Northwest Film Forum

Wheedle's Groove

Sponsored by KBCS 91.3 FM and the Vera Project

Sep 03 - Sep 09

(Jennifer Maas, Seattle, 2009, DigiBeta, 87 min)

Seattle, get ready for some Soul searching! Jennifer Maas' Wheedle's Groove provides a look back some thirty years before grunge music put Seattle on the map, when late 1960s groups like Black on White Affair, The Soul Swingers and Cold, Bold & Together filled airwaves and packed clubs every night of the week.

"Four stars: the best expression of the city's zeitgeist in recent memory" —Seattle Times

"Don't miss: Sheds light on several of the musicians, producers, and managers who fostered that exciting, fleeting moment in Seattle music history." —The Stranger

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The Family Jams

Seattle Premiere

Sep 10 - Sep 12

(Kevin Barker, USA, 2009, DigiBeta, 81 min)

The freak-folk explosion of the mid-00s was a musical trend that demanded documentation. There was the rare sensation of a group of major artists emerging at the same time, hanging out and collaborating with one another, not minding if their styles overlapped. The Family Jams might be the defining film of that moment.

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Styx: Kilroy Was Here

Oct 15

In 1983, Styx returned to the record charts with Kilroy Was Here, the most ambitious of the band's concept albums, which focused on a renegade leading a rebellion in a totalitarian future by bringing rock and roll to the people. This rock classic is a half-amusing, half-menacing parable of technology, the rock culture and modern demagoguery. In other words its just plain awesome!

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I Am Secretly an Important Man

Oct 22 - Oct 28

(Peter Sillen, 2010, USA, DigiBeta, 85 min)

Peter Sillen's documentary portrait of the guru of grunge, Steven (Jesse) Bernstein, undulates like a spoken-word performance. Known in the Seattle art and music scene as one of the most influential voices of the late twentieth century, Bernstein was a poet and performance artist who recorded with Sub Pop Records and inspired Kurt Cobain, Oliver Stone and many other writers, filmmakers, and grunge and punk musicians.

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Howl

Oct 29 - Nov 04

(Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman, USA, 2010, 35mm, 90 min)

The beats are alive and well thanks to a soaring performance by James Franco in Howl, a mesmerizing channeling of Allen Ginsberg, set in 1957 San Francisco as his poetic masterpiece is put on trial. 

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Ornette: Made In America

Oct 29 - Oct 30

(Shirley Clark, USA, 1985, 35mm, 80 min)

Shirley Clarke was one of the key figures of the American independent film movement, with the films The Connection (1961) and The Cool World (1963) building her reputation. Both had strong jazz elements, and for her final film Clarke returned to the jazz scene, making this brilliant music documentary featuring the legendary Ornette Coleman, a toweringly innovative yet humble figure. 

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Ed Thigpen: Master of Time, Rhythm and Taste

Nov 01 - Nov 03

(Don McGlynn, USA/Denmark, 2009, Beta-SP, 91 min)

Apart from being an incredible musician with a rare feel for music, the drummer Ed Thigpen, who passed away this year, was also a human being with a fascinating personal history. This multifaceted portrait film, tells the story of Thigpen, whose work (on no less than 900 albums) has included collaborations with Oscar Peterson, Ray Brown, Herbie Hancock and Ella Fitzgerald.

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Do it Again

Nov 04

(Robert Patton Spruill, USA, 2010, DigiBeta, 90 min)

Every serious music fan has a favorite band—but it’s a very rare fan that single-handedly attempts to reunite that band years after they’ve packed it in. In order to conquer his midlife crisis, the committed pop journalist Geoff Edgers’ dream is to bring back together The Kinks.

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