Arts & Lectures
2001-2002 Season Film Series News Release
For Immediate Release

March 5, 2002
Contact: George Yatchisin
(805) 893-3494
e-mail: yatchisin-g@sa.ucsb.edu

UCSB Arts & Lectures Spring Cinema 2002
features 9 films from around the globe

Summary Facts:

UCSB Arts & Lectures Spring Cinema 2002, a series of nine films, features six Santa Barbara area premieres and spans the globe, from Argentina to Morocco, to present movies overlooked by general film distribution. The Believer, one such film that languished without a distributor for nearly a year, even though it was made in the United States, will screen on May 22. An intense portrait of a young Jewish man living an impossible contradiction as a neo-Nazi, the film won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in 2001 but was considered too controversial to be marketed. Director and screenwriter Henry Bean will be at the screening to answer questions after the film.

The series begins on Friday, April 5 with Waking Life, one of the most highly acclaimed films of 2001. The main character, played by Wiley Wiggins, gets lost on a magic carpet ride of consciousness, unsure if he is awake or dreaming, running into numerous characters that debate the meaning and modes of existence. The high-minded philosophy is tempered not just by occasional highjinks but by the film’s unique look. Director Richard Linklater (Slacker, Dazed and Confused) worked with Bob Sabitson and 31 other artists to develop a swoony new animation style. They shot the film with live actors on digital video and then superimposed digital animation, which, according to film critic Roger Ebert, “creates a shimmering, pulsating life on the screen: This movie seems alive, vibrating with urgency and excitement.” (2001, 99 minutes)

A different kind of urgency runs through Under the Sand, a film that screens on Sunday, April 21. A gripping psychological drama, Under the Sand stars Charlotte Rampling in a moving and sensual performance as a sedate middle class professor of English whose life is ripped apart by the mysterious disappearance of her husband. Up-and-coming director François Ozon (See the Sea, Water Drops on Burning Rocks) coolly plumbs the depths of grief while also exploring the fullest ache of longing. In French with English subtitles. (2000, 95 minutes)

The series continues with a very different film from France, Va Savoir (Who Knows?) on Tuesday, April 23. In Va Savoir New Wave veteran Jacques Rivette presents his typically literate and witty characters in a more light-hearted mode than his Paris Belongs to Us (1960), Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974) or La Belle noiseuse (1991). In Va Savoir three men and three women fall into and out of each others’ minds, hearts and arms against the backdrop of the theater. A.O. Scott of The New York Times called the film “an especially rich and subtle sex farce...with the verve and precision of classic screwball comedy.” In French with English subtitles. (2001, 150 minutes)

Matters of the heart remain central to In the Mood for Love, screening on Sunday, April 28. Hong Kong-based director Wong Kar-wai’s ode to unrequited love stars Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung (who won the best actor award at Cannes for his performance) as a couple who discover that their spouses are having an affair. Drawn to each other, their empathy eventually grows into something more, but they fight their urges, not wanting to become the adulterers their spouses are. A study of longing as it is reflected in bright pop colors, Nat King Cole ballads and the elegantly tailored dresses and suits our lovelorn protagonists wear so attractively. Time Out New York writes, “Rarely has onscreen ardor simmered with such lovely, tactile delicacy.” From the director of Chungking Express and Happy Together. In Cantonese with English subtitles. (2000, 97 minutes)

Ali Zaoua, screening on Thursday, May 2, examines the perilous lives of children trapped in poverty, earning critical comparisons to world cinema classics Los Olvidados and Pixote. Shot on the mean streets of Casablanca, using a mostly non-professional cast, this film follows three homeless teens attempting to give a proper burial to their friend Ali, killed by a rival gang. Best film award winner at the 2001 Pan African Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (Africa’s major film festival), Ali Zaoua is director Nabil Ayouch’s second feature. His first film, Mektoub, is the all-time box office success in Morocco. Co-presented with the UCSB Center for Middle East Studies. In Arabic with English subtitles. (2001, 95 minutes)

The next film in the series, La Ciénaga, like Ali Zaoua, also excited the crowds at the Sundance Festival. Screening on Sunday, May 12, Lucrecia Martel’s biting debut is a languorous look at two Argentine families playing out their sordid domestic dramas at a decaying country estate. Given Argentina’s current economic and social uncertainty, it’s hard not to see the film as an allegory of the times. Martel has said in her director’s statement: “The film depicts a society that has lost its traditions but which cannot afford the security that could make up for them. A society that lives vaguely hoping that nothing will ever change, and in terror of everything repeating itself, indefinitely.” In Spanish with English subtitles. (2001, 103 minutes)

The series moves from Argentina to Brazil for the eye-opening documentary The Charcoal People, which screens on Thursday, May 16. The film delves into the plight of os carvoerios, migrant workers who cut down and burn thousands of trees to make the charcoal used by steel industries around the world. These impoverished yet dignified people live with the bitter knowledge that they must destroy nature in order to survive. Inspired by a U.N.-award winning photographic essay by Brazilian photographer and film co-producer Marcos Prado, The Charcoal People is directed by Academy Award winner Nigel (Close Harmony) Nobel. In Portuguese with English subtitles. (1999, 70 minutes)

On Monday, May 20, the series presents a special treat, a gloriously restored 35-mm print of Beauty and the Beast (La belle et la bête), directed by French poet, artist and filmmaker Jean Cocteau. Although Cocteau might be best know for his Orpheus Trilogy, this magical version of the classic “love conquers all” tale is his best-loved film, full of poetry, superb cinematography (by Henri Alekan, who also shot Wings of Desire) and fantastic sets and make-up. The film stars Jean Marais as its sympathetic and charming Beast and Josette Day as the aptly cast Beauty, who seems to sense just what she loses when her Beast becomes a mere man at movie’s end. In French with English subtitles. (1946, 90 minutes)

The series concludes on Wednesday, May 22 with a screening of the incendiary film The Believer that will be followed by a question & answer session with the film’s director and writer, Henry Bean. Winner of the 2001 Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize, The Believer is a scathing portrait of its protagonist, a Jew who studies the Torah at night yet lives a violent life as a neo-Nazi by day. Relative newcomer Ryan Gosling (a former Mouseketeer, of all things) brings this immensely conflicted character to the screen in a ferocious performance. This is screenwriter Bean’s first directorial effort after penning numerous screenplays including The Golden Eighties, Deep Cover, Mulholland Falls and Enemy of the State. Director Spike Lee claims, “Henry Bean is a big talent and The Believer is his most courageous and thought-provoking work yet.” (2001, 98 minutes)

All film screenings begin at 7:30 pm in UCSB Campbell Hall. Tickets for all films are available in advance at the UCSB Arts & Lectures Ticket Office (893-3535) and may be purchased in person or charged by phone. Tickets can also be bought at the door, if available, starting at 6:30 pm. All tickets are $6 for the general public and $5 for UCSB students.

Presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures, these films are sponsored by The Santa Barbara Independent, KCSB Radio 91.9 FM, Blue Agave and The Daily Nexus. Under the Sand and Va Savoir are presented with support from the French Embassy and the Cultural Ministry of France. Ali Zaoua is co-presented with the UCSB Center for Middle East Studies.

For tickets or more information,
call UCSB Arts & Lectures at (805) 893-3535.

Editor: For photos, please call
George Yatchisin at (805) 893-3494.

©2002 UCSB Arts & Lectures, University of California, Santa Barbara