• WHERE'S THE DISSENT? 30 Years of Protest Films
at Hallwalls
Filmmaker Lynne Sachs in person
Saturday, January 25, 2003 at 8 p.m.
$6 general, $5 students and seniors, $4 members.

Artist Pat Oleszko sounded the cry of "Where's the dissent?" during her 
performance at Hallwalls in September 2002, and she's not alone in her 
desire and need to hear opposition to U.S. military might. This collection 
of post World War II U.S. protest films, most made to protest the war in 
Vietnam, is a reminder of the need for resistance to violence as well as an 
earnest call to artists for action today.

FOR LIFE, AGAINST THE WAR (various artists, 35 min.)
From the archives of the Film-Maker's Cooperative in New York City, and 
curated by executive director M.M. Serra, this program includes rarely seen 
early anti-war protest films and documentaries. The original selection of 
short films was made at the invitation of "The Week of the Angry Arts" in 
1967. Excerpted from a program that originally ran 3 hours, these films 
demonstrate the power of imaginative resistance and chronicle a vital and 
vibrant time in cinematic history. Featuring VIETFLAKES (1965) by Carolee 
Schneemann - one of the first Vietnam War protest films; PEACE PICKETS 
ARRESTED FOR DISTURBING THE PEACE (1965) by Leonard Henny - a Kodachrome 
documentation of an anti-war protest at an induction center, where Joan Baez 
was arrested; TRAP DANCE (1968) by Storm De Hirsch - an Angry Arts protest 
film animation in black and white visuals; and MARCH ON THE PENTAGON (1967) 
by David Ringo - a human document, sometimes harsh, sometimes beautiful, of 
the events and people protesting that day.

LITTLE FLAGS by Jem Cohen (2000, 6:30 min.)
Filmed on the streets of lower Manhattan during a patriotic victory parade. 
Everyone loves a parade-except for the dead.
* Honorable Mention / Director's Citation, Black 2002Maria Festival

ARMY OF LOVERS by local artist Ron Ehmke (2002, 3 min.)
A playful update on Rosa Von Praunheim's pioneering documentary about gay 
liberation which takes the form of a 1940s-style recruitment/propaganda 
film. It satirizes both the gays-in-the-military controversy and gay men's 
own festishization of the outward trappings of militarism.

INVESTIGATION OF A FLAME by Lynne Sachs (2001, 45 min.)
Director Lynne Sachs in person!
"A highly personal, compelling 'anti-documentary' record of a once 
celebrated, now forgotten protest." - San Francisco Weekly
* Certificate of Merit (Golden Gate Award), 2002 San Francisco International 
Film Festival
* Honorable Mention, 2002 Ann Arbor Film Festival
* Director's Citation, 2002 Black Maria Film and Video Festival
On May 17, 1968 nine Vietnam War protesters, including a nurse, an artist 
and three priests, walked into a Catonsville, Maryland draft board office, 
grabbed hundreds of selective service records and incinerated them with 
homemade napalm. INVESTIGATION OF A FLAME is an intimate look at this 
unlikely, disparate band of resisters who broke the law in a poetic act of 
civil disobedience. The publicity and news coverage from the ensuing trial 
helped to galvanize an increasingly disillusioned American public. 
INVESTIGATION OF A FLAME explores this protest - an action more common in 
the 1960's - within in the context of these extremely different times, times 
in which foes of Middle East peace agreements, abortion and technology 
resort to violence to access the public imagination. Filmmaker Lynne Sachs 
has combined a series of informal interviews with Daniel and Philip 
Berrigan, Howard Zinn, John Hogan, Tom Lewis, and Marjorie and Tom Melville 
- all members of the Catonsville Nine - with long unseen archival footage to 
encourage viewers to ponder the relevance of such events today.
In 2001, Lynne Sachs received a Media Arts Fellowship from the Rockefeller 
Foundation to complete INVESTIGATION OF A FLAME. Her films, including WHICH 
WAY IS EAST and THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF LILITH, have been screened at the 
Museum of Modern Art, the Pacific Film Archive and the Sundance Film 
Festival as well as at other museum and alternative exhibition sites 
nationally and internationally. Over the last several years, Lynne has also 
created several conceptually inspired installations using time-based media 
and sculpture. These include HORROR VACUI: NATURE ABHORS A VACUUM and MARY 
MOYLAN: NINE YEARS UNDERGROUND. Lynne is an Assistant Professor in the Film 
and Media Arts Department at Hunter College in New York City.