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AMERICAN REVOLUTION 2 premiere – new 35mm preservation print!

October 26, 2018 at 7:45pm

TICKETS AVAILABLE NOW!

We are thrilled to announce the Chicago premiere of our 2018 preservation project, American Revolution 2, at the Gene Siskel Film Center on Friday, October 26 at 7:45pm. Screening as a brand new 35mm print, this is a rare opportunity to see the film just a few blocks away from the site of the 1968 Democratic National Convention and violent protests that took place in and around Grant Park.

Although American Revolution 2 begins with footage of the explosive confrontations between the Chicago police and protestors during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, the filmmakers (Howard Alk, Mike Gray, and Bill Cottle) quickly move from these clashes to focus on conversations about power, race, and resistance that were taking place in the city. The film is a nuanced, compelling, and timely examination of the unlikely relationship that was developing between the Black Power movement in Chicago and the Young Patriots, a group of impoverished, primarily white, residents of the Uptown neighborhood who were beginning to organize around issues of social mobility, police brutality, and income inequity.

As part of our ongoing efforts to make CFA’s collections available to contemporary artists, CFA commissioned sound artist Adam Sonderberg to create a seven-minute audio prelude piece specifically for American Revolution 2 using archival material from our vault. Sonderberg’s impressionistic audio piece immediately precedes the screening and provides an alternative way to absorb and understand the political and social turmoil that defined Chicago in 1968.

This preservation project and presentation is in honor of Mike Gray and Bill Cottle of the Film Group. CFA’s friend Mike Gray passed away in 2013.

The preservation of American Revolution 2 was made possible with the generous support of the National Film Preservation Foundation and Rebuild Foundation.

“A film every Chicagoan should see … as well edited and as high in technical quality as any cinema verite documentary I’ve ever seen.” – Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

 

 

 

 

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