** Co-presented with Engauge Experimental Film Festival, coming in Fall 2019! **
Made when she was just 18 years old, Barbara Rubin’s art-porn masterpiece Christmas on Earth (1963-65) shocked NYC’s experimental film scene and inspired NYC’s thriving underground. For the next four years her filmmaking and irrepressible energy helped shatter artistic and sexist boundaries. A mythical “Zelig” of the sixties, she introduced Andy Warhol to the Velvet Underground and Bob Dylan to the Kabbalah. But beyond shaping the spirit of the sixties, Barbara was seeking the deeper meaning of life. After retiring to a farm with Allen Ginsberg, she shocked everyone by converting to Hasidic Judaism, marrying and moving to France to live an anonymous life. Tragically, she died in 1980 after giving birth to her fifth child. For years, Jonas Mekas treasured all of Barbara’s letters and films and cherished her memory. Working with Mekas’ footage, the film takes us inside the world and mind of Barbara Rubin; a woman who truly believed that film could change the world.
Description courtesy of Juno Films.
“The Queens teen who inspired Andy Warhol, Bob Dylan and an entire artistic movement.” – The New York Post
“…pound for pound, minute for minute, there are few biographical documentaries more impressive than this.” – Joshua Brunsting, Criterioncast
“Barbara [Rubin] was the moving force and coordinator between us all,” according to Lou Reed. Andy Warhol said Rubin was “one of the first people to get multimedia interest going around New York” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Rubin). And yet, like many women, Barbara Rubin was hidden from history. Rubin made groundbreaking experimental films (“Christmas on Earth”) and she was also a catalyst in the burgeoning New York underground film scene, whose colleagues and collaborators included, in addition to Reed and Warhol, Jonas Mekas, Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan. Come see a new documentary that explores her life, her work and the experimental film scene that she energized in New York.
Chuck Smith USA 2018 1h 18m
