FilmClick

Chris Taylor’s documentary “Food Fight” plays at the Santa Cruz Film Festival on Tuesday, May 12th, at 6:30pm at Regal Riverfront Twin Cinemas. Taylor’s film examines American agricultural policy and food culture development in the 20th century and how the California food movement has created a counter revolution against agribusiness.

This film delves in to the local-sustainable-organic food movement that grew out of the counter-culture of California in the late 1960s and 1970s and which lead to the birth of farmer’s markets.  Featuring interviews with restaurateurs Alice Waters and Suzanne Goin, writer Michael Pollan (The Omnivore’s Dilemma),  chef Wolfgang Puck and many more.

View the trailer here:

Director’s statement:

When I started to think about the story that I wanted to tell in FOOD FIGHT, I knew that the story would have many threads. It’s a story that starts politically, in the cultural ferment of Berkeley in the 60’s, and ends in pleasure, by way of some committed chefs, restaurateurs, and food activists in California. Along the way this counter-revolution has brought American food consumers, small farmers and political activists into direct conflict with the power of big agribusiness and American government policy.
This way of eating that I portray in the film started out (or more accurately was rediscovered) in a restaurant called Chez Panisse in Berkeley. Almost by accident, Alice Waters and her chef and partner Jeremiah Tower found that they could find the best ingredients not by buying from the usual industrial food distributors, but instead by canvassing the local neighborhood backyard gardens. Fellow-counter culturists and other proto-organic farmers were growing fresh tomatoes, lettuces, micro greens, and making artisanal cheeses locally.

As Alice herself says in the film, “When I started the restaurant I wasn’t looking for the local organic farmer. I was looking for taste. But in looking for taste, I found those farmers.” Soon she was putting together a local food chain, free from long-distance shipping, and without the pesticides and fertilizers that were leaching taste from supermarket food. As she developed this food chain of small local farmers, an especially fortuitous piece of California statehouse legislation opened a new opportunity for these same farmers to meet consumers directly. This legislation, in 1975, enabled local farmers to sell produce directly to consumers, and Farmers Markets were born. The first markets developed in university towns, Berkeley, Santa Cruz, San Luis Obispo, and later in Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, and San Diego. In the Bay Area, as Chez Panisse developed a national reputation for spectacular culinary results, the local farmers were named on the menu, and the spotlight of chef artistry was shown on the farmers. Savvy consumers realized that they could buy the same ingredients as Alice Waters and Wolfgang Puck (who was reprising the same paradigm in spectacular fashion at Spago), and as dedicated foodies know, 85% of cooking is getting the best ingredients.

-Chris Taylor, Director, “Food Fight”

For more information on the film visit:

http://www.foodfightthedoc.com

Check out more films and ticket information about the Santa Cruz Film Festival, which runs from May 7 to May 15, by visiting their website at:

http://www.santacruzfilmfestival.org/

The Santa Cruz Film Festival celebrates opening night at 7:30pm on May 7 at the Del Mar Theatre with Giancarlo Esposito’s (in attendance) directorial debut, “Gospel Hill”, starring Angela Bassett and Danny Glover and featuring Samuel Jackson, Julia Stiles and Adam Baldwin.

About the film
In the town of Julia, the neighborhood citizens of Gospel Hill are being forced out of their homes to make way for a multimillion-dollar development. Dr. Ron Palmer (Giancarlo Esposito, Do the Right Thing, The Usual Suspects), an influential black community leader who runs the local health clinic blindly supports the development. The good doctor’s desire for wealth and status awakens the racially divided community town. John Malcolm (Danny Glover, The Color Purple, Lethal Weapon), withdrew following his brother Peter’s (Samuel Jackson, Pulp Fiction, Eve’s Bayou) assassination thirty years ago, and is still haunted by the pain of the unsolved murder. He is detached from his wife and the society he once fought for.

John’s wife, Sarah (Angela Bassett, What’s Love Got To Do With It, How Stella Got Her Groove Back) takes it upon herself to battle Dr. Palmer and reveal his profiteering to the whole town. Meanwhile, the towns bigoted, ex-sheriff (Tom Bower, Appaloosa, North Country), who was responsible for letting the investigation of Peter’s murder go unresolved, is facing his own mortality and twisted choices.

Each of these characters’ lives intertwine to create a gripping, revealing and dramatic tale touching on issues of race, imminent domain, and the power of the human spirit to overcome the pain and hatred of division. Gospel Hill is overflowing with the deep emotions of greed, transformation, racism, redemption, forgiveness, and hope.

Check out more films playing at the Santa Cruz Film Festival from May 7 to May 15 by visiting their website at:

http://www.santacruzfilmfestival.org/

Recognizing both national and international filmmakers alike, SF DocFest celebrates some of its bay area pride, both in content and creators. Always a haven for interesting documentary filmmakers, the bay area locals at Docfest this year present a wide variety of views and subjects for local audiences, many of them shot right at home.

HEAD TRIP (85 min), set at the beginning of the Iraq war, follows a bus-load of San Francisco characters as they crisscross across the USA on a quixotic/good-will journey to NYC. They drop in on noteworthy American monuments and oddball artists along the way with their own “roadside attraction”: three giant Doggie Diner Heads that they tow with them on their adventure.

Produced by Laughing Squid. John Law is an original Suicide Club member, charter member of the Cacophony Society and co-founder of Burning Man festival. Flecher Fleudujon is a film professional and co-founder of the Yard Dogs Roadshow & Revue.

