Premieres
Once Upon A Time In Harlem
William Greaves, David Greaves
A decade after his death, genre-defying filmmaker William Greaves has one last trick up his sleeve with what he considered the most important event he captured on film: a 1972 party he engineered with the living luminaries of the Harlem Renaissance.
- Runtime
- 100 min
- Language
- English
Screenings
Already an established documentarian and having just made Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One, William Greaves gathered some of the key artists, musicians, librarians, poets, journalists, actors, photographers, teachers, and critics of the Harlem Renaissance at Duke Ellington’s home for a party, which he filmed. The resulting lively conversations, built around vivid retelling of past events, are in part old friends reconnecting, in part a rehashing of familiar conflicts, and in part personal memories becoming recorded history. Co-directed by his son David Greaves, who was a cameraman that day at Ellington’s apartment, Once Upon A Time In Harlem is a staggering achievement, both as a record of one of the most significant artistic movements in American history, and also as a chronicle of the magical power of art and its creation to remake our world. — SS
Available in person only.
Already an established documentarian and having just made Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One, William Greaves gathered some of the key artists, musicians, librarians, poets, journalists, actors, photographers, teachers, and critics of the Harlem Renaissance at Duke Ellington’s home for a party, which he filmed. The resulting lively conversations, built around vivid retelling of past events, are in part old friends reconnecting, in part a rehashing of familiar conflicts, and in part personal memories becoming recorded history. Co-directed by his son David Greaves, who was a cameraman that day at Ellington’s apartment, Once Upon A Time In Harlem is a staggering achievement, both as a record of one of the most significant artistic movements in American history, and also as a chronicle of the magical power of art and its creation to remake our world. — SS
Available in person only.