Film About Friends: Journeys Towards Peace

The 15th Street Arts Committee Presents:

Screening: Film about Friends Journeys Towards Peace

7:00pm May 5th 2011

15 Rutherford Place

15th Street Meetinghouse

Quakers believe in Peace. Film About Friends profiles five from the Mount Toby Meeting. They reach their belief from different backgrounds. David, an ex-Marine, knows the horror of war; Frances, a peace activist, has been imprisoned for her activism; Mary studied nonviolence in India; Margaret searched for peace in her professional life; and John prevented conflict by feeding the world.

The film's director Joe Fenstermaker lives in Brooklyn and attends Brooklyn Meeting. Joe will be present at the screening with a question and answer period after the film.

Film Trailer: http://vimeo.com/3120825

Film Summary:

Film About Friends: Journeys Toward Peace introduces five members of the Mount Toby Friends Meeting in Leverett, MA engaging in work that represents their fundamental values and beliefs about Peace. The individuals profiled range in age from 40 to 90 years old and illustrate how one can live a peaceful existence in each stage of life. From these portraits emerges an understanding of Peace as seen through the lens of the Quaker faith and, by extension, how leading a peaceful existence can impact all members of society.

An observational framework places viewers in the physical and spiritual perspective of Quakers. The film documents each life with the care and precision of a portrait film. Subjects respond to the viewer, recounting their journey towards Peace with past examples and current struggles. To maintain unity, the themes of Quaker faith and a belief in Peace weave individuals together. The characters’ lives speak in a calico unity of overlapping and opposing visions of Peace, as witnessed personally through their Quaker faith. The film ends with the silence of an unprogramed Quaker meeting, and all scenes in the film function within a Quaker context of silence and simplicity. No narrator tells the audience what to think, and no music tells the audience how to feel. Viewers in this peaceful environment may examine and consider their lives, as Quakers do, by questioning and engaging in a dialogue with themselves. Quotations appear between major thematic junctures in the film to foster and promote ongoing self-examination for viewers.

Quakers listen, discuss, and act on the inner light that they believe is fundamental to all people. This process involves reflection and action; filmmaking also requires a similar intellectual progression. This film is guided and mediated by the constraints that shooting on 16mm film fosters. Every decision must be made earnestly because the format forces structure and deliberation into the creative process. The film runs approximately an hour in length, providing enough space to explain, reflect on, and illustrate the individuals profiled.

Gasland Friday April 8, 7pm

Screening of the Academy Award Nominated Documentary

GASLAND Followed by Q & A

Friday, April 8, 7-9 pm

at 15th Street Quaker Meetinghouse

15 Rutherford Place

(15th St. between 2^nd and 3^rd Aves. in Manhattan)

(PLEASE ALSO SAVE THE DATE—TWO DAYS EARLIER—FOR T.C. MCLUHAN’S THE FRONTIER GANDHI: BADSHAH KHAN A TORCH FOR PEACE)

Presented by:

Friends in Unity with Nature • The Quaker Arts Committee

Neighborhood Energy Network • Tri-State Food Not Lawns

Sane Energy Project*

The program is free and open to the public.

About the film

The largest domestic natural gas drilling boom in history has swept across the United States. The Halliburton-developed drilling technology of "fracking" or hydraulic fracturing has unlocked a "Saudi Arabia of natural gas" just beneath us. But is fracking safe? When filmmaker Josh Fox is asked to lease his land for drilling, he embarks on a cross-country odyssey uncovering a trail of secrets, lies and contamination.

A recently drilled nearby Pennsylvania town reports that residents are able to light their drinking water on fire. This is just one of the many absurd and astonishing revelations of a new country called GASLAND.

The movie GASLAND has also been sweeping the country, alerting citizens everywhere to the true price of natural gas, and mobilizing them in defense of the land that they love. If you haven’t seen it, now’s your chance. If you have, it’s a great way to come together with others who are equally concerned for the beauty, health and integrity of our natural environment.

Q & A

After the film, a question and answer period will address the repercussions of fracking in New York City’s watershed and the proposed natural gas storage and transmission pipe line entering Manhattan at the Gansevoort peninsula. An opportunity to take action and discuss sustainable alternatives will be offered to attenders.

