SECOND ANNUAL FILM FEST!

ALL TICKETS ONLY $5
CHILDREN UNDER 12 FREE

Saturday, November 3, 1:00 p.m.
Author Talk: Brian Morton
“How a Novel Becomes a Film: ‘Starting Out in the Evening’”
Novelist (and Teaneck native) Brian Morton talking about the process of having a novel turned into a film. His book "Starting Out in the Evening" will be a film of the same name, to be released at the end of November, starring Frank Langella and Lauren Ambrose.

Saturday, November 3, 2:30-4:30 p.m.
FILM: Spotlight on Local Talent
Films highlighting local talent, including from Teaneck High School. A program of shorts by filmmakers from our area, this taste of local talent will touch you; make you think; make you chuckle. Featured: Cathy Levin-Barbella, Lupita Sebastian O’Brian, Marta Renzi. Plus: winning short films from Teaneck High School’s own 2007 film festival. Meet the filmmakers following the screenings.

Saturday, November 3, 7:15 p.m.
FILM: 51 Birch Street (88 min.)
Filmmaker Doug Block had every reason to believe his parents’ 54-year marriage was a good one. So he wasn’t prepared when, just a few months after his mother’s unexpected death, his 83-year-old father, Mike, phoned to announce that he was moving to Florida to live with Kitty, his secretary from 40 years before. When Mike and Kitty married and sold the longtime family home on Long Island, Doug returned with camera in hand for one last visit. And there, among the lifetime of memories being packed away forever, he discovers three large boxes filled with his mother’s daily diaries going back well over 35 years. The veteran documentarian conducted increasingly candid conversations with family members and friends and found constantly surprising diary revelations. This is a riveting personal documentary that explores a universal human question: how much about your parents do you really want to know? A. O. Scott of The New York Times called this film “one of the most moving and fascinating documentaries I’ve seen this year…Mr. Block has put his parents’ life, and his own, into this film with such warmth and candor that it may take more than one viewing to recognize it as a work of art.”

Saturday, November 3, 9:00 p.m.
FILM: Reno Finds Her Mom (90 min.)
Directed and produced by Lydia Dean Pilcher
Comedian Reno is on a search to find her birth mother who abandoned her as an infant and drags cameras into the quest. Reno is advised by an acquaintance shrink that she can't figure out who she really is unless she discovers where she came from The camera follows Reno out onto the streets, into the halls of bureaucracy, across the country -- or wherever the trail may lead -- en route to solving the mystery of her birth. As a docu-comedy, the program uses a raw cinema verite approach to the actual search blended with heightened fantasy sequences in which Reno both looks forward to and dreads the truth that awaits her. The extraordinary Reno, a hit at last year’s festival and subsequent performance at the Puffin Cultural Forum, will attend the screening and participate in a Q&A afterward.

Sunday, November 4, 1:15 p.m.
FILM: Long Road Home (60 min.)
The community of sports is ably represented in this Sunday afternoon program. The documentary “Long Road Home” is the compelling story of John Malangone, an ex-Yankee baseball player who grew up in the 1950s in East Harlem, whose personal secret haunted much of his adult life. Featuring priceless archival photography, the film was a labor of love for Teaneck resident Bruce Spiegel, a producer at CBS's 48 Hours Mystery, who had met Mr. Malangone at age 70 at the Hackensack YMCA, throwing baseballs up against a padded wall in the gym on a February morning. The film will follow "Don't Nobody Love the Game More than Me," a 10-minute short by Martha Pinson, centered on an upper Manhattan basketball court. Followed by Q&A with directors and John Malangone.

Sunday, November 4, 3:30 p.m.
CLASSIC FILM: Wild Strawberries (91 min.)
An incomparable writer and director, the late Ingmar Bergman left a body of work always focused on the major questions: life’s meaning, what it means to be human, the persistent impact of childhood experiences; the struggles of relationships between men and women. One extraordinary example is “Wild Strawberries, filmed in 1957, which chronicles one long day in the life of a 78-year-old medical professor named Isak Borg (Victor Sjostrom). On that day, Borg makes a long automobile journey – and a long, strange trip it is -- from his home in Stockholm to a university in southern Sweden to receive an academic honor. He is a man who has been successful in his professional life, but failed to connect with people on a personal level. Most of all, Borg's mind is flooded with memories, reveries and dreams as he tries to come to terms with the life he has lived. If you haven’t seen this film in long time, see it again! If you’ve never seen it, you’re in for a great pleasure.
Black and white. English subtitles.

Sunday, November 4, 7:30 p.m.
FILM: Living on the Fault Line: Where Race and Family Meet (75 min.)
This film explores the intersection of familial love and racial injustice in the experience of transracial families created through adoption. An intimate portrait, the film reveals the challenges these families face as children of color grow up in communities where racism and white privilege are unspoken yet undeniable realities. We get to know and care about the children as they express their tales of joy, challenge, acceptance and isolation, and as they strive to connect with their own racial and ethnic heritage. The film also explores how parents, trying to create supportive adoptive families, cope with and react to the unanticipated struggles their children often face. Followed by Q&A with director Jeff Farber.

Friday, November 9, 8:00 p.m.
CONCERT: Wholly Brass
The Wholly Brass has been entertaining and dazzling audiences since 1996. With performances at the New York's Alice Tully Hall, Carnegie Hall, and many more prestigious venues, Wholly Brass brings music in an educational and entertaining fashion everywhere it goes. The group was founded and nurtured while the players were still students at The Juilliard School. The repertoire of the group includes Classical Masterpieces, Jazz, Broadway, World and Hollywood music.

