Gunny Jackson is just one of the many characters who populate the prison town of FLORENCE, ARIZONA
FLORENCE ARIZONA (Andrea B. Scott, 2014)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Friday, November 14, 12:30, and Wednesday, November 19, 7:30
Festival runs November 13-20
212-924-7771
www.florencearizonafilm.com
www.docnyc.net
Brooklyn-based documentarian Andrea B. Scott reveals the soft underbelly of contemporary America in Florence, Arizona, which is having its world premiere this week at the annual DOC NYC festival. Scott heads to the small desert town of Florence in the Grand Canyon State, an area that was a farm community until a nearby 1875 silver boom led to its becoming a more wild West kind of place. Today the town revolves around the prison system; there are twice as many prisoners in Florence as there are residents, and a call to privatize more of the jails is part of the battle for mayor between the New Age-y Lina Austin and former police chief Tom Rankin, both of whom speak openly and honestly with Scott. Scott, who directed, produced, coedited, and photographed the film — which includes gorgeous shots of sunrises and vast landscapes — also meets with prison barber and former inmate Andy Celaya, who remembers the respect ex-cons used to get after serving their time; another former prisoner, young Marcus Seitz, who can’t wait to turn twenty-one so he can work inside the prison, explaining, “That would be pretty cool”; and grizzled prison detention officer Gunny Jackson, who runs the Semper Fi Ranch with his wife, Lois, and considers himself a “dove” who can be “a very vicious man when I want to be; I know how to inflict pain.” Scott also visits the Pinal County Historical Society, which features a section on all of the people who have been executed in Florence’s prisons.
Originally called Good Men, Bad Men, and a Few Rowdy Ladies during its successful Kickstarter campaign, Florence, Arizona is a pure slice of Americana, casting no judgments on a small cowboy town now beholden to the prison industrial complex. “What I found there was so much richer and nuanced than I ever could have expected — a prison town, yes, but also a deeply American town, full of colorful characters with universal stories,” Scott has said about her first visit to Florence, in December 2010. “On that trip, we began to spin an intricate web of people and places and stories — and before long, like any well-made web, we got stuck there, drawn into the town, its history, and its characters.” Florence, Arizona is screening November 14 and 19 at the IFC Center, with Scott, producer Devorah Brand, and executive producers David Menschel and Julie Goldman on hand to talk about the making of the film. DOC NYC runs November 13-20 at the IFC Center, Bow Tie Chelsea Cinemas, and the SVA Theatre, consisting of more than 150 screenings of new and old films, panel discussions, Q&As, and workshops.
D. H. Lawrence’s oft-banned and censored Lady Chatterley’s Lover has been turned into several films, including highly erotic versions starring Sylvia Kristel, Patricia Javier, and Harlee McBride. But for his 2006 film, Lady Chatterley, French director Pascale Ferran turned to the second version of Lawrence’s tale of love, sex, and infidelity, adapting 1927’s John Thomas and Lady Jane into the César-winning Lady Chatterley. Marina Hands won a César as Best Actress for her sensitive portrayal of Constance Chatterley, wife of Sir Clifford Chatterley (Hippolyte Girardot), a bitter, wealthy aristocratic mine owner who was paralyzed from the waist down in World War I. Sent to give a message to the Chatterleys’ gamekeeper, Parkin (Jean-Louis Coulloc’h), Connie sees him with his shirt off, washing himself outside, and something instantly stirs inside her. She begins making frequent visits to his cabin in the forest, and soon they are having an affair. When Connie prepares to go on a trip with her sister, Hilda (Hélène Fillières), she hires Mrs. Bolton (Hélène Alexandridis) as Sir Clifford’s nurse, but Clifford and Mrs. Bolton grow suspicious of Connie’s long disappearances, forcing Connie to decide what path to take.
In The Invisible Front, directors Vincas Sruoginis and Jonaš Ohman and producer Mark Johnston tell the story of the little-known Lithuanian resistance movement against the Soviets beginning in the early 1940s, as Stalin sought to spread his communist rule by invading Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. The central focus is on the heroic Juozas Lukša, whose memoir, Forest Brothers: The Account of an Anti-Soviet Lithuanian Freedom Fighter, 1944-1948, is quoted extensively in the film. Using news reports, archival footage, and new interviews with surviving partisans, Soviet collaborators, and former Lithuanian president Valdas Adamkus, Sruoginis and Ohman relate the devastating tale of the 1940s resistance, celebrating the enduring spirit of the Lithuanian freedom movement, including the battle for independence in 1991. Unfortunately, the tale gets drowned in sentiment and propaganda, with dry narration and melodramatic music. Of course, the story is as relevant as ever as Vladimir Putin and the Russians again threaten to wreak havoc in the region, but the film is more a call-to-arms than a historical investigation. In fact, the filmmakers are raising money for the current Ukraine resistance; it might be a noble cause, but that purpose further marks the film as having too much of an agenda. The Invisible Front opens November 7 at Cinema Village, with Sruoginis, Ohman, and Johnston participating in Q&As following the 7:00 screenings on Friday and Saturday and the 1:00 show on Sunday.
