The 56th Annual Flaherty Film Seminar took place recently in upstate New York on June 19-25, 2010. Two of us from CAAM, Christine Kwon and Michella Rivera-Gravage had an amazing experience there this year. CAAM has had a connection to the Flaherty for sometime now. Chi-hui Yang, our former Festival Director is on the board of the Flaherty and programmed the film seminar in 2008.
The Flaherty Film Seminar is a profound experience in many ways. The mix of filmmakers, programmers, academics, students, and film lovers is unique. The schedule is intense and the method of screening is rigorous and mind-opening. When you go to the Flaherty all you know is the theme for the year and the programmer. The 2010 programmer was the discerning and keen Dennis Lim and the theme was “work.” Before the lights went down, we were just told the running times and number of films.
We did a video blog of our experience at Flaherty and will be posting them in a series over the course of the next two weeks. In this first one we have snippets of our film discussion with Pedro González-Rubio (ALAMAR, 2009, TORO NEGRO, 2005) and Alex Rivera (WHY CYBRACEROS? 2005, SLEEP DEALER, 2007). I highly suggest you click on their links if you do not know who they are. We interview Alex Rivera in this episode.
Let us know what you think and if you have any questions by commenting below!