Hank Willis Thomas will discuss his long-term installation, “Unbranded,” at the Brooklyn Museum on Saturday night (Hank Willis Thomas, “Why wait another day to be adorable? Tell your beautician ‘Relax me,’” chromogenic photograph, 1968/2007)
Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway
Saturday, February 5, free, 5:00 – 11:00 (some events require free tickets distributed at the Visitor Center)
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org
For its February First Saturdays free program, the Brooklyn Museum is honoring Black History Month with its usual wide-ranging schedule of events. Kicking things off at 5:00 will be the Fat Cat Big Band, with Jade Synstelien leading a group of up to sixteen musicians through jazz and bebop. At 5:30, Denzel Washington’s THE GREAT DEBATERS (2007) will be shown, introduced by author Trey Ells (RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW), who will also participate in a Q&A following the screening. At 6:00, curator and writer Kalia Brooks will discuss the exhibition “Lorna Simpson: Gathered”: Simpson’s photographs will also be the focus of the 6:30 Hands-On Art workshop, and people are encouraged to bring their own photos to add to a collaborative interactive project as well. At 7:00, curator Sharon Matt Atkins will take visitors on a tour of “Norman Rockwell: Behind the Camera,” while at 8:00 a student guide will give a Young Voices gallery talk on the installation “American Identities: A New Look.” The always hot dance party gets under way at 8:00, hosted by DJ Stormin’ Norman, who will be playing hip-hop and soul tunes. And at 9:00, Hank Willis Thomas will discuss his long-term installation, “Unbranded,” while at the same time the Smalls Jazz Club All-Stars will take listeners back to the Golden Age of music.
Written and directed by first-time feature filmmakers Antonio Naharro and Álvaro Pastor, ME, TOO is a beautifully told story about a man with Down syndrome trying to make it in the so-called normal world. When Daniel (Pablo Pineda) first shows up for work at a government disability agency in Sevilla, Laura (Lola Dueñas) mistakes him for someone who has come seeking help, not the person who will be occupying the desk next to hers on a daily basis. Daniel does not see himself as a victim, and he is clearly not a charity case; instead, he has earned a university degree and refuses to allow his disease — or, more important, the way his disease is viewed by others — to limit the things he can accomplish in life. Soon Daniel and Laura grow very close, but she is unable to let their relationship reach the next level, regardless of how much they care for each other — and how many times she instead goes to a local bar and picks up strangers. Meanwhile, Luisa (Lourdes Naharro) and Pedro (Daniel Parejo), who both have Down syndrome and are members of the Danza Mobile dance company, which works with people suffering from intellectual disabilities, have fallen in love, but they feel free to express it, even in public, which gets them in trouble with Luisa’s mother (Catalina Lladó). The contrast between the two romances, one of which is “mixed” but both of which are complicated, is well handled by Naharro (who also plays Daniel’s older brother in the film) and Pastor, steering clear of the kind of sappy melodrama that could have compromised the film’s point of view. They deal with the issue of the infantilization and stereotyping of people with Down syndrome with just the right amount of honesty and subtlety to avoid becoming a pedantic message movie. Both Dueñas, an Almodóvar regular, and Pineda, making his cinematic debut, won Silver Shells for their acting at the 2009 San Sebastian Film Festival. Pineda is in fact the first person with Down syndrome in Europe to earn a major university degree, and he is endearing in the lead role, never overly sentimental, and the script avoids treacly moments, as does Guille Milkyway’s soundtrack. ME, TOO will be screening as part of the ReelAbilities NY Disabilities Film Festival on February 5 at the JCC in Manhattan and on February 6 at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington.
