Chicago Premiere: Nov 30 & Dec 1, The Nine Muses by John Akomfrah at ICE Theaters

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Wed, Nov 30, 7pm,
ICE Theaters Lawndale
3330 W Roosevelt
Admission: $5.00

Thurs, Dec 1, 7pm,
ICE Theaters Chatham
210 W 87th St
Admission: $5.00

THE NINE MUSES (UK 2011, 94 min HDCinema)
Directed by John Akomfrah | TRAILER

“Akomfrah’s The Nine Muses wraps the viewer in literature, music and archive footage, summoning up a mood rather than a story that reflects on the immigrant experience and the violence of displacement with a majestic grace”

                                         –Jason Solomons, The Observer”Fascinating! Cerebral and sensual, British filmmaker John Akomfrah’s The Nine Muses considers the history of the African diaspora to postwar Europe through a highly unusual prism of structuralist cinema, archival footage, spoken-word recordings and the nine muses birthed by the union of Zeus and Mnemone, the Greek goddess of memory [with] many heady references”
–Robert Koehler, VarietyTwenty-five years after the end of the Trojan War, Odysseus still has not returned home. So his son, Telemachus, sets off on a journey in search of his lost father. So begins Homer‘s revered epic poem, The Odyssey, the primary narrative reference point for The Nine Muses, John Akomfrah‘s remarkable meditation about chance, fate and redemption.
Structured as an allegorical fable set between 1949 and 1970, The Nine Muses is comprised of nine overlapping musical chapters that mix archival material with original scenes. Together, they form a stylized, idiosyncratic retelling of the history of mass migration to post-war Britain through the suggestive lens of the Homeric epic.

In addition to its resonance with Homer‘s epic, The Nine Muses was devised and scripted from the writings of a wide range of authors including Dante Alighieri, Samuel Beckett, Emily Dickinson, James Joyce, John Milton, Friedrich Nietzsche, William Shakespeare, Sophocles, Dylan Thomas, Matsuo Basho, TS Elliot, Li Po, and Rabindranth Tagore.
The Nine Muses is a journey through myth, folklore, history, and a museum of intangible things. It is a  ‘sorrow song‘ or ‘song cycle‘ on journeys and migration, memory and elegy, knowledge and identity.Festivals:
Sundance Film Festival 2011
London Film Festival 2010
Dubai International Film Festival 2011
Jeonju Film Festival 2011
Sheffield Documentary Film Festival
Karlovy Vary Film Festival 2011
Jerusalem Film Festival 2011
Viennale, Vienna, Austria 2011
EWA Film Festival, Poland 2011
Orizzonti Finalist, Venice Film Festival 2010


Black World Cinema, a showcase of seldom seen classic features and new films from around the world. Black World Cinema presents films by filmmakers that bring us story with compelling content and a human dimension seldom presented in mainstream cinema.

All screenings are followed by lively discussions moderated by program director Floyd Webb or local scholars, screenwriters and directors.

Screenings occur the first Wednesday at
ICE Theaters Lawndale
3330 W Roosevelt Road

And first Thursday of every month at

ICE Theaters Chatham 14
210 W. 87th Street
Chicago, IL

 

 

 

 

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