williamaveryhudson

Ci-Qing | Spider Lilies (Zero Chou, Taiwan, China, 2006)
sunday 18 Feb
C: Rainie Yang, Isabella Leong, Shen Jian-hung, Kris Shie, Shih Yuen-chieh

Winner of this year’s Teddy Queer Film Award, a story of love and memory, abandonment and return.

A web-cam girl, unknowingly under police surveillance, jumps into analog life to rediscover her childhood love, who cares for her dissociated brother, earning a pretty good living for them as a hip and elegant tattoo artist. An insecure mugger and a stuttering policeman play strangely, sweetly supportive roles as the two women retrace the strings of the past and weave the stuff of their future. Nothing seems to turn out right until it turns out as it must.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Gen zong | Eye in the Sky (Yau Nai Hoi, Hong Kong, China 2007)
sunday 18 Feb
C: Tony Leung Ka Fai, Simon Yam Tat Wah, Kate Tsui

Whereas the Beijing foot massage parlor owner in Ping zuo was bumbling and ineffectual in a charming, thinning-on-top sort of way, the HK criminal mastermind in Gen zong is ruthlessly, efficiently lethal.

First-time director Yau Nai Hoi follows a rookie surveillence on her first, and perhaps last, case, as she makes decisions - more than once with no good outcome possible.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Sakuran | Sakuran (Mika Ninagawa, Japan, 2006)
sunday 18 Feb
C: Anna Tsuchiya, Kippei Shina, Hiroki Narimiya

This gloriously realized first feature by Mika Ninagawa, based on a popular manga, follows the education and gradual self-emancipation of a superstar courtesan (Oiran) in early 17th century Japan. Like Sophia Coppola in Marie Antoinette, Ninagawa chose to employ a pop soundtrack to help her tell this story of youth and celebrity from a distant time.

No one should say they’ve mastered walking on platforms without first seeing this film.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Fay Grim (Hal Hartley, Germany, USA, 2006)
saturday 17 Feb
C: Parker Posey, Jeff Goldblum, Jasmin Tabatabai, Saffron Burrows, Liam Aiken, Thomas Jay Ryan

Fay, the sister of the notorious Nobel prize-winning smut poet Simon Grim, still loves Henry Fool. Their son receives an ingenious orgy-in-a-box from an undisclosed sender and a chase across three continents ensues, involving a supremely sad-sack collection of government agents, terrorists, flight attendants, and bellhops.

Parker Posey delivers a perfectly timed comic performance, including some brilliant physical work. With strong contributions by Jasmin Tabatabai and Saffron Burrows, Fay Grim proves in the best Billy Wilder tradition that nothing is funnier than a beautiful woman in trouble.

Another good score by Hartley (and thanks in the credits to the American Academy in Berlin, where Hartley served as a fellow in Fall 2004).

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Ping Guo | Lost In Beijing (Li Yu, People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, China 2007 )
saturday 17 Feb
C: Tony Leung Ka Fai, Fan Bingbing, Tong Da Wei, Elaine Jin (Y.L.), Zeng Mei Hui Zi

The hapless owner of a foot massage parlor accidentally rapes one of his employees, is caught in the act by her window-washer husband, pays 100,000 yuan to keep the child - and everyone gets less and more than they bargained for. Seriously sharp and humane.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

State Legislature (Frederick Wiseman, USA, 2007 )
friday 16 Feb

Anna Hoffmann said it perfectly: “Is it possible to film the idea of democracy? ”

Wiseman has performed something of a miracle, showing how legislative democracy actually can work in the United States.

Another quote, this time Ekkehard Knörer writing in Sight & Sound:

“State Legislature” documents both the idea and the praxis of politics in America, showing how even – or precisely – at the semi-professional state level, the two are inseparably linked. The politicians we watch are shown as embodiments of the indissoluble interweaving of praxis and idea.

The omnipresent reference to the founding fathers of the constitution, the ever-present antagonism - even in conservative Idaho - between the principles of freedom and control, all of this determines the most nitty-gritty debates and decision-making. Even if you don’t share many or even most of the often reactionary positions and attitudes expressed, “State Legislature” shows what holds not only this state, but the whole of the United States together: the idea that procedures must exist that give people a hearing in matters that concern them. The grandeur of this idea shines through the nuts and bolts of political workings, and Europeans can only look on in astonishment.

