The Connection
The Avant-Garde
•
1h 42m
Directed by Shirley Clarke • Drama • With William Redfield, Warren Finnerty, Roscoe Lee Browne • 1961 • 110 minutes
Created by director Shirley Clarke at a time when female filmmakers were in short supply, The Connection shatters stereotypes to become one of the most vital American independent classics. Based on the play within a play by Jack Gelber, the film portrays a group of addicts waiting in a New York apartment for their next hit. Meanwhile, a writer has entered their midst to write a script about those in the group who are jazz musicians, analyzing their every move. With brilliantly written dialogue and kinetic choreography to match its musical players, this long-lost touchstone returns to distribution for the first time in decades with a new restoration from UCLA.
Up Next in The Avant-Garde
-
Convulsive States
Directed by Liz Magic Laser • Documentary • With Liz Magic Laser • 2023 • 54 minutes
Edited by Isaac Goes and Michelle Yoon of Kinet Media. Cinematography and additional editing by Laura Geisswiller.
Performance artist and filmmaker, Liz Magic Laser, explores the shaking body as both a sympto... -
Encounters with Your Inner Trotsky Child
Directed by Jim Finn • Documentary • With Lois Severin • 2013 • 21 minutes
"Encounters with Your Inner Trotsky Child also riffs on the self-help genre by reading the persecution of the Russian Marxist of the title as an allegory for finding inner peace. Mimicking the wobbly appearance of Eightie...
-
Frida Kahlo & Tina Modotti
Directed by Laura Mulvey • Documentary • With Miriam Margolyes • 1983 • 29 minutes
This tautly structured documentary sheds light on the work of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo and Italian photographer Tina Modotti, women icons of the Mexican Renaissance. The film not only explores the two women's a...