The Rutgers Film Co-op/New Jersey Media Arts Center, and the Rutgers University Program In Cinema Studies present the:
New Jersey Film Festival Spring 2022 - 40th Anniversary
Welcome to the Spring 2022 New Jersey Film Festival!
Our 40th Anniversary Festival will be taking place on select Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays between January 28 and February 20, 2022. As a result of COVID our Festival will be a virtual one again this Spring. All the films will be available virtually via Video on Demand for 24 hours on their show date.
Tickets: $15=Per Program; Festival All Access Pass=$100.
Friday, January 28, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Experimental Film Program
Battle – Hüseyin Mert Erverdi (Istanbul, Turkey)
In this experimental animation film, Shodo-Budo and abstract expressionism as well as eastern and western sensibilities of calligraphy and painting, are put to a Zen like dynamic visual dialogue to evoke a feeling of an inner battle. Battle also in a sense a salute to Stan Brakhage’s final film Chinese Series, made during his own battle with cancer, by wetting a filmstrip with saliva and using his fingernail to scratch marks into the emulsion. Battle is about the daily struggle of being in the world. It is dedicated to all the silent and not so silent battles we fought. 2021; 3 min.
caprice x2 – Claudia Ungersbäck (Austria)
In this lovely black and white experimental animation, forms and gestures, marks and notes happen while light resounds. 2021; 4 min.
mise en abyme – Charly Santagado (Metuchen, New Jersey)
What happens when the muse of our daydreams is displaced by egoism parading as a deep exploration of identity? In mise en abyme, the “artist” is consumed with herself and gradually neglects her muse. As the room around her becomes increasingly ornate, the artist is more and more consumed by her “work”, which is merely a simultaneously idealized and dumbed down projection of herself. All the while, the muse’s frustration at the emptiness of the whole endeavor swells. 2021; 5 min.
Pottero – Lindsay Martin (Athens, Ohio)
A humorous and dark animated film based on family folklore and issues surrounding mental health, accessible healthcare and social mobility. 2022; 10 min.
Flux - Cléa van der Grijn (Sligo, Ireland)
FLUX is about creating a space between now and then. Exploring the dynamism of emptiness in a realm where time and space are altered. Past, present and future are considered in the gaps in-between, blurring the boundaries between fact and fiction. Expressing emotions, ideas and concepts through literal and abstract imagery, through the creative use of editing and sound design incorporating Irish Sean Nós song. Characters emphasize the fragile and emotional states of mankind, with prominence on dreamscapes and mindscapes. An oneiric land cinematically beautiful and psychologically disturbing. A world that explores significant topics such as death, loss, love, isolation and mental-fragility. 2021; 17 min.
Home in the Air - Elena Vilallonga (Barcelona, Spain)
Home in the Air is a reflection both on our idea of home and caretaking, and on our passage through this patch of sky. Built like a nest, with the bare essentials, the film has a poetic dimension with its focus on the bird’s and children’s watchful observation and on a listening ear for their songs and flutterings. Home in the Air is not about aesthetics or anything premeditated, it’s a natural prayer of the soul, an ode to animal and human behavior. The sharp eye of a bird and the children’s voices off-camera give shape to this film which places itself somewhere between the Earthly and the Divine. In Spanish, subtitled. 21 min.
Saturday-January 29, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
RUTH STONE'S VAST LIBRARY OF THE FEMALE MIND – Nora Jacobson (Norwich, Vermont)
Ruth Stone was a promising young poet, living an idyllic life with her beloved husband, a poet and professor. When he died unexpectedly by suicide, Ruth was flung out into the world, destitute with three daughters to support. Though not well known outside of the poetry world, Ruth won accolades and awards, such the National Book Award for Poetry, the Wallace Stevens Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, two Guggenheim Fellowships, the Delmore Schwartz Award, and she was a finalist for the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, among many others. Beloved by many, Ruth’s house in Goshen, Vermont became a mecca for students, poets, friends and family members. There she inspired people to make art and write, not only through activities such as the “poetry game”, but by providing solace and nurture, surrounded by nature and camaraderie. After Ruth died, her granddaughter Bianca Stone and husband Ben Pease, began renovating Ruth’s house and turning it into a writer’s retreat. Their goal is to create an enduring legacy that will keep Ruth’s name alive and nurture a new generation of poets. 2021; 77 min.
