BY YANNIC RACK | The third annual MoRUS film festival will bring the East Village’s community gardens to life for a week starting this Sat., Aug.1.
Under the topic “I (heart) NRCHY: Subversion & the City,” the Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space will screen a series of shorts, documentaries, oral histories and features that pay homage to the spirit and legacy of anarchy and grassroots activism in New York.
The eight-day festival will happen in a different community garden every night and the screenings start at 8 p.m. Food will be provided, at least on some nights, by Roots Hummus and there will also be pizza from Two Boots, as well as popcorn.
A limited supply of all-inclusive passes ($20) are available from morusfilmfest.eventbrite.com and at MoRUS, 155 Avenue C between E. Ninth and 10th Sts. Museum hours are Tuesday and Thursday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tickets are also available at the door for a suggested $5 donation per film.
On Sat., Aug. 1, there will be a screening of “Anarchism in America,” a 1983 film directed by Steven Fischler and Joel Sucher, at Orchard Alley community garden at 350 E. Fourth St. The film includes rare archival footage and interviews, as well as live performance footage of the Dead Kennedys.
On Sun., Aug. 2, also at Orchard Alley, there will be two films under the topic “Bio Terror, Manufactured Fear & State Repression,” the Critical Art Ensemble production “Marching Plague,” as well as “Strange Culture,” directed by Lynn Hershman Leeson.
On Mon., Aug. 3, Le Petit Versailles garden, at 346 E. Houston St., will see a screening of “Neighborhood Narratives,” featuring oral histories and interviews with contemporary community activists, like the West Village’s Doris Dieter and tenant leader Ted Osbourne.
On Tues., Aug. 4, two films will screen at 6th & B Garden. “Still We Ride” is a documentary examining the showdown between the monthly Critical Mass ride and the New York Police Department in 2004, directed by Andrew Lynn, Elizabeth Press and Chris Ryan. “Community Gardens: 42 Years of Activism in Greening Manhattan” is the debut by director Jessica Kaller, who will be in attendance.
On Wed., Aug. 5, La Plaza Cultural garden will be the setting for two screenings on sustainable activism, “Disruption,” a look at the devastating consequences of inaction on climate change, directed by Kelly Nyks and Jared P. Scott, and “Idle Threat,” the story of one man’s fight to improve public health, directed by George Pakenham, who will also attend.
On Thurs., Aug. 6, also at La Plaza Cultural, you can catch “Rezoning Harlem,” directed by Natasha Florentino and Tamara Gubernat, about the fight against the rezoning of 125th St. in 2008. Also showing will be “The Rink,” a documentary on the Branch Brook Park Roller Rink in Newark, N.J. Director Sarah Friedland will be in attendance along with guest speaker DW Gibson, author of “The Edge Becomes the Center, an Oral History of Gentrification in the 21st Century.”
On Fri., Aug. 7, three films will be on at El Jardin del Paraiso, 311 E. Fourth St. “Voces de Fillmore,” directed by Ariana Allensworth, Teresa Basilio and Regina Eaton, is a documentary tracing the history and experiences of Puerto Rican families living on one block in South Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Next up will be Jennifer Pritheeva Samuel’s “Claiming Your Voice” and “Falling,” an experimental narrative film that explores the challenges faced by L.G.B.T.Q. youth. “Falling” directors Maya Suchak and Imani Peterkin will be in the audience.
On Sat., Aug. 8, MoRUS will close the festival at El Jardin del Paraiso with director Herbert J. Biberman’s “Salt of the Earth,” a neorealist drama based on the 1951 strike against the Empire Zinc Company in Grant County, New Mexico.