Sane Energy Project℠ is an advocacy coalition composed of the following volunteer groups: Catskill Citizens for Safe Energy, NYH2O, CDOG, Damascus Citizens for Sustainability, No Gas Pipeline, Sierra Club and United for Action.

Donations for the upkeep of the Meetinghouse are gratefully accepted.

This Friday: Sir, No Sir!

7pm Friday, March 11, 2011. Sir, No Sir! Filmmaker and activist David Zeiger’s documentary chronicles the largely forgotten antiwar activities of American GIs and other members of the military during the Vietnam era -- actions that put them in greater peril than civilian protesters. Powerful and surprising, the film weaves together the stories of veterans who participated in the opposition movement, an effort that, by the early 1970s, found widespread support from civilians and troops alike. 1 win & 2 nominations. Location: Room 1, 15th Street Meeting House, 15 Rutherford Place, Manhattan, near Union Square.

This film is part of the Courage vs. Violence Film and Discussion Series

If you imagine there’s nothing you can do, see what people with nothing have done and imagine again more clearly.

Eyes on The Prize

7pm Thursday, February 10, 2011. Eyes on the Prize. This Emmy-winning documentary from the PBS "American Experience" series uses newsreel footage and narratives from famous and everyday people to take viewers inside the struggle for civil rights during the crucial years of 1954 through '65. Among the critical events discussed are the Montgomery bus boycott, the integration of schools in Little Rock, the murder of activists in Mississippi and Martin Luther King's groundbreaking marches to freedom. Location: Penington Friends House, 215 East 15th Street, near the corner of Rutherford Place.

This film is part of the Courage vs. Violence Film and Discussion Series

Tian'anmen (Gate of Heavenly Peace)

7pm Friday, February 4, 2011 (Part 2). Tiananmen/Gate of Heavenly Peace. Location: Room 1, 15th Street Meeting House, 15 Rutherford Place, Manhattan.

A feature-length documentary about the 1989 protest movement, reflecting the drama, tension, humor, absurdity, heroism, and many tragedies of the six weeks from April to June in 1989. Six awards, one nomination. For more info visit http://www.tsquare.tv

This film is part of the Courage vs. Violence Film and Discussion Series

Joyeux Noel & Weapons of the Spirit

Thursday, December 16, 2010. 7pm. Joyeux Noel. Location: Meeting Room, 15th Street Meeting House, 15 Rutherford Place.

Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA nominee for Best Foreign Film, Joyeux Noel tells the story of a spontaneous Christmas Eve truce declared by Scottish, French and German troops in the trenches of World War I [loosely based on a number of truces that really broke out on Christmas Eve during World War I]. Enemies leave their weapons behind for one night as they band together in brotherhood and forget about the brutalities of war. Diane Kruger (Troy), Daniel Bruhl (Good Bye Lenin!) and Benno Furmann (The Princess and the Warrior) head a first rate international cast in a powerful, must-see film [from the DVD case]. PG-13. Nominated for an Academy Award. Another 2 wins & 9 nominations.

Friday, December 17, 2010. 7pm. Weapons of the Spirit. Location: Room 1, 15th Street Meeting House, 15 Rutherford Place, Manhattan.

Le Chambon-sur-Lignon was a tiny Protestant farming village in the mountains of south-central France. Defying the Nazis and the French government that was collaborating with the Nazis, the villagers of the area of Le Chambon provided a safe haven throughout the war for whoever knocked on their door. During the course of the war, the villagers collectively rescued 5,000 Jews, mostly children. NR. 2 wins. [http://www.chambon.org/weapons_en.htm].

These films are part of the Courage vs. Violence Film and Discussion Series

Courage vs. Violence Film and Discussion Series

CLICK HERE FOR SHOWTIMES AND LOCATIONS

posters designed by Juan Alduey

We All Sing Glory to the Mountains

Actor Martin Pfefferkorn as energy genius Nikola Tesla. Click image to see slide show.

On Thursday, July 15, 2010 the 15th Street Friends Meeting House hosted an evening of entertainment and action to support the March on Washington (September 25 - 27) to end mountaintop removal and strip mining in Appalachia. The Arts Committee helped to secure the space, and provided technical support. Appalachia Rising is organizing the March.