Frequent Small Meals presents
Civil Rights on Film

Program 3: The Fierce Urgency of Now

A program of rare short films capturing the difficulties, urgency and hopes of the movement and its leaders

Friday, February 27, 2009, 8:00 PM
at Eyedrum

still from NOW! by Santiago Alvarez

Black Power, White Backlash (excerpt) (CBS-TV, 1966) 15 min., shown on DVD
Perfect Film (Ken Jacobs, 1986) 22 min., b&w, 16mm
Malcolm X: Nationalist or Humanist? (Madeline Anderson, 1968) 14 min., b&w, shown on VHS
NOW! (Santiago Alvarez, 1965) 6 min., b&w, shown on DVD
I Have a Dream (speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., August 28, 1963), DVD
Phyllis and Terry (Eugene and Carole Marner, 1964) 36 min., b&w, 16mm
additional selections TBA

A group of rare films from the 1960s, from a wide range of media sources, capture the difficulties, urgency, and hopes of the Civil Rights movement and its leaders. A network TV special (Black Power, White Backlash) gives a glimpse of mainstream media coverage of the tensions between Martin Luther King Jr. and the Black Power movement, and a film on Malcolm X (Nationalist or Humanist?) is shown as an example of the first Black-produced network TV show. Two films consist entirely of images taken from the media – one by a noted avant-gardist who simply left the raw footage alone to speak for itself (Perfect Film), and another by a master propagandist who edits for maximum emotional effect (NOW!). Martin Luther King Jr.'s legendary speech "I Have a Dream" is seen here in its entirety as it appeared live on television screens in 1963. The second part of the program is a little-seen documentary gem about two teenage girls on New York’s Lower East Side (Phyllis and Terry), made by independent filmmakers in 1965.

Eyedrum
290 Martin Luther King Jr Dr, Suite 8
Atlanta, GA 
Parking: FREE
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