CineKatipunan Screenings

THIS WEEK AT CINEKATIPUNAN
April 2-4, 2007
Screening Starts at 5:30 PM
Mag:net Cafe Katipunan (fronting Miriam and Ateneo)
www.magnet.com.ph

Announcement:
Cinekatipunan will be closed for the duration of Holy
Week, from April 5 onwards. Screenings will resume on
Monday, April 9.

April 2 (Monday)
Elli Safari: The Noble Struggle of Amina Wadud
(Documentary)
The Netherlands/US, 2006, 29 minutes

On March 18, 2005, Amina Wadud shocked the Islamic
world by leading a mixed-gender Friday prayer
congregation in New York. THE NOBLE STRUGGLE OF AMINA
WADUD is a fascinating and powerful portrait of this
African-American Muslim woman who soon found herself
the subject of much debate and Muslim juristic
discourse. In defying 1400 years of Islamic tradition,
her action caused global awareness of the struggle for
women's rights within Islam but also brought violence
and death threats against her.

Filmmaker Safari follows this women's rights activist
and scholar around the world as she quietly but with
utter conviction explains her analysis of Islam in the
classroom, at conferences, in her home, and in the
hair dresser's shop. Wadud explains how Islam, with
its promise of justice, appeals to the African
American community. And she links the struggle for
racial justice with the need for gender equality in
Islam. Deeply engaging, this film offers rare insights
into the powerful connections between Islam, women's
rights, and racial justice.

April 3 (Tuesday)
From Conrado's Cabinet: MAN RAY: PROPHET OF THE
AVANT-GARDE

Man Ray, famed Dada artist, expatriate, and innovator,
is the subject of this PBS American Masters Series
episode. Stockard Channing hosts this in-depth
documentary. Several interviews with the artist
himself and other archival footage aptly covers and
describes one of the 20th Century's most influential
artists

April 4 (Wednesday)
Carl Th. Dreyer: THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC

THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC
by André Bazin
Those who have the opportunity of seeing Carl
Dreyer's masterpiece The Passion of Joan of Arc are
actually seeing a print made from the original
negatives. They were thought to have been destroyed
but were miraculously discovered among the out takes
of sound film at Gaumont Studios. There is perhaps no
other film in which the actual quality of the
photography is more important.

The Passion of Joan of Arc was filmed in France in
1928 by the Danish director Carl Dreyer, using French
writers and a French crew. Based on a script by Joseph
Delteil, the film is in fact inspired by the actual
minutes of the trial. But the action here is condensed
into one day, conforming to a dramatic requirement
that is in no way a distortion.

Dreyer's Joan of Arc will remain memorable in film
annals for its bold photography. With the exception of
a few shots, the film is almost entirely composed of
close-ups, principally of faces. This technique
satisfies two apparently contradictory purposes:
mysticism and realism. The story of Joan, as Dreyer
presents it, is stripped of any anecdotal references.
It becomes a pure combat of souls. But this
exclusively spiritual tragedy, in which all action
comes from within, is fully expressed by the face, a
privileged area of communication.

I must explain this further. The actor normally uses
his face to express his feelings. Dreyer, however,
demanded something more of his actors—more than
acting. Seen from very close up, the actor's mask
cracks. As the Hungarian critic Béla Balasz wrote,
"The camera penetrates every layer of the physiognomy.
In addition to the expression one wears, the camera
reveals one's true face. Seen from so close up, the
human face becomes the document." Herein lies the rich
paradox and inexhaustible lesson of this film: that
the extreme spiritual purification is freed through
the scrupulous realism of the camera as microscope.
Dreyer forbade all makeup. The monks' heads are
literally shaved. With the film crew in tears, the
executioner actually cut Falconetti's hair before
leading her to the stake. But this was not an example
of real tyranny. We are indebted to Dreyer for his
irrefutable translation direct from the soul.
Silvain's wart (Cauchon), Jean d'Yd's freckles, and
Maurice Schutz's wrinkles are of the same substance as
their souls. These things signify more than their
acting does. Some twenty years later Bresson
resubstantiated this in Diary of a Country Priest
(1950).

But there is still so much more to say about this
film, one of the truest masterpieces of the cinema. I
would like to enumerate two more points. First, Dreyer
is perhaps, along with Eisenstein, the only filmmaker
whose works equal the dignity, nobility, and powerful
elegance found in masterpieces of painting. This is
not only because he was inspired by them but
essentially because he rediscovered the secret of
comparable aesthetic depths. There is no reason to
harbor false modesty with respect to films. A Dreyer
is the equal of the great painters of the Italian
Renaissance or Flemish school. My second observation
is that all this film lacks is words. The only thing
that has aged is the intrusion of subtitles. Dreyer so
regretted not being able to use the still frail sound
available in 1928. For those who still think that the
cinema lowered itself when it began to have sound, we
need only counter with this masterpiece of silent film
that is already virtually speaking.

(Radio-Cinéma—1952)

La Passion De Jeanne d'Arc

With its stunning camerawork and striking
compositions, Carl Th. Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of
Arc convinced the world that movies could be art.
Renee Falconetti gives one of the greatest
performances ever recorded on film, as the young
maiden who died for God and France. Long thought to
have been lost to fire, the original version was
miraculously found in perfect condition in 1981 - in a

Norwegian mental institution. Criterion is proud to
present this milestone of silent cinema in a new
special edition featuring composer Richard Einhom's
Voices of Light, an original opera/oratorio inspired
by the film.