Filmed during the three-month 2004 session of Idaho’s citizen legislature, State Legislature employs Wiseman’s “personal experience” form of documentary film-making. Wikipedia authors have collected a good summary of this form from the man himself:

[My films are] based on un-staged, un-manipulated actions… The editing is highly manipulative and the shooting is highly manipulative… What you choose to shoot, the way you shoot it, the way you edit it and the way you structure it… all of those things… represent subjective choices that you have to make… In [Belfast, Maine] I had 110 hours of material … I only used 4 hours – near nothing. The compression within a sequence represents choice and then the way the sequences are arranged in relationship to the other represents choice. Aftab, Weltz

All aspects of documentary filmmaking involve choice and are therefore manipulative. But the ethical … aspect of it is that you have to … try to make [a film that] is true to the spirit of your sense of what was going on. … My view is that these films are biased, prejudiced, condensed, compressed but fair. I think what I do is make movies that are not accurate in any objective sense, but accurate in the sense that I think they’re a fair account of the experience I’ve had in making the movie. Spotnitz

I think I have an obligation, to the people who have consented to be in the film, … to cut it so that it fairly represents what I felt was going on at the time in the original event. Poppy

Wiseman documents the theory and practice of this one legislative body, through the words and actions of Idaho’s senators, representatives, staff members, pages, and the lobbyists who seek to shape legislative policy - not always for the worse.

Serving in the state capital, Boise, only three months, with nine months off to pursue their private lives, Idaho’s legislators “have to go home and live with what we’ve done to ourselves.”

Anyone who has seen a Frederick Wiseman film will appreciate how once more this master can produce a 3 1/2 hour documentary, with no music, no voiceover, and no interviews, that is uncannily entertaining from beginning to end.

In the Q&A, which had some very good questions, Wiseman offered the following observations (which I tried to capture accurately):

Idaho legislators place a high premium on being civil to each other. It makes legislation move more smoothly, as is true in much of life.

Editing consists of a compression, condensation, summary of the actual event.

My obligation to the people who have given me permission to film is greater than any obligation to any network.

My motive in making the film was more personal. The legislature is the body that provides the support for most of the institutions I’ve filmed. In one sense, I’ve made one long film, now about 90 hours long, about the role of institutions in American life. In many ways, State Legislature serves as a conclusion…

Some evidence that Paine, Jefferson, Madison et al weren’t completely wrong.

Oh - Delphi is a sumptuous movie palace. Head for the comfy armchairs at the front of the balcony!

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Deserto Feliz | Happy Desert (Paulo Caldas, Brazil, Germany 2007)
thursday 15 Feb
C: Nash Laila, Peter Ketnath, Hermila Guedes

Nash Laila © Fred Jordão

Life in the villages of Brazil isn’t easy for armadillos, anacondas, and girls. And Rio is not a playground.

Director Caldas hopes for a better future - his daughter was born during shooting - but first he shows us first how far we have to go.

As Jéssica, Nash Laila turns in a heroic performance of teenage peril & promise. The film gains power as it settles in the conscience.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Bushi no Ichibun | Love And Honor (Yoji Yamada, Japan, 2006)
wednesday 14 Feb
C: Takuya Kimura, Rei Dan, Mitsugoro Bando, Kaori Momoi

A perfect Valentine’s Day fable for Berlin. Sweet and sentimental - no. A young low-level samurai is blinded during his duties as a food-taster for the emperor and his wife pays the price.

No spoilers here - you’ll have to see the movie. It starts sweet, it ends sentimental - but the middle tears up expectations and throws them in the latrine.

Veteran director Yôji Yamada is now in pre-production of Kaabee, based on the life of Kurosawa’s legendary production manager Teruyo Nogami.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Alice’s Restaurant (Arthur Penn, USA, 1969)
tuesday 13 Feb
C: Arlo Guthrie, Pat Quinn, James Broderick

Thirty-eight years after the initial release, seeing this film fresh with an entirely new audience, I think Vincent Canby got it right the first time around:

Penn, who collaborated on the screenplay with Venable Herndon, has made a sort of folk movie—wise, fantastic, technically superb (especially the color photography by Michael Nebbia), sometimes wildly funny, sometimes touching in ways that are most agreeable because they are completely unforeseen.

Lovely to see the extended Alice’s Restaurant Massacree sequence, ending with Arlo in his skivvies having a good old time with the other Group W rejects from Uncle Sam’s VEET-nam army:

And I, I walked over to the, to the bench there, and there is, Group W’s where they put you if you may not be moral enough to join the army after committing your special crime, and there was all kinds of mean nasty ugly looking people on the bench there. Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father rapers! Father rapers sitting right there on the bench next to me! And they was mean and nasty and ugly and horrible crime-type guys sitting on the bench next to me. And the meanest, ugliest, nastiest one, the meanest father raper of them all, was coming over to me and he was mean ‘n’ ugly ‘n’ nasty ‘n’ horrible and all kind of things and he sat down next to me and said, “Kid, whad’ya get?” I said, “I didn’t get nothing, I had to pay $50 and pick up the garbage.” He said, “What were you arrested for, kid?” And I said, “Littering.” And they all moved away from me on the bench there, and the hairy eyeball and all kinds of mean nasty things, till I said, “And creating a nuisance.” And they all came back, shook my hand, and we had a great time on the bench, talkin about crime, mother stabbing, father raping, all kinds of groovy things that we was talking about on the bench. And everything was fine, we was smoking cigarettes and all kinds of things, until the Sargeant came over…

[lyrics from Arlo Guthrie’s website]

With Frederick Wiseman’s State Legislature, some evidence that Paine, Jefferson, Washington et al weren’t completely wrong.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Three Films (Danny Williams, USA)
monday 12 Feb

• Factory, October 14-25, 1965
• Harold Stevenson No.1 and No.2
• Trips and Parties

Callie Angell (Whitney Museum) and Esther B Robinson premiered three experimental films by Robinson’s vanished uncle Danny Williams.

Williams, a 26-year-old photographer, documented Andy Warhol’s Factory scene for 6 brief months in 1965 - and witnessed scenes of joy that even the people who survived cannot remember.

These silent films are inherently musical, integrating motion, rhythm and image in a visual counterpoint to Warhol’s own films. Williams was shooting simultaneously with Warhol during a couple of Factory films - which would make a pairing of these movies highly desirable.

It’s a cliche - but Williams deconstructs celebrity expertly - just watch Edie Sedgwick and Harold Stevenson. Don’t miss the joyful dissipation of these beautiful people who for a brief moment loved each other and Andy’s scene before imploding.

Incidentally (!) - Williams’ camera work anticipates film for the next twenty years. And I think nobody has managed to capture his strobe effects - pale faces, flashed for a millesecond, then left to fade.

Also, one of the most obnoxious men ever captured on film - cleaning his nose on a socialite’s car coat.

A rare privilege - the Berlinale audience were the first to see these rare & delicate films. Previous screenings had fewer than a dozen friends and family members. A debt of gratitude to Andy Warhol, who ensured that the prints would survive.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Saturday, Feb 10, 2007
21:00
Behind The Veil | Behind The Veil
D: Eve Arnold
United Kingdom 1969
English
Magnum in Motion
CinemaxX 6

22:00
75′
Flaming Youth
It
D: Clarence Badger
USA 1926/27
English Intertitles
C: Clara Bow, Antonio Moreno, William Austin, Gary Cooper
Klavier: Maud Nelissen
Retrospective
CinemaxX 8

Monday, Feb 12, 2007
15:45
22′
Forum expanded Underground / Übersee
Factory, October 14-25, 1965
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
Forum expanded
Arsenal 1
40′
Harold Stevenson No.1 and No.2
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
Forum expanded
27′
Trips and Parties
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
Forum expanded

Tuesday, Feb 13, 2007
21:00
111′
Alice’s Restaurant
D: Arthur Penn
USA 1969
English
C: Arlo Guthrie, Pat Quinn, James Broderick
Homage
CinemaxX 4