Sunday, January 30, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Short Film Program
Slow Moving Houses – Mischa Jakupcak (Seattle, Washington)
While a man is in the midst of an existential crisis, a mysterious young girl appears and leads him into a future he can’t imagine for himself, forever altering the course of his life. 2021; 8 min.
Dilemma – Luis Suarez Bracho (Madrid, Spain)
In a rural setting, a young nun, disenchanted with her faith, wishes to hang up her habit. In Spanish, subtitled. 2021; 6 min.
Galileo – Ryan Gentle and Austin Quarles (Hixson, Tennessee)
Alexander, a space-loving day dreamer hopes to pass that love on to his son Galileo. As he grows up, Galileo realizes he needs to break away from his father's hope to find his own path, but his path is closer to his father's dreams than he ever thought. 2021; 13 min.
Counting Down – Oya Babaoglu (Atlanta, Georgia)
A young psychiatrist in 1875 is promoted to be the head doctor of the city asylum, but she has a secret, she suffers from arithmomania - a form of OCD where sufferers have a strong urge to count. She is committed to cure herself all on her own, but she only has one week. Can she succeed? 2021; 15 min.
It’s Not Safe For You In This Zoo – John Garet Stoker (Los Angeles, California)
An aimless Angeleno decides to write a pop song, sending his relationship into the deep end. 2021; 17 min.
The Call of the Water - Kaya Tone (New York, New York)
Flung into the astral-plane, Nadia must face ancient forces in order to realize her responsibility to her homeland. 2021; 19 min.
Waiting for Deading – Paul Sestakov (Austin, Texas)
Two apprentice Grim Reapers are sent on their first assignment, but everything turns from bad to even f-ing worse when this bickering duo stray from the protocol. 2021; 28 min.
Friday-February 4, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Twotwo – Jun Hoskulds (Los Angeles, California)
David had the dream life. Good education, suit and tie job in the corporate world, an apartment with a view Downtown LA. His life collapses when he loses this job, can’t find any other work, and can’t pay his rent. Depressed and hung over after a night of pills and drinking, David wakes up in a dirty back alley. A homeless man starts talking with him. David doesn't care to listen, but the old man seems to know a lot about life, and strangely, about him. He makes David an offer: to “give it all up, in order to find it all over again”, in a very similar, but much better, parallel universe. In this new world he meets the mysterious and beautiful Twotwo, a woman with a number for name, who likes artists and has unique powers she uses to help them. She has no memory of her past, no belongings and no home, but many places she can stay. Somehow even if it seems like they have nothing in common, she likes to spend time with David, teaching him things, and ultimately revealing his own truth to him. As she tries to enlighten David, his faith is tested. Is he ready?
It’s a double trip, one for David as he gets to know Twotwo and learn from her, and the other for us, seeing more into this other world that David can’t see. Twotwo is a fantasy film, a metaphor about life, purpose, connecting, spirituality, love, creativity, parallel universes, and the unseen presence of a power always watching. 2021; 98 min.
Friday-February 4, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Princess – Peter Luisi (Zurich, Switerland)
It is the year 1985: Josef (47) is an alcoholic who has given up on life. When his younger sister moves into the same house, an unexpected friendship develops between him and her 4-year old daughter, Nina. Thirty-five years later the two meet again. Nina is in trouble and Josef, now 82 years old, sets out to help her. In German, subtitled. 2021; 101 min.
Saturday- February 5, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
When Claude Got Shot – Brad Lichtenstein (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)
When Claude Got Shot follows five years in the life of Claude Motley as he tries to recover mentally and physically from being shot in the face by 15 year old carjacker, Nathan King. The day after shooting Claude, Nathan was shot and paralyzed by Victoria Davison who used a conceal and carry gun to stop his attempt to rob her. With Claude's journey at the center, three strikingly unique experiences of gun violence, justice and healing unfold. A striver seeking to get back on track to a legal career, Claude persists through multiple surgeries, catastrophic health care bills and trauma that affects him and his family. All the while he and his wife remain engaged in the criminal justice process determining his shooter's fate. Torn between punishment and the injustice of mass incarceration of young black men, Claude reflects on his own life and its similarity to Nathan's. Ultimately, Claude discovers that the path to healing leads back to the boy who shot him. 2021; 97 min.