Sunday, October 26 at 7:15 PM at Roxie Cinema

Monday, October 27 at 9:30 PM ROxie Cinema

GOING On 13 takes us on a four year ride of puberty, from Tweety Bird to Bow Wow, double dutch to chat rooms, Daddy’s girls to first deceptions, as we watch o Ariana, Isha, Rosie, and Esme let go of childhood and fumble - or sprint - toward an uncertain future. For each of these California girls of color, puberty is a whirlwind of change and new choices.

Meet Esmeralda, Mexican American, first to complete her daily schoolwork and first in her class to have a secret boyfriend; Ariana, African American, who goes from tomboy to popular girl as her family struggles to leave the poverty of West Oakland; Rosie, mixed race Latina, precocious and sunny at 9, but dangerously alienated as a pre-teen; and Isha, an immigrant from India, who despite her devotion to her traditional family, explores Internet teen chat-rooms with user names like ‘ghetto girl’ and ‘cutie pie.’

Going on 13 shows us a reality far more complex than what we are used to seeing in the media about pre-teen girls and urban girls of color. Through intimate interviews and cinema verite footage of the everyday drama of their changing lives, Isha, Rosie, Esme and Ariana remind us that it is the small moments of insight that usher us down the rough road from childhood to adulthood.

Saturday, October 18 at 5:00 PM at Roxie Cinema
Wednesday, October 22 at 7:15 PM at Roxie Cinema
Sunday, November 2 at 7:15 PM at Shattuck Cinema

B. Douglas Robbins’s DEBATE TEAM puts a whole new spin on the idea of competition as it explores the bizarre subculture of competitive college debate. Competitors battle at 360 words per minute, hauling around mountains of evidence called “cards” and nearly every debate ends in global nuclear annihilation.

In 2005, nearly 200 teams converged atSan Francisco State to compete in the National Championship. The documentary follows four teams, from Michigan State, Harvard, West Georgia, and Berkeley in their quest for the national title.

Exploring the potentially dangerous history of college debate teams, what emerges is not simply a chronicle of the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat, but a more disturbing examination into the nature of competition itself and the American fetish with championships and champions.

Sunday October 19 at 7:15 PM at Roxie Cinema
Tuesday October 21 at 7:15 PM at Roxie Cinema
Sunday November 2 at 9:30 PM at Shattuck Cinema

I THINK WE’RE ALONE NOW focuses on two individuals, Jeff and Kelly, who claim in love with the 80’s pop singer Tiffany. Fifty-year-old Jeff Turner, a man from Santa Cruz, CA has been going to Tiffany concerts since 1988. Diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, he has never had a girlfriend. Jeff spends his days on the streets of Santa Cruz, striking up conversations with anyone who has a moment to spare. Kelly McCormick is a 35-year-old intersex person from Denver, CO, who claims to have been friends with Tiffany as a teenager and credits Tiffany as the shining star who been the motivation for everything in Kelly’s life.

Both Jeff and Kelly have been labeled stalkers by the media and other Tiffany fans. This film takes you inside the lonely lives these two characters, revealing the source of their clinging obsessions. This age-old story of unrequited love is a comedic and emotional trip through themes of desperation, isolation, and hope, illustrating that having something, or someone, to believe in can be more powerful than anything realit has to offer.

Friday, October 24 at 9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Wednesday, October 29 at 9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Saturday, November 1 at 7:15 PM at Shattuck Cinema

THE LONG HAUL shares the journey of a lesbian couple who journey cross-country on their move from New Jersey to California. As they attach their 1956 Airstream Caravan to a Ford F250 pickup, Martha and Lavonne, who have been together for almost two decades, test their patience athey navigate through the Deep South. Driving by day, drinking and camping by night, they show us that they’re like any other couple. Whether it’s sharing a plate of biscuits in South Carolina, bickering over map directions, or being devastated about church ladies shutting down their favorite bar in Louisiana—Martha and Lavonne try to ride it out for the long haul.

Thursday, October 30 at 9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Sunday, October 26 at9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Monday, November 3 at 7:15 PM at Shattuck Cinema

THE PEOPLE’S ADVOCATE: The Life & Times of Charles R. Garry

One of the most influential criminal defense attorneys of the 20th century, Charles R. Garry (1909-1991) became a household name during the 1960s with his defense of a host of revolutionary political icons, including Huey Newton and Bobby Seale of the Black Panther Party. This documentary seeks to fill the gap Seale wrote about nearly thirty years ago in his autobiography Seize the Time: “We don’t know every detail of Charles’ life, but we can see that he is a man who is dedicated to the survival and the existence of the right to self-determination of human beings. We need a lot more history on Charles R. Garry so we can understand what motivates a man to be such a defender of the people’s human rights.” An outspoken advocate for the underdog, Garry’s career came to an unexpected and tragic halt in 1978, when his client, the Reverend Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple, led over 900 of his followers in mass suicide at Jonestown. This documentary recounts Garry’s life through the voices of those who knew him best—family, fellow attorneys and former clients. Interviewees include: Black Panther Party leaders Bobby Seale, Kathleen Cleaver, Ericka Huggins and David Hilliard; famed historian and civil rights activist Howard Zinn; and Jim Jones’s son Stephan Jones.

Friday, Oct 17 at 9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Wednesday, October 29 at 9:30 PM at Roxie Cinema
Monday November 3 at9:30 PM at Shattuck Cinema