Documentaries

All Rendered Truth

Friday, 5 – 7:15 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

56 Minutes

Armed with a map and 10 essential questions, Scott and Patrick set out on a trip to make a film about folk artists. They soon find their subjects uncooperative and sometimes unable to answer the questions posed. The filmmakers realize that it isn’t their job to lead these artists; their task is to follow and capture as much of the spirit of these folks as possible.

Director: Patrick Long Producer: Scott Blackwell Editor: Patrick Long Production Company: FAF/Storyteller

Apparition of the Eternal Church

Thursday, 3:30 – 5:45 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

World premiere

57 Minutes)

Like the proverbial blind men describing an elephant, the cast of this documentary puts words to the experience of hearing Olivier Messiaen’s monumental organ work, “Apparition of the Eternal Church.” The resulting conversation dwells in hilarity and the profane before it yields its insights into the personal and the sublime.

This film contains adult language.

Director/Producer/Editor: Paul Festa

Dead Time

Friday, 7:15 – 10:15 p.m.
Fine Arts Theatre, upper

U.S. premiere

80 Minutes

Documents two sisters, Wendy and Julie, and their attempts at survival in spite of sexual abuse, excessive drug use, and consequent criminal behavior. Wendy, unsuccessfully married twice to fellow drug users and Julie, self-described as 120 pounds of post-psychedelic drugs surfing on the border of clarity and functioning, are one careless step away from death through suicide, overdose or criminal prosecution. Like a house of cards verging on self-destruction, their lives play out through a series of revolutions in an effort to regain control over their inner worlds.

This film contains adult material.

Director/Producer: Steve Sanguedolce Editor: Steve Sanguedolce, Jeffrey Paull Production Company: Sweetblood Productions

Bazaar Bizarre: The Strange Case of Serial Killer Bob Berdella

Friday, 7:15 – 10:15 p.m.
Fine Arts Theatre, upper

North Carolina premiere

88 Minutes

Between 1984 and 1988, Robert A. Berdella tortured, sodomized, photographed and murdered six young men, dismembering them in the bathtub and putting their bagged remains out on the curb for Monday-morning trash pick-up. When one of his victims escaped, he told police how Berdella raped, tortured and photographed him over a period of several days, leading to Berdella’s arrest. Crime novelist James Ellroy presents a new film about Bob Berdella in a campy yet direct presentation guaranteed to make the viewer squirm.

This film contains graphic adult material.

Director: Benjamin Meade Producer: James Ellroy Editor: Benjamin Meade Production Company: Corticrawl Production

Rank Strangers

Friday, 7:15 – 10:15 p.m.
Fine Arts Theatre, upper

North Carolina premiere

88 Minutes

You’re invited to come along and experience Mrs. Hyatt’s mountain music jam – a weekly tradition since 1951. Shot against the majestic backdrop of the Smoky Mountains, Rank Strangers takes a fun and poignant look at a group of bluegrass musicians and devout fans of all ages as they celebrate their heritage and try to keep their land intact amidst the pressures of the modern world and the threat of suburban sprawl.

Filmed in North Carolina.

Director/Producer: Rod Murphy, Scott B. Morgan Editor: Scott B. Morgan Production Company: 614 Films

Donor

Friday, 7:45 – 10 p.m.
Saturday, 8 – 10 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

World premiere

92 Minutes

Jeff Moonie Sr. was a handsome, healthy, athletic 46-year-old man. So being diagnosed with multiple myeloma (bone cancer) was a complete shock. After treatment, he develops the post-transplant condition GVHD, causing him to undergo a dramatic physical transformation and changes in his personality. Combined with the stress of coping with his sickness and an unlikely bond with a female co-worker (also a transplant recipient), his marriage and family life are threatened.

Filmed in North Carolina. This film contains adult language.

Director: Jeff Moonie Jr. Producer: Jeff Moonie Jr., Jeff Moonie Sr. Editor: Jeff Moonie Jr. Production Company: Dark Pro Films

Flag Day

Friday, 10:30 p.m. – 12:30 a.m.
Saturday, 8 – 10 P.M.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

7 Minutes

This year, in Rockport, Maine, a man got tired of hiding the death this war is bringing us. He planted flags, one for each dead soldier, in his yard … and now the flags are moving from one yard to the next, a visible reminder of the number, rising daily, of the dead.

