject matter. There is also a load of short films. These include the traditional shorts sections of live action narrative, animated, and documentary shorts. But Slamdance also always has some sections that are a bit more out there. This year, that includes, “The Department of Anarchy”, “Experimental Shorts” and “DIG: Digital, Interactive, and Gaming”. Slamdance is also featuring a special section of shorts called “Unstoppable” that deals with people with disabilities. There will also be panel discussions about filmmaking and the business along the way.

I plan on reporting on many of the features, some in single film review, some in small groups of films, throughout the week. I’ll also be spending some time with the shorts and bringing reports on many of them.

Because this is a virtual festival, it means that you, too, can be part of the festival. Festival passes are available at the festival website for an amazingly low price of $10. That gets you access to the wide range of films without standing in line or filling a crowded screening room. (Even though many of us are yearning to return to theaters for films, we can’t just yet.)

Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution

by Leave a Comment

“What we saw at that camp was that life could be better.”

Perhaps the main theme of the Netflix documentary Crip Camp comes near the beginning as we see film of teenaged disabled campers in 1971 while hearing Richie Havens singing the word “freedom” over and over from “Motherless Child”. For these campers, their time at Camp Jened was the first real taste of freedom and fitting in they had experienced. For some it changed their life. And they went on to change the world, which accounts for the film’s subtitle: A Disability Revolution.

Camp Jened was a camp designed for handicapped kids. It is described in the film as “run by hippies”.  Co-writer/co-director/former camper James Lebrecht recalls that a friend told him the counselors would probably smoke dope with them, which led Lebrecht to respond “Sign me up!” That does seem to reflect the kind of freedom that these kids found. We learn that this was not how life was in the world they normally inhabited. Many weren’t allowed in school because they would be a hazard to other students in case of a fire. Of course, no schools were accessible in those times. They were left outside of everyday life. Here, as one of the former campers says in the film, “At Jened you were just a kid.” Here they did all the thing we expect kids of that age to do: camp romances and picking up bad habits. One of the former campers relates about one of the counselors giving him kissing lessons. He said it was the best physical therapy ever.

copyright NolLynn D’Lil

But the camp experience isn’t the real focus of this film. It only takes up the first third of the documentary. Because of this camp, the campers saw that life could be far different than what they had known. And for some, that led to a life of activism. These campers went on to demand inclusion in the world around them. They pushed for legislation (section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, first vetoed by President Nixon) that gave disabled people civil rights. But those rights were never really enforced. In the film we see some of the former campers as they shut down traffic, and as they occupy the Health, Education, and Welfare office in San Francisco. This, especially the democratic nature of the protest, seems to be a precursor of later protests such as Occupy Wall Street. Perhaps the most effective bit of political theater was the “Capitol Crawl” as many disabled people crawl up the steps of the U.S. Capitol.

The film shows great progress (from not being allowed in school to being allowed in but put in the basement to having laws that require access), but also shows that progress, as is always the case, was hard won. And it is still far from complete. As one of the people in the film says, “If I have to feel thankful for an accessible toilet, when will I ever be equal in the community?”

The film does an excellent job of pulling us into the issue of disabled access through the personal stories of these campers who became activists in various ways. The inspirational aspect of the film is not what they did in spite of handicaps, but the way they changed the world because of their strength of character. Seeing them in their youth reminds us of our commonality with them, as opposed to seeing their disabilities first. That continues to be an issue in how we relate to people with disabilities. We often see the wheelchair first and only discover the person in it later. We all fall into such perceptions. This film gives us a chance to see things differently.

Photos courtesy of Netflix

Give Me Liberty – Van Load of Chaos

by Leave a Comment

As Give Me Liberty opens, we hear and then see a bedridden man who tells of being told he would never walk again, and finding that it was true. But he goes on to say, “Life, it is what it is. Life is wonderful. It’s beautiful. I love life. I love everything about life, even the ducks, chickens, rats. Love conquers all. If you’ve got love, you have everything.” This monologue (and additions to it as the story takes place) are not really a part of the story, but set the tone for the dark comedy that evolves.

Vic (Chris Galust) is a medical transit driver who is about to set out on a very bad day. He’s running late trying to get his grandfather up.  His grandfather has a funeral to attend that day, along with many other elderly Russian emigres. When he must return home because his grandfather has set off smoke detectors cooking, the crowd of funeral goers demand he take them to the funeral since their van hasn’t shown up. Along with them is Dima (Maxim Stoyanov) a boxer or conman who claims to be the deceased’s nephew. Vic has to pick up others along the way. Already far behind schedule he keeps making promises of “five or ten minutes. Soon the all of the people in the van are all complaining and chaos develops. It only gets worse as a protest has the main route blocked.

Vic may seem like the epitome of irresponsibility (especially to his boss), but the problems stem from his desire to help others. Of course, in the attempt to help so many at once, it means that everyone ends up getting less than they want.

The one thing that nearly everyone in the film has in common is that they all suffer from some sort of disability. Some are physically challenged, some mentally, some from the frailty of aging. Everyone seems to be trying to deal with life that has many roadblocks to hinder them. (Just as the protest blocks Vic’s way to deliver everyone where they need to go.) These are all people that society ignores. Even for the transport company, they are only freight to be delivered. But Vic responds to their needs—even if it is not in a timely way. The film uses a number of non-professional actors mixed in with a few professionals. That serves to enhance the aspect of the film giving voice to a part of society that is often unheard.

As the day wears on, the animosity between people begins to shift into a sense of community. There is a recognition that everyone has needs. We may demand that our needs be met, but it may mean that someone else’s needs are deferred. Or we may learn that we need to defer our needs for some that are important to others. In a world that constantly moving more to a “me first” expectation (“America First” is only a larger variation of that concept), it is refreshing to be reminded that others need help just as much as we do—sometimes their needs must supersede our own.

Photos courtesy of Music Box Films