Wednesday, Feb 14, 2007
22:30
121′
Bushi no Ichibun | Love And Honor | Love And Honor
D: Yoji Yamada
Japan 2006
Japanese
C: Takuya Kimura, Rei Dan, Mitsugoro Bando, Kaori Momoi
Panorama Special
Cubix 7 & 8 Interlocked

Thursday, Feb 15, 2007
21:30
92′
Deserto Feliz | Happy Desert | Happy Desert
D: Paulo Caldas
Brazil, Germany 2007
Portuguese, German, English
C: Nash Laila, Peter Ketnath, Hermila Guedes
Panorama Special
Zoo Palast 1

Friday, Feb 16, 2007
11:00
91′
Ferien | Vacation | Ferien
D: Thomas Arslan
Germany 2006
German
C: Angela Winkler, Karoline Eichhorn, Uwe Bohm, Gudrun Ritter, Anja Schneider
Panorama Special
CinemaxX 7 (E)
[MAYBE]

16:30
217′
State Legislature | State Legislature
D: Frederick Wiseman
USA 2007
English
Forum
Delphi Filmpalast

22:30
112′
Ping Guo | Lost In Beijing | Lost In Beijing
D: Li Yu
People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, China 2007
Mandarin
C: Tony Leung, Fan Bingbing, Tong Da Wei, Elaine Jin (Y.L.), Zeng Mei Hui Zi
Competition
Berlinale Palast
[I HOPE]

Saturday, Feb 17, 2007
20:00
118′
Fay Grim | Fay Grim | Fay Grim
D: Hal Hartley
Germany, USA 2006
English
C: Parker Posey, Jeff Goldblum, Jasmin Tabatabai, Saffron Burrows, Liam Aiken, Thomas Jay Ryan
Panorama Special
Cubix 7 & 8 Interlocked

Sunday, Feb 18, 2007
15:00
111′
Sakuran | Sakuran
D: Mika Ninagawa
Japan 2006
Japanese
C: Anna Tsuchiya, Kippei Shina, Hiroki Narimiya
Berlinale Special
Urania

20:00
90′
Gen zong | Eye in the Sky
D: Yau Nai Hoi
Hong Kong, China 2007
Cantonese
C: Tony Leung Ka Fai, Simon Yam Tat Wah, Kate Tsui
Forum
Colosseum 1

22:30
94′
Ci-Qing | Spider Lilies | Spider Lilies
D: Zero Chou
Taiwan, China 2006
Mandarin, Taiwanese, Japanese
C: Rainie Yang, Isabella Leong, Shen Jian-hung, Kris Shie, Shih Yuen-chieh
Panorama
Colosseum 1

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

It (Clarence Badger, USA, 1926/27, 75 min)
saturday 10 Feb

So what is “It”?

“It… that strange magnetism which attracts both sexes… entirely unself-conscious… full of self-confidence… indifferent to the effect… she is producing and uninfluenced by others.”

The film begins with a Cosmo extract of a novella by Elinor Glyn, and picks up speed with a newspaper story by an uncredited, luminous Gary Cooper. So it is about writing, but ultimately about the stunning comedic talent of Clara Bow and the anthropologic eye of Clarence Badger, Josef von Sternberg (uncredited) and H. Kinley Martin. Macy’s (Waltham’s), Coney Island & a 1920’s steam-powered yacht.

Clara Bow acts with subtlety, light elan and small, powerful gestures that would set the choreography for women in film for the next century. Don’t miss the original. Her final scene on the yacht’s anchor with Antonio Moreno is the funniest, sexiest, most artful thing I’ve seen since I don’t know when.

Pity the people who won’t hear Maud Nelissen’s piano composition behind this brilliant film.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Behind The Veil (Eve Arnold, UK, 1965, 50 min)
saturday 10 Feb

Magnum doyenne Eve Arnold somehow got privileged access to film wedding preparations for the marriage of to-be Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum, as told by his bride’s handmaid, Nora.

Famous for her intimate photographs of Marilyn Monroe, Arnold also made a prodigous contribution to the photography of women around the world. In the middle east, she was present when the veil first began to lift.

“My name is Nora” - the beginning of an eloquent script, written by Arnold and worth close study. Understated, clear & direct.

Not so many veils in view, rather masks - strange, leather-like carnival masks that the high-born women of Dubai and Abu Dhabi wear and keep adjusting, to drink, to eat & just to get a better look.

