Pioneers: Genre Trailblazers (Part 1)
91 minutes, Digital
USA
Distributor: Kino Lorber
The 11/13 screening will be followed by a discussion with Dr. Meredith C. Ward of Johns Hopkins University.
Dr. Meredith C. Ward is a film and media historian and theorist, with a specialty in sound and sound media. She received her Ph.D from the Screen Cultures Program at Northwestern University, where she wrote her dissertation, Chatter, Reverberation, and the Static in the System: Noise in American Cinema Culture.” This work won the 2016 Society for Cinema and Media Studies Dissertation Award for the best dissertation submitted to the international organization for film and media scholars. Her forthcoming book, also entitled The Static in the System, is under contract with The University of California Press and is anticipated in 2018.
Short Film: (Pictured)
A Daughter of the Law
Director: Grace Cunard
1921 • USA • 21 MIN • Silent
Known as “the Serial Queen” for her vivacious turns in western, action, and thriller shorts, Grace Cunard was also a prolific writer and director whose unabashedly entertaining films include this two-reel adventure in which she plays a Secret Service agent.
“Wickedly funny and playful”
— Ela Bittencourt, Hyperallergic
Feature Film:
’49-’17
Director: Ruth Ann Baldwin
1917 • USA • 70 MIN • Silent
The earliest known western directed by a woman, Ruth Ann Baldwin’s ’49 –’17 is the curious story of a former miner who, nostalgic for the adventurous days of the 1849 Gold Rush, sets out to recreate a Wild West town.
“Stands out for its clever reworking of traditional Western mythology at a time when the cinematic genre was still in its infancy.”
— Cullen Gallagher, Not Coming
Series sponsored by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation.