2020 MFA degree candidates in Documentary Media at Northwestern University present their thesis films online in the annual showcase of “NU Docs” through the Block Museum of Art. Post-screening Q&A with RTVF Professor Ines Sommer and the NU Doc Media filmmakers.

The NU Doc Media Thesis Showcase: Doppler Effect will take place in two parts on Thursday, June 11th and Friday, June 12th at 7 PM CDT – PART 2 CAN BE FOUND HERE: https://www.facebook.com/events/290710041952590/

Part 1: Dark Glass

A documentary film can take on the staggering task of reflecting our realities back at us. It has the power to shift the scale of this reflection from the life of one person to the slow-moving eddies of human history, and all scales in between. Rhythms and rhymes abound when cinema captures experience: a documentary offers a view of ourselves “through a glass, darkly.” These imperfect visions make space for a poetry and truth that is arrived at by meditation. These five films will be our cloudy mirrors: they will show us forms that appear familiar and may even seem to track our own movements. Within each of these films lies its own bubble universe—a road existing in a quantum state—and you are the stationary observer. Tonight, the program will interrogate the possibility of cinema to show us ourselves in the form of each other; they will try to use the specificity and focus afforded by cinema to construct a bridge between worlds and identities.

Sacred Brick Technology, 2020, 13 mins. Dir: Ian Bertorelli
A psychedelic voyage to the origins of humanity’s oldest building material and its role in Chicago’s architectural landscape.

Ted, 2020, 20 mins. Dir: Cindy Zhang
A tender, yet unflinching look at disabled artist Ted Gram-Boarini’s struggles for independence, desires for self-expression, and community through the arts.

A Distant Surface, 2020, 18 mins. Dir: Abbigail Vandersnick
A Distant Surface is a short experimental documentary that engages an artist’s memory through photographic archival remnants. The artist’s memory becomes the catalyst for a mediated journey on how the past and present informs a creative practice.

Decisiones, 2020, 19 mins. Dir: Emmely Aldave
Decisiones is my emotional journey into understanding my parents’ choice to stay in the United States despite the predicaments in our immigration status.

Reality Show, 2020, 16 mins. Dir: Xinyan Wang
Ziqi, a struggling Chinese gymnast turned Tiktoker, tirelessly produces low-budget vlogs and manipulates the uncertain rules of big data as he tries to live up to the ideals he teaches in his highly constructed online persona.

TRT ~86 minutes

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Tags: Abbigail Vandersnick, Block Museum, Dark Glass, Dir: Cindy Zhang, Dir: Xinyan Wang, Emmely Aldave, Evanston, Ian Bertorelli, NU Doc Media Thesis Showcase - Program 1: Dark Glass