For nearly a half-century, Su Friedrich has played a pivotal role in American queer cinema and autobiographical film with her rich and often unflinching explorations of family, kinship, and society. Join us for two screenings featuring three landmark films, including her groundbreaking family portrait SINK OR SWIM (1990), her wry breakup short RULES OF THE ROAD (1993) (both screening Thursday, September 7, 6:00 p.m.), and her latest feature, TODAY (2022) (Thursday, September 7, 8:30 p.m.), a personal essay on beauty, loss, and life. Friedrich will discuss the films and her process at both programs.

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SINK OR SWIM

“[A] personal chronicle about language, memory, and Dad that strikes hard, and deep.”
– Manohla Dargis, The Village Voice

A landmark in autobiographical filmmaking, SINK OR SWIM is a wrenching portrait of a girl’s fraught relationship with her father. Unspooling in a series of 26 interlocking vignettes, the film chronicles punishments, neglect, and the tumultuous dissolution of her parents’ marriage, touching upon the father’s own childhood traumas and the girl’s emergence into adulthood. Friedrich brings together her own footage, archival film, and text into an evocative collage that underscores the shape-shifting relationship between past and present, family and self. (1990, United States, 16mm, 48 minutes / In English)

RULES OF THE ROAD

At once wry and piercing, RULES OF THE ROAD traces the arc of a love affair through the couples’ prized possession: a Cutlass Cruiser station wagon with fake wood paneling. (1993, United States, 16mm, 31 minutes / In English)

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BIOGRAPHY

Su Friedrich has produced 23 films and videos since 1978. She is the recipient of many awards, including fellowships from the Rockefeller and Guggenheim foundations, a Herb Alpert Award, as well as numerous grants from the Jerome Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, and Independent Television Service. Her work is widely screened in the United States, Canada, and Europe and has been the subject of retrospectives at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Rotterdam International Film Festival; the London LGBTIQ+ Film Festival; the Stadtkino,Vienna; The Cinematheque, Vancouver; the National Film Theater, London; the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema; the New York LGBTQ+ Film Festival; the first Tokyo International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival; the Cork International Film Festival; the Wellington Film Festival; the Bios art center, Athens; and the Anthology Film Archives, New York. Friedrich taught film and video production at Princeton University from 1998–2023.

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TICKETS

Purchase

$13 General public
$8 Students with a valid ID
$6.50 Film Center members
$5 SAIC faculty & staff & AIC staff
Free for SAIC students

Unless otherwise noted, SAIC student tickets are released five days prior to showtime. Tickets must be picked up in person from the Gene Siskel Film Center box office. A student ID is required.

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ACCESSIBILITY

CATE events are presented with real-time captions (CART). Hearing loops, wheelchair accessibility, and companion seating are also available at the Gene Siskel Film Center. For other accessibility requests, please visit saic.edu/access or write cate@saic.edu.

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CONVERSATIONS AT THE EDGE

Conversations at the Edge is SAIC’s award-winning media art series, organized by the Department of Film, Video, New Media, and Animation in partnership with the Gene Siskel Film Center and Video Data Bank. For more information, visit saic.edu/cate.

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Tags: CATE, Chicago, Conversations At The Edge, Gene Siskel Film Center, Loop, Su Friedrich, Su Friedrich: Sink or Swim and Rules of the Road