Next Weekend! The NYC Anarchist Film Festival, 5/3 & 5/4 at Spectacle
Meet the the NYC Anarchist Film Festival's featured filmmakers
The NYC Anarchist Film Festival, a fundraiser for MACC, will be held at Spectacle Theater in Brooklyn and starts on Friday, May 3rd, at 7:30 PM. Festivities continue on Saturday, May 4th, at 5 PM until around 10:30 PM. On Saturday night, join us around the corner from the theater for an afterparty at East River Bar featuring a live performance by a secret musical guest!
The festival will feature films by comrades like Dylan Greenberg and Dove of Resistance, plus MACC’s own filmmakers, Tom Jarmusch, Jay Whang, Marisa Holmes, Charles de Agustin, and Peter Azen. Check out Spectacle’s website for more details on our programming and instructions on how to buy tickets! I spoke to several of our featured filmmakers about anarchism, filmmaking, and what they hope audiences gain from the festival.
Tom Jarmusch
Tom Jarmusch is an artist and filmmaker. He feels no choice but to resist authority, patriarchy, fascism, capitalism, racism, misogyny, defend queer and trans lives, resist ecological devastation. He works with others building towards collective liberation. Catch his short films Dream; Friends; and document, memory, for my friend Bill Rice, Saturday night during Program 3. Buy tickets here.
MOLLY GUILLERMO (FESTIVAL ORGANIZER): How can watching a film inspire political action?
JARMUSCH: That's a tricky question. There's different kinds of films, and different ways they can be political, and aren't all calls to action or educational. I think ideally it's the space and the audience. Not necessarily a facilitated discussion, but excitement and sharing. Even a buzz in the room. Another thing is a film can be personal and kind of self care. This can inspire the audience to do the same, make their own films or anything. This is a kind of liberation. And autonomy.
GUILLERMO: What kind of organizing work do you do for MACC? How has your community impacted your art?
JARMUSCH: I am actively in several working groups. I'm involved with A LIBRARY BUS, actions, media propaganda, and mutual aid (maybe more). This work with MACC and anarchists have changed me so much! All these different blocks and problems life long are disappearing! Creatively I feel like a child. Physically I'm much healthier too! I've been and begun painting for awhile now and I'm crazy enjoying it. This all since becoming an active anarchist with MACC. I'm being healed and transformed by community and this work. It is literally healing ADHD and brain damage I had undiagnosed for decades.
GUILLERMO: What do you hope audiences gain from the film festival?
JARMUSCH: I hope our audiences have fun! I hope they get excited by possibilities in all sorts of ways. I hope they join us building community and fighting and resisting all this shit. And leave lit up with excitement and happy.
Film still from document, memory, for my friend Bill Rice by Tom Jarmusch.
Marisa Holmes
Marisa Holmes is an organizer, filmmaker, writer, and educator based in Brooklyn, NY. She is the director of two non-fiction feature films, All Day All Week: An Occupy Wall Street Story, which captures the occupation at Zuccotti Park, and After the Revolution, a non-linear narrative of the post-2011 context in North Africa. After the Revolution will be screened Saturday night during Program 2. Purchase tickets here.
Film still from After the Revolution by Marisa Holmes and Rosavilla.
GUILLERMO: How do your anarchist principles influence your filmmaking?
HOLMES: I became an anarchist and a filmmaker at the same moment. Thus, the two identities are inseparable for me. The camera has been, for me, a tool of social struggle and reflection. My films are anarchistic in terms of form and content. They are organized spatially, according to their own maps. Spaces are held and borders are crossed. There is a refusal to adhere to the boundaries of property lines or states.
GUILLERMO: What role do creativity and art play in your organizing work with MACC? How important is art in political action?
HOLMES: Art opens the door of imagination. It helps us to envision new worlds, and feel that they are possible. The role of MACC is to prefigure the world we want, through our practices. Thus, art is an essential part of what we do.
GUILLERMO: What do you hope audiences gain from the film festival?
HOLMES: If one isn’t already an anarchist, then I hope they leave one.
Jay Whang
Jay Whang was born in Seoul, South Korea, and now lives in New York City as freelance photographer and mixed-media artist. He is also looking for short or feature film ideas and hoping to direct them. Watch his short films, The Tragic End of Rodney and Madlyn U and The Clash Between Good and Evil Friday night during Program 1. Purchase tickets here.
GUILLERMO: How do you use animation to envision a better future? Do you imagine different worlds or explore new ideas?
WHANG: I view animation as some sort of living painting that needs to be exhibited at art museums. This means I have to make something that challenges Americans' common perception of animation that was shaped by Disney movies. One of my many goals in my life is to make something that no one dares to make. They couldn't dare themselves to make it because it goes against the conventions and what's considered acceptable in today's society. One of many movies that made me want to make that kind of artwork was Alejandro Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain. This movie brought me a lot of new ideas. This not only made me believe that live-action movies can have infinite amount of potentials that have yet to explore, but also ALL art mediums have endless amount of potentials and expressions. And through that, that's how I explore new ideas and different worlds. I usually came up with different ideas through combining incompatible things, or throwing everything on the wall and see what sticks out.
Film still from The Clash Between Good and Evil by Jay Whang.
GUILLERMO: What’s your role in MACC and how has being part of an anarchist community helped you grow as an artist?
WHANG: I am part of the media team within MACC. I wanted to use this opportunity to hone my skill as an artist and make pieces about Anarchism or any related ideas.
GUILLERMO: What do you hope audiences will gain from the film festival?
WHANG: I hope they gain a perspective that's completely outside of conventional Hollywood views.
Event Info and Tickets
The NYC Anarchist Film Festival, a fundraiser for MACC, will be held at Spectacle, 124 S 3rd St, Brooklyn, NY, on Friday, May 3rd, 7:30 PM and Saturday, May 4th, at 5 PM. Saturday night there will be an after party after the festival (around 10:30 PM) at East River Bar and will feature a live performance by a secret musical guest.
Please wear masks inside the theater. The festival is split into three “programs” and tickets cost $10 per program. More information and details on how to purchase tickets is available at this link. Buttons and stickers will be available at the after party for free or with a small donation.
No one will be turned away for lack of funds. DM MACC on Instagram or Twitter/X (@macc_nyc) or contact a festival organizer on Signal to arrange it.
See you next weekend!