ROOFTOP WEEKEND RECAP - September 5th & 7th
TWO SHOWS ON COMING TO AMERICA

By Rooftop Films on 09/08/2008

FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 5: La Frontera Infinita at El Museo del Barrio (East Harlem)
The rain threatened all night, but never came, and Rooftop Films concluded an excellent run of shows at El Museo del Barrio. The museum, which is committed to exhibiting the work of Latino artists from East Harlem and abroad (even while under renovation and expansion), made an excellent partner for Rooftop Films, where we don't screen in theaters, we screen in communities. In 2008, we hosted three evenings of music and film, focused on the local and international Latino community. Each show, including this one, was filled to capacity.

Photo by Dillon DeWaters.

On Friday, for the second year in a row, we were collaborating with the Morelia International Film Festival in Mexico. In just six years, Morelia has become one of the premiere festivals for Mexican and Latino cinema, a destination festival for international industry insiders and a tremendous boon for local cinema lovers. Rooftop Artistic Director Mark Elijah Rosenberg attended in 2007, and highly recommends their fest.

This final screening was of Juan Manuel Sepulveda's haunting documentary La Frontera Infinita, a lovely and lyrical film about the hardships which tens of thousands of immigrants face every year while traveling thousands of hazardous miles for a chance to work in the States. Splendid shots of train travel and long hikes are offset by harrowing accounts of train-hopping accidents and intimate scenes of infinite patience as the travelers wait at waystations and in the woods for the right moment to move on. At the crowded after-party, one viewer called the film "Beckett-like," not only because of the eternal waiting and desperate hope, but because of the film's ingenious dislocation of space and distance. The subjects have a general sense of heading North, but in both dialogue and cinematic reference, the sense of direction and expanse is always vague, leaving the viewer feeling as lonely and lost as the documentary subjects. Often, a film like this could be difficult to watch outside, but the packed house was riveted, and deeply moved.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 7: Arusi: Persian Wedding on Roosevelt Island
Hurricane rains did hit New York on Saturday, forcing us to reschedule this screening for Sunday. But the weather was beautiful that night, and despite the postponement there were still some 200 people on the lawn, with the Queensboro Bridge looming over the screen as a stunning backdrop. Special thanks to the New York City Council's Manhattan Delegation, and Council Member Jessica Lappin, for bringing Rooftop out to Roosevelt Island.

Three short films began the night, each touching on themes that would be elaborated in the feature--finding a new way to see (A Different Color Blue), traveling to some place foreign (The Tourists), and metaphorically "lifting the veil" (A L'Ombre du Voile).

The feature film covers all that and more, as Iranian-American filmmaker Marjan Tehrani travels with her brother and his American-born wife back to Iran, for the first time, for a traditional Persian wedding. The touching film simultaneously tells the story of a couple in love, of a family being reunited, and of a country at odds with itself and the world, and the crowd loved it--people cheered throughout, particularly at points which expressed pride in Iranian culture.

During the Q & A, you could tell that people with varying political views, religions and cultural backgrounds were all moved by the universality of this story of love and family, as seen on a global political stage.