Sundays, 2 PM, Kerr McGee Auditorium in the Meinders School of Business
NW 27th Street and McKinley Ave, ÂÜÀòÊÓƵ, OK 73106
A discussion session follows each film for those who wish to stay
Free Admission, Donations Appreciated
Director: Dr. Harbour Winn, [email protected]
March 27, 2011, Kerr McGee Auditorium, 2 PM
Lixin Fan’s Last Train Home, China & Canada (2009), 87 min
Every spring, China’s cities are plunged into chaos as 130 million migrant workers journey to their home villages for the New Year’s holiday. This mass exodus is the world’s largest human migration—an epic spectacle that reveals a country tragically caught between its rural past and industrial future. The stunning debut from Chinese-Canadian director Lixin Fan, Last Train Home, a film not to be missed, portrays the fractured lives of a migrant family in China. Caught between tradition and the new realities of the globalized economy, the Zhangs abandon their rural home and children to toil in an urban factory, and are only able to return home to their family once a year for the Chinese New Year, along with millions of other migrant workers. Last Train Home’s intimate observation of one family sheds light on the profound human cost of China’s ascendancy as an economic superpower, of its economic miracle.
April 10, 2011, Kerr McGee Auditorium, 2 PM
Pamela Yates & Thomas Sigel’s When the Mountains Tremble, USA (1983), 90 min
The film that shook audiences and critics alike upon its original release, this revolutionary tour-de-force—Sundance Jury Prize winner and American Film Festival Blue Ribbon Award winner—chronicles the war between the heavily armed Guatemalan military and a nearly defenseless Mayan population. As the first film to report this previously unreported conflict, directors Yates and Siegel throw themselves into the center of a storm to capture live combat footage with robust passion and exhilaration. In the tradition of political truth-telling documentaries, the film discusses the role of the US government in providing money, arms, and training to the Guatemalan government and thus has relevance to countless other American interventions in foreign affairs. Commentary provided by the Quiche woman Rigoberta Menchu, the Nobel Peace Prize winner known around the world for her humanitarian efforts.
April 17, 2011, Kerr McGee Auditorium, 2 PM
Gini Reticker’s Pray The Devil Back to Hell, USA (2008), 72 min
The women of Liberia are living proof that moral courage and non-violent resistance can succeed, even where the best efforts of traditional diplomacy have failed. Their demonstrations culminated in the exile of Charles Taylor and the election of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Africa's first female head of state, and marked the vanguard of a new wave of women taking control of their political destiny around the world. This remarkable chapter of world history was on its way to being lost forever, for the Liberian war and peace movements were largely ignored as the international press focused on Iraq. Pray the Devil Back to Hell reconstructs the moment through interviews, archival footage and striking images of contemporary Liberia. It is compelling testimony to the potential of women worldwide to alter the history of nations.
Admission to the film series is free, but donations help sustain the Institute's mission. Donations can be made at each film or mailed to the ÂÜÀòÊÓƵ Film Institute Endowment at ÂÜÀòÊÓƵ University or the ÂÜÀòÊÓƵ Film Institute’s Designated Endowment in the Community Foundation of the Kirkpatrick Family Fund. ÂÜÀòÊÓƵ University and the Thatcher Hoffman Smith Endowment Fund for the university’s Center for Interpersonal Studies through Film and Literature also support the Institute.