Director/Editor: Kristy Higby Producer: Maureen Carrigg

A Forest Returns: The Success Story of Ohio’s Only National Forest

Saturday, 5 – 7:30 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

29 Minutes

Ora Anderson, now 93, was a journalist living in southeastern Ohio during the Great Depression. In this oral history, he recalls the severe environmental and social conditions that led to the establishment of the Wayne National Forest and people’s evolving relationship with the land. Along with historical photographs and emotionally evocative music, Anderson’s firsthand account gives life to a significant chapter of American history.

Director: Jean Andrews, Steve Fetsch Producer: Jean Andrews Editor: Steve Fetsch

The Great American Quilt Revival

Thursday, 1 – 3 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

Saturday, Noon – 1:30 p.m.
Fine Arts Theatre, upper

U.S. premiere

58 Minutes

A single monumental art show at New York’s Whitney Museum of Art in 1971 helped to transform the world of quilting and ignited the modern art world with interest in quilts. This film explores the historic roots of quilting as well as the people, the art, and the economic and historical forces that brought quilting in and out of fashion.

Filmed partially in North Carolina.

Director: Paul Bonesteel Producer: Matthew Bellert, Georgia Bonesteel Editor: Evan Schafer, Paul Bonesteel Production Company: Bonesteel Films, Inc.

In a Nutshell: A Portrait of Elizabeth Tashjian

Thursday, 6:30 – 8:45 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

80 Minutes

In A Nutshell chronicles the unique life of Elizabeth Yegsa Tashjian — concert violinist, classical painter, Christian Science healer, media celebrity, and founder and curator of the one and only Nut Museum. Today, at 92 years old, Tashjian finds herself in a new role — ward of the state.

Director: Don Bernier Producer: Tina Erickson Editor: Don Bernier Production Company: mimetic media

King of Punk

Friday, 5 – 7:15 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

74 Minutes

The documentary King of Punk includes interviews with Marky Ramone, Jayne County, Stiff Little Fingers and other artists involved in the Punk scene between 1976 and 1982. They talk about the past, present and future of the music form and the industry in general. Interviews are edited around the story of a five-piece, all-girl Punk band called OBGYN from Fayetteville, N.C. As their popularity grew, they released a CD that attracted attention from the local press and booking agents. King of Punk gives an interesting perspective between the old and new generations of Punk artists.

Filmed in North Carolina.

Director/Editor: Kenneth van Schooten Producer: Julie and Kenneth van Schooten Production Company: etit Productions

Miles Above

Saturday, 5 – 7:30 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

26 Minutes

On Feb. 1, 2003, the space shuttle Columbia crashed from the sky and thousands of people watched as debris scattered from California to western Louisiana. Rarely, if ever, has a single moment been documented from so many different points of view, in real time and largely by amateurs. Miles Above stitches these pieces together, presenting the final moments of the Columbia’s reentry, taking us from witnesses’ backyards to the NASA control room and even the shuttle itself moments before it broke apart. At a time when the shuttle’s mission has been in question, the film provides a ground-up view of what could be lost if we stop searching our frontiers.

Director: Mike Welt Production Company: University of California – Berkeley, Graduate School of Journalism

Music Is My Life, Politics My Mistress

Thursday, 9:15-11:15 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

110 Minutes

This documentary is a rich and intimate look at the renaissance man Oscar Brown Jr. – musician, writer, poet, playwright and civil rights activist. The late Chicago native is credited with writing more than a thousand songs and more than a dozen musical plays, and engaging in a rare brand of social activism. This film examines Brown’s life from his debut at age 15 to his last performance with his daughter Maggie Brown. Weeks before his death on May 29, 2005, Brown had the opportunity to view the film at the Maryland Film Festival in Baltimore and said, with tears in his eyes, “You captured me.”

