SHORT SYNOPSIS:
Examined Life takes philosophy out of the darkened corners of academia and into the hustle and bustle of the everyday, a visual reminder that great ideas are born through profound engagement with the world around us.
Featuring the “rock star” philosophers of our time, including Cornel West, Peter Singer, Slavoj Zizek, Judith Butler, Avital Ronell, Michael Hardt, Anthony Appiah and Martha Nussbaum.
Long Synopsis
UPCOMING SCREENINGS:
Cinematheque Winnipeg - March 4 & 5 @ 7pm, 2009
Cinema Village, NYC - Opens March 6 (1:15 PM 3:15 PM 5:20 PM 7:20 PM 9:20 PM)
Pacific Cinematheque - March 20 - 25, 2009
Cinema du Parc, Montreal, March 23 - 26 @ 9pm
Bytowne Cinema - March 22 - 25, 2009
Broadway Theatre, Saskatoon - March 9 - 12, 2009
Art Gallery of Hamilton - March 25, 2009
Cinecenta, Victoria - April 1 & 2, 2009
Cinema du Parc, Montreal - April 3 - 9
Regina Public Library, Regina, SK - April 4 & 5, 2009
Metro Cinema, Edmonton, April 18 - 20, 2009
View screenings in the United States, courtesy Zeitgeist Films!
View complete Showtimes for all films!
PREVIOUS SCREENINGS:
The Royal, Toronto - Opening Jan 23, 2009 - EXTENDED TO FEB 5th!
Friday @ 7, Saturday @ 7, Sunday @ 4:30 & 7, Monday @ 7, Tuesday @ 7 & 9:30, Wednesday @ 7, Thursday @ 7 & 9
(Panel follows Jan. 27, 7pm screening, on the intersection of public space & intellectual pursuits, featuring Astra Taylor, Jane Farrow, Deborah Cowen, Kanishka Goonewardena and Doug Hutchinson. Filmmaker Q&A on Sat, Sun & Mon.
Kingsway Theatre, Toronto: Jan 30 - Feb 5, 2009 - Nightly at 9pm - 2nd Theatre Added!
Regent Theatre, Toronto: Feb. 6 - 12, 2009
Western Arctic Moving Pictures Film Festival, Feb. 8, 2009 - 7pm
City Cinema, Charlottetown - Feb 11 - 15, 2009
Port Moody, B.C. Film Festival - Feb. 12 - 21, 2009
View complete Showtimes for all films!
Examined Life takes philosophy out of the darkened corners of academia and into the hustle and bustle of the everyday, a visual reminder that great ideas are born through profound engagement with the world around us.
Long Synopsis
UPCOMING SCREENINGS:
Cinematheque Winnipeg - March 4 & 5 @ 7pm, 2009
Cinema Village, NYC - Opens March 6 (1:15 PM 3:15 PM 5:20 PM 7:20 PM 9:20 PM)
Pacific Cinematheque - March 20 - 25, 2009
Cinema du Parc, Montreal, March 23 - 26 @ 9pm
Bytowne Cinema - March 22 - 25, 2009
Broadway Theatre, Saskatoon - March 9 - 12, 2009
Art Gallery of Hamilton - March 25, 2009
Cinecenta, Victoria - April 1 & 2, 2009
Cinema du Parc, Montreal - April 3 - 9
Regina Public Library, Regina, SK - April 4 & 5, 2009
Metro Cinema, Edmonton, April 18 - 20, 2009
View screenings in the United States, courtesy Zeitgeist Films!
View complete Showtimes for all films!
PREVIOUS SCREENINGS:
The Royal, Toronto - Opening Jan 23, 2009 - EXTENDED TO FEB 5th!
Friday @ 7, Saturday @ 7, Sunday @ 4:30 & 7, Monday @ 7, Tuesday @ 7 & 9:30, Wednesday @ 7, Thursday @ 7 & 9
(Panel follows Jan. 27, 7pm screening, on the intersection of public space & intellectual pursuits, featuring Astra Taylor, Jane Farrow, Deborah Cowen, Kanishka Goonewardena and Doug Hutchinson. Filmmaker Q&A on Sat, Sun & Mon.
Kingsway Theatre, Toronto: Jan 30 - Feb 5, 2009 - Nightly at 9pm - 2nd Theatre Added!
Regent Theatre, Toronto: Feb. 6 - 12, 2009
Western Arctic Moving Pictures Film Festival, Feb. 8, 2009 - 7pm
City Cinema, Charlottetown - Feb 11 - 15, 2009
Port Moody, B.C. Film Festival - Feb. 12 - 21, 2009
View complete Showtimes for all films!