Arnold has an ethnographer’s eye, and the scenes she records are timelessly current. Boys and men dancing with ageless moves that will undoubtedly show up later in the Berlin night. Girls flaying the foreground with their hair in a moving dance of innocence and freedom before puberty and the veil.

How on earth did Arnold get access to film the bride’s expert, mirrorless application of under-the-eyelid-liner and perfume (costlier than diamonds), and iconic hair-combing before sequestration for the marriage consummation? The look she achieves is completely natural and devastatingly beautiful. I’ve heard it - “No wonder they keep them behind the veil.”

Meanwhile, outside, the men are partying, joy-shooting beloved rifles, riding rare horses bareback, racing camels ahead of an armada of Mercedes-Benz’s across the desert.

Devastating. Gratitude to Moni for the tip.

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Hard choices! 368 films over 11 days.

The program & online calendar was posted today on the festival website. Tickets for some specials are available now, the rest will be on Tuesday.

Here’s a first-flush list of what look like 22 must-sees -

300 | 300 | 300
D: Zack Snyder
USA 2006
English
C: Gerard Buttler, Lena Headey, David Wenham, Dominic West
Competition
out of competition
117′

Alice’s Restaurant
D: Arthur Penn
USA 1969
English
C: Arlo Guthrie, Pat Quinn, James Broderick
Homage
111′

Andy Warhol’s Factory – Short Films
Factory, October 14-25, 1965
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
Forum expanded
22′
Harold Stevenson No.1 and No.2
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
Forum expanded
40′
Trips and Parties
D: Danny Williams
USA 1965
no language
27′

Berlin Alexanderplatz: Remastered | Berlin Alexanderplatz: Remastered | BerliAlexanderplatz: Remastered
D: Rainer Werner Fassbinder
Federal Rep. Germany, Italy 1979/1980
German
C: Günter Lamprecht, Hanna Schygulla, Barbara Sukowa, Gottfried John, Franz Buchrieser, Claus Holm, Brigitte Mira, Roger Fritz
Berlinale Special
939′

Bonnie and Clyde
D: Arthur Penn
USA 1967
English
C: Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Gene Hackman
Berlinale Special Homage
111′

Bushi no Ichibun | Love And Honor | Love And Honor
D: Yoji Yamada
Japan 2006
Japanese
C: Takuya Kimura, Rei Dan, Mitsugoro Bando, Kaori Momoi
Panorama Special
121′

Day On Fire | Day On Fire
D: Jay Anania
USA 2006
English, Arabic
C: Carmen Chaplin, Martin Donovan, Olympia Dukakis, Alyssa Sutherland
Berlinale Special
94′

Fay Grim | Fay Grim | Fay Grim
D: Hal Hartley
Germany, USA 2006
English
C: Parker Posey, Jeff Goldblum, Jasmin Tabatabai, Saffron Burrows, Liam Aiken, Thomas Jay Ryan
Panorama Special
118′

Hamlet | Premiere der wiederentdeckten, neu restaurierten Farbfassung. Erstaufführung der Filmmusik von Michael Riessler (2007). In Kooperation mit dem Deutschen Filminstitut - DIF, Frankfurt am Main, und dem ZDF in Zusammenarbeit mit ARTE
D: Svend Gade, Heinz Schall
Germany 1920/21
German Intertitles
C: Asta Nielsen, Mathilde Brandt, Eduard von Winterstein
Es spielt Michael Riessler mit Solisten-Ensemble
Retrospective Special Event
110′

How To Cook Your Life | How To Cook Your Life | Wie man sein Leben kocht
D: Doris Dörrie
Germany 2006
English
Eat, Drink, See Movies
100′
Chef of the Day: Thomas Kammeier

Interview | Interview | Interview
D: Steve Buscemi
USA, Netherlands 2006
English
C: Sienna Miller, Steve Buscemi
Panorama
81′

Irina Palm | Irina Palm | Irina Palm
D: Sam Garbarski
Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg 2006
English
C: Marianne Faithfull, Miki Manojlovic, Kevin Bishop
Competition
103′