Director: donnie l betts Producer: donnie l betts, Mark Alston, Tarek Chacra Editor: Dave Wruck Production Company: No Credits Productions

A Reel Man

Thursday, 6:30 – 8:45 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

World premiere

46 Minutes

A Reel Man is a profile of Skip Elsheimer, a Raleigh, N.C., resident who collects educational films. Skip started collecting these 16mm films years ago and now has more than 14,000 from the 1940s through the 1980s on every conceivable instructional topic: sex education, personal hygiene, driver’s education, how to be popular, etc. The films in his archive are campy, amusing and not a little propagandistic, but they’re also valuable time capsules that reflect America’s social attitudes and cultural values throughout the last half-century.

Director: Todd Lothery Producer: Todd Lothery Editor: Todd Lothery Production Company: Innocynic Films

Rosevelt’s America

Friday, 10:30 p.m. – 12:30 a.m.
Saturday, 10:30 p.m.-12:15 a.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

26 Minutes

Rosevelt’s America is a cinema verite profile of the struggles of a Liberian refugee to build a new life in America. After being tortured and narrowly escaping execution during Liberia’s civil war, Rosevelt Henderson made his way to America with three of his children, but was forced to leave his pregnant wife behind. By capturing Rosevelt’s day-to-day struggles and achievements, viewers come to appreciate the distance he has traveled during his harrowing journey away from torture and desperation in his native Liberia.

Director/Producer: Roger Weisberg, Tod Lending Editor: Christopher White Production Company: Public Policy Productions

A Russian Wave

Friday, 7:45 – 10 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

25 minutes

Invited by the Russian government, two expedition kayakers, Becky Bristow and Dunbar Hardy, go in search of new whitewater in the far northeastern reaches of the Russian tundra. They have no idea what they’re really in for! This is a humorous, spirited and touching film that takes us on an adventurous journey into the Russian culture.

Director/Producer: Becky Bristow Editor: Rodney Steadman, Becky Bristow Production Company: Wild Soul Creations

Siberian Adoption Story

Thursday, 1 – 3 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

43 Minutes

Russia is second only to China in the number of children adopted by U.S. parents. Prospective parents can expect to spend up to $25,000, produce hundreds of pages of notarized paperwork, experience in-house reviews, make two trips to the country, and even then, may return home empty-handed. But more than 6,000 Russian orphans go home with American parents every year. This is an intimate look at two of their stories.

Director/Producer: Jon Alpert, Matthew O’Neill Editor: Michael Wei Production Company: Downtown Community Television Center

Stone Rising: The Work of Dan Snow

Thursday, 3:30 – 5:45 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

57 Minutes

With playful devotion, a master of natural stone construction shares the challenge, mystery and endless surprise of his craft. This documentary explores the creative process of author and waller Dan Snow through interviews with the artisan, his associates, and customers. Filmed over a period of 16 months, the footage covers a wide variety of stunning experimental constructions: grottos and waterfalls, a stone boat, a beehive tomb, ancient-looking fortifications, and a Moorish-style stone tent.

Director/producer/Editor: Camilla Rockwell Production Company: Fuzzy Slippers Productions

Troop 1500

Saturday, 5 – 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, 10:30 p.m. – 12:15 a.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

68 Minutes

Their mothers may be convicted felons, but the girls of Troop 1500 want to be doctors, social workers and marine biologists. With unprecedented access from both the Girl Scouts USA and the Texas Criminal Justice System, the filmmakers volunteered for Troop 1500, “the prison troop,” for two years before shooting any footage. Once a month, this innovative Girl Scout troop travels to the Hilltop Prison in Gatesville, Texas, to bring daughters together with their inmate mothers, offering a chance to rebuild their broken relationships.

Director: Ellen Spiro Producer: Karen Bernstein Editor: Lillian Benson, Kyle Henry Production Company: Mobilus Media

Waging a Living

Friday, 10:30 p.m. – 12:30 a.m.
Asheville Community Theatre

North Carolina premiere

86 Minutes

An intimate portrait of four low-wage earners chasing the elusive American dream.

Director/Producer: Roger Weisberg Editor: Sandra Christie, Lewis Erskine, Christopher White Production Company: Public Policy Productions