Spirits of Rebellion: Black Independent Cinema from Los Angeles
Women's Work: Essential Films by Female Filmmakers
•
1h 41m
Directed by Zeinabu irene Davis | 101 mins | 2016
Davis’s documentary on the LA Rebellion, a surge of artistically ambitious, far-from-the-mainstream Black-American-directed films that came out of southern California—specifically, out of the UCLA film production program—beginning in the late ’70s, gets up close and personal with leading lights of the movement including Charles Burnett, Julie Dash, Haile Gerima, Billy Woodberry, Barbara McCullough, Ben Caldwell, and Davis herself, with those who witnessed it firsthand setting the record straight about the facts of the Rebellion and offering their individual answers to the question: “What is a Black film?” A rousing lesson in Black cinema history that looks forward to its future.
Up Next in Women's Work: Essential Films by Female Filmmakers
-
The Competition
Directed by Claire Simon | 121 mins | 2016
The Competition begins, significantly, with the image of a locked gate—that of La Fémis, one of the most prestigious film schools in the world, offering hands-on training from working professionals and accepting only 40 students per year from hundreds of... -
Variety
Directed by Bette Gordon | 100 mins | 1983
A young woman lands a job as a cashier at a downtown porno theater, and soon finds herself inexorably drawn towards what’s happening onscreen—as well as other troubling fantasies. One of the great independent films of the ’80s, featuring a who’s who of t...