It
D: Clarence Badger
USA 1926/27
English Intertitles
C: Clara Bow, Antonio Moreno, William Austin, Gary Cooper
Klavier: Maud Nelissen
Retrospective
75′

La masseria delle allodole | The Lark Farm | Das Haus der Lerchen
D: Paolo und Vittorio Taviani
Italy, Spain, France, Bulgaria 2007
Italian
C: Paz Vega, Moritz Bleibtreu, Alessandro Preziosi, Angela Molina, Tcheky Karyo, Arsinée Khanjian, André Dussollier
Berlinale Special
122′

Madrigal | Madrigal | Madrigal
D: Fernando Pérez
Spain, Cuba 2006
Spanish
C: Carlos Enrique Almirante, Liety Chaviano Pérez, Carla Sánchez, Luis Arberto García, Yailene Sierra, Ana Celia de Armas, Armando Soler
Berlinale Special
112′

Ping Guo | Lost In Beijing | Lost In Beijing
D: Li Yu
People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, China 2007
Mandarin
C: Tony Leung, Fan Bingbing, Tong Da Wei, Elaine Jin (Y.L.), Zeng Mei Hui Zi
Competition
112′

Prinzessinnenbad | Pool Of Princesses | Prinzessinnenbad
D: Bettina Blümner
Germany 2006
German
Perspektive Deutsches Kino
92′

Sai bo gu ji man gwen chan a | I’m A Cyborg, But That’s Ok | Ich bin ein Cyborg, aber das macht nichts
D: Park Chan-wook
Republic of Korea (South Korea) 2006
Korean
C: Lim Soo-jung, Jung Ji-hoon
Competition
105′

Sakuran | Sakuran
D: Mika Ninagawa
Japan 2006
Japanese
C: Anna Tsuchiya, Kippei Shina, Hiroki Narimiya
Berlinale Special
111′

SLOW FOOD ON SHORT FILMS - Carlo Petrini präsentiert: The Best of Terra Madre 2007
Eat, Drink, See Movies
The Day After Tomato | The Day After Tomato | The Day After Tomato
Sweden 2006
3′
Grocery Store Wars | Grocery Store Wars | Grocery Store Wars
D: Luis Fox
USA 2006
4′
The Sound Of Mountains | The Sound Of Mountains
D: Alexandru Belc
Romania 2006
Romanian
5′
Sawasiray - Pitusiray | Sawasiray - Pitusiray | Sawasiray - Pitusiray
D: Mariana Herrera Bellido
Peru 2006
Spanish
C: Cornelio Hancco, Julio Hancco
8′
Manoomin - The Sacred Food | Manoomin - The Sacred Food
D: Jack Pettibone Riccobono
USA 2006
English
6′
BINAMBAN - the lorious food of Lagonoy | BINAMBAN - the lorious food of Lagonoy
D: Ferdinand DeMadura
Philippines 2006
5′
Parabolo d’oro | Parabolo d’oro | Parabolo d’oro
D: Vittorio De Seta
Italy 1955
12′
L’age de raison | The Age of Reason
D: Myriam Aziza
France
French
14′
Jidlo | Food
D: Jan Svankmayer
Czechoslovakia, United Kingdom 1992
15′

State Legislature | State Legislature
D: Frederick Wiseman
USA 2007
English
Forum
217′

When A Man Falls In The Forest | When A Man Falls In The Forest | When A Man Falls In The Forest
D: Ryan Eslinger
Germany, Canada, USA 2006
English
C: Sharon Stone, Timothy Hutton
Competition
85′

tags: berlin berlinale film festivals movies

Extracted from Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat (to help launch a week of start-up meetings to imagine a better world and organize locally for positive change).

11/9 Versus 9/11
The dismantling of the Berlin Wall on 11/9 was brought about by people who dared to imagine a different, more open world – one where every human being would be free to realize his or her full potential – and who then summoned the courage to act on that imagination.

We need to think more seriously than ever about how we encourage people to focus on productive outcomes that advance and unite civilization – peaceful imaginations that seek to minimize alienation and celebrate interdependence rather than self-sufficiency, inclusion rather than exclusion, openness, opportunity, and hope rather than limits, suspicion, and grievance.

We’re about the Fourth of July. We’re about 11/9.

tags: activism social progress