SYNOPSIS:
This thoroughly engaging documentary, charts the meteoric rise and fall of the inimitable New York painter with rock-star status and one of the leading lights of late-20th-century art. The film is centered on a rare interview that director and friend Tamra Davis shot with Basquiat over twenty years ago. Much can be gleaned from insider interviews and archival footage, but it is Basquiat's own words and work that powerfully convey the mystique and allure of both the artist and the man.
In his short career, Jean-Michel Basquiat was a phenomenon. In the late 1970s, he covers the city with the graffiti tag SAMO. In 1981, he puts paint on canvas for the first time, and sells his first piece to Deborah Harry for $200. By 1983, the selling price is more than a million. Tragically, heroin addiction kills Basquiat in 1988, at age 27 at the height of his career. His dense, bebop-influenced neoexpressionist work emerged while minimalist, conceptual art was the fad. As a successful black artist, he was constantly confronted by racism and misconceptions; his cult status eventually overrode
the art that had made him famous in the first place.
Featuring interviews with Julian Schnabel, Larry Gagosian, Bruno Bischofberger, Tony Shafrazi, Fab 5 Freddy, Jeffrey Deitch, Glenn O'Brien, Maripol, Kai Eric, Nicholas Taylor, Fred Hoffmann, Michael Holman, Diego Cortez, Annina Nosei, Suzanne Mallouk, Rene Ricard, among many others.
DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT:
In 1983 I was working at an art gallery in Los Angeles and going to film school at LA City College. At that time Jean-Michel Basquiat was a young painter and was visiting LA for his first show at the Larry Gagosian Gallery. He came to the gallery to visit our mutual friend, whom I worked with, and we immediately bonded over our love of cinema.
I started filming him painting for his show at Larry’s, and whenever he would come to Los Angeles, I would film him while we were hanging out. In 1985, when he was 25 and quite successful, I shot a lengthy interview with him. Our mutual friend Becky Johnston asked the questions.
Less than two years later he died. I took all my footage and put it away in drawer. I knew that one thing that made Jean-Michel very upset was when his friends sold work he had given them. I didn’t want him to think, even in death, that I was one of his friends who would sell his work for profit.
Twenty years later I was on a walk with a friend who was working on a great retrospective of Basquiat at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). When I told her about my footage, she asked to see it so I screened the 20-minute film I had cut. To everyone’s astonishment it became clear that the footage I possessed was a rare glimpse into, and a very intimate portrait of, one of America’s most important artists.
I knew then that my footage no longer belonged in my drawer. It was important for Jean-Michel’s voice to be heard and for the real story of what happened to be told.
I screened the short film at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006 and met David Koh of Arthouse Films, who asked me if I could make the short into a feature.
Since then I’ve been on an incredible journey to interview those who were close to Jean-Michel and search for archival footage from a fantastic time in New York – the 1980’s. With my original footage, these new interviews and a ton of archival footage, I constructed a film that is both documentary and a moving narrative.
The film is a very personal and intimate portrayal of an artist and my friend. I am so grateful to all the people who’ve helped me create an in-depth study of his life. He was an incredible artist who lived life to the fullest, died too young, and left an amazing body of work behind.
UPCOMING SCREENINGS!
Shadows of the Mind Film Festival: Sault Ste. Marie, On.: March 2 - 6, 2011
Salt Spring Film Festival, BC: March 4 - 6, 2011
Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary: March 24, 201
Galerie d`art Stewart Hall, Pointe-Claire, Qc : March 23, 2011
PREVIOUS SCREENINGS:
Atlantic Film Festival: Saturday, September 18 @ 12:05PM Empire Park Lane Theatre 4
Cinefest, Sudbury: September 20
Vancouver International Film Festival: Buy Tix Online!
Thu, Sep 30th 6:15pm - Empire Granville 7
Sun, Oct 3rd 11:00am - Vancity Theatre
TIFF/ Bell Lightbox, Toronto: Opens Oct 7
Daily at 1pm, 3:30pm, 6pm
11:15pm (Friday and Saturday Only)
Please visit listings at Bell Lightbox for complete details
Cinema Du Parc, Montreal: Opens Oct 8
Royal Cinema, Toronto: Oct 18, 19, 20
Mayfair, Ottawa: Oct 29 & 30, Nov 1, 2 & 3
Broadway Theatre, Saskatoon: Oct 8 - 14
Metro Cinema, Edmonton: October 21 - 24
Pacific Cinematheque, Vancouver: Opens Oct 29
City Cinema, Charlottetown: Oct 29 - 31
Cinecenta, Victoria: Nov 3 &4
Bloor Cinema, Toronto Nov. 12, 14, 16.