Sunday, February 6, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Letters2Maybe - Yehuda Sharim (Merced, California)
Letters2Maybe offers an intimate portrayal of those who refuse to surrender amidst daily devastation and culminating strife, offering a vision for equality and a renewed sense of solidarity in a divisive country. Letters2Maybe offers a fluid and eclectic tapestry of physical and emotional movement of different immigrant communities as they encounter impossible challenges in a country of compounded catastrophes. By embracing a kaleidoscopic style of storytelling to highlight the poetics and precarity that follow the craving for freedom, Letters2Maybe is an unfinished letter, articulating the ever-growing yet unflinching demand for justice and tenderness in our world today. 2021; 92 min.
Friday-February 11, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Short Program #2
Covid Crusader: The Carla Brown Story – Randy Slavin (Port Washington, New York)
Motivated by the death of her husband due to COVID-19, Carla Brown is on a mission to vaccinate the African American population of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 2021; 3 min.
Memory Builds The Monument – Isaac Yowman (Houston, Texas)
Compelled by the vivid memories of the legendary Club Matinee by aging citizens, this film leaps into the music, the art, and the community of Houston's historic 5th Ward. The doc highlights the impossible to ignore cultural and social challenges of African-Americans in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s living in the South. The through-line of this story showcases how the music of these eras played a part in defining generations and bringing people of all ethnicities and backgrounds together and how memories, at the verge of being lost can be shared to propel the future. 2021; 15 min.
Joey Skaggs: Fish Condos – Judy Drosd and Joey Skaggs (New York, New York)
This short documentary is the fifth in the ongoing and growing series, Joey Skaggs: Satire and Art Activism, 1960s to the Present and Beyond. In 1983, Joey Skaggs invented condominiums for upwardly mobile guppies and forever changed the status quo of fish tanks. Decades later, his Fish Condos are still thriving. In this film, Joey shares the origin story and traces the saga of his satirical aquatic sculptures. 2021; 19 min.
Just Like Water - Manos Triantafillakis (Athens, Greece)
This lovely short is about the father of the director, Spyros, his life and experiences. He is the protagonist and narrator. Just Like Water speaks about time and the circle of life. The questions asked are, what is time and how do we perceive it? Do we really live the moments in our daily lives and do we give them their due value? So, we follow a magical journey through time, embedded with vivid images of Spyros, grandfather, man, child ... A girl and a woman always there. A patchwork of images, accompanied by original musical composition, sketched in detail: it weaves the puzzle of a whole life nestled in the Island of Crete. In Greek, subtitled. 2021; 13 min.
Threads of Desire – Bianca Di Marco (New York, New York)
Threads of Desire tells the story of Bettina, a lonely and overlooked farmer who steals an elegant dress from town. Riddled with guilt, Bettina must choose between following her conscience or her fantasies of owning a beautiful gown. 2021; 9 min.
¡Llámame Chinita! – Stacy Chu (Los Angeles, California)
Lulu, a 30-year-old woman from China, travels alone to Mexico in the middle of the Pandemic. Despite her distance from home, her daily life and pressures seem to follow. In Chinese and Spanish, subtitled. 2021; 22 min.
Saturday- February 12, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
The Outwaters - Robbie Banfitch (Los Angeles, California)
The Outwaters is a naturalistic, slow-burn story about a group of travelers who encounter menacing phenomena while camping in a remote stretch of the Mojave Desert. 2022; 104 min.
Friday-February 18, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
The History of Metal and Horror – Mike Schiff (Bronx, New York)
A documentary that explores the history of heavy metal and horror, and how the two genres merged over time. Hosted by Michael Berryman, and featuring Alice Cooper, Rob Zombie, Kirk Hammett, John Carpenter, Tom Savini, Dave Mustaine, Jonathan Davis, Corey Taylor, and many more. 2021; 101 min.
