Closing Screening

Sunday, September 21, 2025

Brunch: 11:00 pm / Screening: 12:00 pm

Datura’s Aubade (17:00)

Jean-Jacques Martinod in collaboration with Bretta C. Walker

USA, Ecuador

2021

In the high Chihuahuan Deserts a local myth tells the story of how a local farmer once discovered the remains of a fallen meteorite. In the liminal deserts a vacuous wind enmeshes itself with magnetic lands where the earth and the alien surrender to inner overlapping rhythms, and where serpents, wolves, and nature spirits roam horizonless and free of form.

Eastern Anthems (78:00)

A filmic correspondence between Matthew Wolkow and Jean-Jacques Martinod

Canada, USA, Ecuador

2024

An unfinished film is passed along from one friend to another. The dialogue between them is a journey crossed by the swarming of the American Great Eastern Brood X of periodical cicadas that prophetically emerge every 17 years, invoking a reflection of a post-pandemic present and our shared futures. A film composed of a chorus of voices (both human and non-human), the warnings of history, the power of nature and rebirth.

Director’s Statement:

This film has had many lives. It’s in discourse with our times, with the intersections of the realities of our bioregional spheres. Simultaneously, this film is about the inherent friendship required in any type of true collaboration and building discourse as a larger human family in its multifaceted relations to the natural world. While suffering from several important setbacks during production, including the inability for one of us to be present during the emergence of Brood X, and then a mechanical failure that almost completely annihilated our faith in being able to complete the film, the project continued steadfast thanks to tenacity and sacred community. We were also all in lockdown, figuring out ways of expressing love, camaraderie, and perseverance during trying times. This film was reconjured out of ruins, in full play with the art of failure, thanks to a commitment to the event, manifested in a filmic situation that brought true friendship among all the makers to forms of collaboration all were unaware of could be possible. This is partially the reason why this film operates within the context of chorus and noise awakening harmoniously from the ashes.

This screening will be followed by a Q&A with Jean-Jacques Martinod.