$10 suggested donation.

Sunday, November 11, 7:00 p.m.
Author Interview: Mahmoud Watad & Lenny Grob
A peaceful, long-lasting resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict may never be found until both sides learn to see each other, not as "the enemy", but as fellow human beings. "Teen Voices from the Holy Land" takes a creative approach toward reaching greater understanding between two peoples who have known little but mutual hostility and suspicion for over fifty years. Based on interviews of thirty-four Palestinian and Israeli teenagers, this uplifting book presents candid, first-person narratives of their day-to-day lives.

Free and open to the public.

Sailing the High C's: A Trip Through the Colorful World of Opera
Instructor: Christine Cullen
From Mozart to Puccini this class will explore the timeless art of Opera discovering composers, their operas and unforgettable characters.
Wednesdays, November 14, 28 and Dec. 5, 12 & 19. 7:00 – 9:00 pm Fee is $50 for all five sessions.
For information call 201-836-8923.

Friday, November 16, 8:00 p.m.
WORLD CONCERT: Deep Sahara
Band leader Abdoulaye Alassane Toure is a brilliant multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, producer and professor of music. He was born to a noble Songhai family from Gao, near the northernmost reach of the Niger River on the border of Niger and Mali. He plays Molo, Gurmi, Komsa, Godje, Kalagon, and a number of other Central Saharan string instruments, as well as Guitar. He was musical director, composer and lead guitarist for the wonderful Niger roots orchestra, Mamar Kassey, that toured internationally to rave reviews. One could say that Mr. Alassane Toure is the Quincy Jones of Saharan music, having also launched the careers of Moussa Poussy and many other singers from Niger, for whom he composed and arranged all of the music. Of the same tradition as his mentor, Ali Farka Toure, Abdoulaye Alassane Toure is a master of the music of many Saharan cultures and languages: Songhai, Sonrai, Tamaschek, Peul, Toureg, Zerma, Hausa and others. His original music is rich in complex rhythms, beautiful modes, and full of joyous enthusiasm.
Abdoulaye Alassane Toure (Composer, Guitar, Gurmi & Voice), Makan Kouyate (Calabash Drum), Idrissa Kone (Talking Drum), Kali. Z. Fasteau (Soprano Sax & Ney Flute), Tara Thierry (Bass)

$10 suggested donation.

Saturday, November 17, 7:00 p.m.
Exhibition Opening: Geo/Genome
We are inextricably linked to the earth, not [merely] in a spiritual sense, but in a most material sense. As Al Gore wins the Nobel Peace Prize, we collectively experience the palpable sense of leaning over the precipice into Silent Spring.  This exhibition reconsiders the human body, examines the paradigms of health and illness, and challenges us to think anew about our role in nature and our responsibility in being the “most advanced species on the planet.” Curated by Tim Blunk. With new works and installations by Virgil Wong, Lorraine Walsh, Julie Dermansky and Laura Gravestine

Free and open to the public.
Regular gallery hours: M-F 1-5 pm thru Jan. 6, 2008.

Sunday, November 18, 4:00 p.m.
CLASSICAL CONCERT: David Dubal & Guests
For the second On the Rise concert, David Dubal presents a program entitled, The Glory of the Piano. The renowned Emmy and ASCAP award-winning journalist and radio host of WQXR's (96.3 FM) Reflections from the Keyboard will discuss the piano with On the Rise curator Thomas Osuga, and in addition will present three up-and-coming pianists: Irene Wong, Michael Brown, and Kimball Gallagher. Program includes: Robert Schumann (1810-1856) from Fantasiestuecke; Fryderyk Chopin (1810-1849)
Fantasie in F minor, Op. 49 and Polonaise No.6 in A flat, Op.53, "Héroique"; Frederic Mompou (1893-1987) Variations sur un thème de Chopin; Michael Brown (b. 1987) Homage to Mompou; and Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) Étude-Tableau Op. 39, No. 5, in E-flat Minor.

This is a celebration of the piano as we approach the 300th anniversary since it's invention. (1709-2009).

$15 suggested donation.

Tuesday, November 20, 7:00 p.m.
FILM: Blue End (2001, 85 min.)
When Jernigan was convicted no one, including Jernigan, had foreseen that he would be reborn on the Internet as the "visible man": the first completely digitized human being, a third millennium prototype of human anatomy. This worldwide, digitally distributed Visible Human Project is the result of a unique interaction between justice and science, between family destiny and American career planning, and between the helplessness of the individual and the power of scientific ambition.

Free and open to the public.

Tuesday, November 27, 7:00 p.m.
FILM: SiCKO (2007, 113 min.)
The words "health care" and "comedy" aren't usually found in the same sentence, but in Academy Award winning filmmaker Michael Moore's new movie 'SiCKO,' they go together hand in (rubber) glove. In the tradition of Mark Twain or Will Rogers, 'SiCKO' uses humor to tell these compelling stories, leading the audience conclude that an alternative system is the only possible answer.

Free and open to the public.

Friday, November 30, 8:00 p.m.
TEEN EVENT: Poetry Slam
Slam Global Enterprises presents the third monthly Youth Poetry Slam at the Puffin. MC Big Mike from Slam Global. Teen poets, rap artists and spoken word performers are invited to participate in this competitive spoken word performance event. Or just come and help the judges determine the evening’s best performers. Poets can also sign up for our pre-slam Performance Poetry Workshop with Slam Global beginning in November.

$5 suggested donation.