Regina Public Library: Nov 13 &14
The Cinematheque, Winnipeg: Nov 12 & 13, 17 & 18
Toronto Creole Festival: Nov 19 - 21
Bloor Cinema, Toronto: Dec 2 & 3
Princess Cinema, Waterloo: Dec. 7 - 9
In his short career, Jean-Michel Basquiat was a phenomenon. In the late 1970s, he covers the city with the graffiti tag SAMO. In 1981, he puts paint on canvas for the first time, and sells his first piece to Deborah Harry for $200. By 1983, the selling price is more than a million. Tragically, heroin addiction kills Basquiat in 1988, at age 27 at the height of his career. His dense, bebop-influenced neoexpressionist work emerged while minimalist, conceptual art was the fad. As a successful black artist, he was constantly confronted by racism and misconceptions; his cult status eventually overrode
the art that had made him famous in the first place.
Featuring interviews with Julian Schnabel, Larry Gagosian, Bruno Bischofberger, Tony Shafrazi, Fab 5 Freddy, Jeffrey Deitch, Glenn O'Brien, Maripol, Kai Eric, Nicholas Taylor, Fred Hoffmann, Michael Holman, Diego Cortez, Annina Nosei, Suzanne Mallouk, Rene Ricard, among many others.
DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT:
I started filming him painting for his show at Larry’s, and whenever he would come to Los Angeles, I would film him while we were hanging out. In 1985, when he was 25 and quite successful, I shot a lengthy interview with him. Our mutual friend Becky Johnston asked the questions.
Less than two years later he died. I took all my footage and put it away in drawer. I knew that one thing that made Jean-Michel very upset was when his friends sold work he had given them. I didn’t want him to think, even in death, that I was one of his friends who would sell his work for profit.
Twenty years later I was on a walk with a friend who was working on a great retrospective of Basquiat at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). When I told her about my footage, she asked to see it so I screened the 20-minute film I had cut. To everyone’s astonishment it became clear that the footage I possessed was a rare glimpse into, and a very intimate portrait of, one of America’s most important artists.
I knew then that my footage no longer belonged in my drawer. It was important for Jean-Michel’s voice to be heard and for the real story of what happened to be told.
I screened the short film at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006 and met David Koh of Arthouse Films, who asked me if I could make the short into a feature.
Since then I’ve been on an incredible journey to interview those who were close to Jean-Michel and search for archival footage from a fantastic time in New York – the 1980’s. With my original footage, these new interviews and a ton of archival footage, I constructed a film that is both documentary and a moving narrative.
The film is a very personal and intimate portrayal of an artist and my friend. I am so grateful to all the people who’ve helped me create an in-depth study of his life. He was an incredible artist who lived life to the fullest, died too young, and left an amazing body of work behind.
UPCOMING SCREENINGS!
Shadows of the Mind Film Festival: Sault Ste. Marie, On.: March 2 - 6, 2011
Salt Spring Film Festival, BC: March 4 - 6, 2011
Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary: March 24, 201
Galerie d`art Stewart Hall, Pointe-Claire, Qc : March 23, 2011
PREVIOUS SCREENINGS:
Atlantic Film Festival: Saturday, September 18 @ 12:05PM Empire Park Lane Theatre 4
Cinefest, Sudbury: September 20
Vancouver International Film Festival: Buy Tix Online!
Thu, Sep 30th 6:15pm - Empire Granville 7
Sun, Oct 3rd 11:00am - Vancity Theatre
TIFF/ Bell Lightbox, Toronto: Opens Oct 7
Daily at 1pm, 3:30pm, 6pm
11:15pm (Friday and Saturday Only)
Please visit listings at Bell Lightbox for complete details
Cinema Du Parc, Montreal: Opens Oct 8
Royal Cinema, Toronto: Oct 18, 19, 20
Mayfair, Ottawa: Oct 29 & 30, Nov 1, 2 & 3
Broadway Theatre, Saskatoon: Oct 8 - 14
Metro Cinema, Edmonton: October 21 - 24
Pacific Cinematheque, Vancouver: Opens Oct 29
City Cinema, Charlottetown: Oct 29 - 31
Cinecenta, Victoria: Nov 3 &4
Bloor Cinema, Toronto Nov. 12, 14, 16.
Regina Public Library: Nov 13 &14
The Cinematheque, Winnipeg: Nov 12 & 13, 17 & 18
Toronto Creole Festival: Nov 19 - 21
Bloor Cinema, Toronto: Dec 2 & 3
Princess Cinema, Waterloo: Dec. 7 - 9
JEAN MICHEL BASQUIAT:
THE RADIANT CHILD
a film by TAMRA DAVIS
Year: 2010
Running time: 93 Minutes
Language: English
THE RADIANT CHILD
a film by TAMRA DAVIS
Year: 2010
Running time: 93 Minutes
Language: English
