Autoethnography as Documentary, in association with the Visual Studies Graduate Student Association present

"Film Screenings"
Thursday, April 22, 2010
5:30 p.m.
Humanities Gateway, Room 1070 (McCormick Screening Room)

PLASTIC FLOWERS NEVER DIE
Directed by Roxanne Varzi, Associate Professor, UCI Anthropology 
(U.S./Iran, 2008, 34 min., color, dvd)
In English and Persian with English subtitles
5:30 p.m.  Screening
Followed by Q & A with director
6:30 p.m. Reception in Humanities Gateway Courtyard

SHUNGU: THE RESILIENCE OF A PEOPLE
Directed by Saki Mafundikwa (U.S./Zimbabwe, 2009, 54 min., color, Digibeta)
In English
7 p.m. Screening
Followed by Q & A with director

About the directors:
Anthropologist, writer and filmmaker Roxanne Varzi (UC Irvine Department of Anthropology and Department of Film & Media Studies) spent a year in Iran without a film permit speaking to ideologically driven mural painters, museum curators, war vets and other cultural producers along side the secular youth who were meant to consume the culture created by the government. The result is an experimental documentary mediation on the aftermath of the war, especially the mourning after. PLASTIC FLOWERS NEVER DIE was an Official Selection of the Fourth International Documentary Film Festival in Mexico City (2009), the New Filmmakers Festival in Los Angeles (2008), and the MESA FilmFest in Washington, D.C.(2008).

In SHUNGU: THE RESILIENCE OF A PEOPLE, Zimbabwean filmmaker and graphic designer Saki Mafundikwa explores his country's current political and economic crises by closely examining the lives of fellow Zimbabweans: a widow toils away in vain on her failing farm, a metalsmith cannot work without his tools and does not know if he will be able to support his third child, a doctor looks on despondently as health care goes from bad to worse. In addition to detailing this painful existence, Mafundikwa uses archive footage to throw light on British colonialism in his country, wars, the politics of Mugabe, and the opponents of the dictator, who hope to offer their country a better future. A selection of the 23rd International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam, scheduled for November.

These events are free and open to the public. 

For further information, please contact Arden Stern, Ph.D. program in visual studies, sterna@uci.edu . 

Co-sponsored by the UC Irvine Humanities Collective, the Design Alliance, International