Friday-February 18, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
Not Today - Aditya Kripalani (Singapore, Singapore)
In this tense and gripping feature film, a 24-year-old from a traditional Muslim family in Mumbai goes to work secretly as a suicide prevention counsellor. On her first day, she encounters a 52-year-old man, standing atop a high-rise, wanting to jump. In trying to bring him down, she is forced to confront why she became a Suicide Prevention Counsellor in the first place, and also share a lot of herself to get him to share and open up. In English and Hindi, subtitled. 2021; 93 min.
Saturday- February 19, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
2022 United States Super 8 Film & Digital Video Festival Day 1- Programs 1 +2
View the winning films and digital videos of the International United States Super 8 Film & Digital Video Festival, selected by a jury of filmmakers, Rutgers University student interns, and media professionals. The festival--now in its 34th year—will feature finalist works by independent filmmakers from the United States and around the world. Each part approx. 90 min. A complete festival line-up is available at our website. Co-sponsored by Pro 8mm!
Sunday, February 20, 2022 – Online for 24 hours!
2022 United States Super 8 Film & Digital Video Festival Day 2
View the winning films and digital videos of the International United States Super 8 Film & Digital Video Festival, selected by a jury of filmmakers, Rutgers University student interns, and media professionals. The festival--now in its 34th year—will feature finalist works by independent filmmakers from the United States and around the world. Each part approx. 90 min. A complete festival line-up is available at our website. Co-sponsored by Pro 8mm!
Information
New Jersey Film Festival
Rutgers Film Co-op/New Jersey Media Arts Center
Rutgers University Program in Cinema Studies
4170 Academic Building, 15 Seminary Place
New Brunswick, New Jersey, 08901-8525 U.S.A.
Phone: (848) 932-8482
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Websites: www.njfilmfest.com
https://watch.eventive.org/newjerseyfilmfestivalfall2021
Sponsors:
The New Jersey Film Festival is funded and/or sponsored in part by The Rutgers Film Co-op/New Jersey Media Arts Center; The Rutgers University Program in Cinema Studies/School of Arts and Sciences; Middlesex County, a partner of the New Jersey State Council on the Arts - Funding has been provided by the Middlesex County Board of County Commissioners through a grant award from the Middlesex County Cultural and Arts Trust Fund; The Rutgers University Office of Summer and Winter Sessions; OVID/Icarus Films, The Rutgers University American Studies Department; Rutgers University School of Arts and Sciences Honors Program; Rutgers University Writer’s House; Pro 8mm; WRSU; New Jersey Stage, The Home News Tribune; The Asbury Park Press; New Brunswick City Center; The Rutgers University Office of Community Affairs; Grunin Foundation; Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation; Rutgers-Newark; New Jersey Theatre Alliance; ArtPride New Jersey; Steven C. Schechter, Esq.; Share and Harris.
Rutgers Film Co-op/NJMAC 2022 Staff
Executive Director/Curator: Albert Gabriel Nigrin
Office and House Managers: Isabelle Bonvini, Hamsa Hassan, Katie Scrivani
Volunteers/Interns: Justin Almodovar, Amit Bachani, Doris Diaz, Dennis Geissler, Thomas Kozakiewicz, Dana Lauria, Capri Leone, Caroline Mabrey, Alexandra Mazza, Prajesh Patel, Emily Ranieri, Sahar Saiyed, Michaela Schwab, Jordan Sickafoose, Jennifer Stanilla, Ashley Terer, Max Valentine, Isabella Vidro, Hannah Vliet, Kalilah Whitford
Advisors: Bob Brodsky, Victoria Connor, Matthew Maginley, Dr. Susan Martin-Marquez, Dr. Daniel Nigrin, Dr. Meheli Sen, Toni Treadway, and Dr. Alan Williams
Board of Trustees: Dr. Irene Fizer, Bill Harris, Albert Gabriel Nigrin, and Steven C. Schechter, Esq.