The
Rural Route Film Festival has been created to highlight works
that deal with rural people and places. While the term "rural"
is defined by Webster's Dictionary as: 1) Of or relating to
the country: RUSTIC 2) Of or relating to people who live in
the
country 3) Of or relating to farming: AGRICULTURAL, the creators
of Rural Route Film Festival leave it up to you, the film and
video artists, to explain your own definition of "rural."
Whether it be a documentary about an organic turnip farm in West
Virginia, a fictional backpacking drama set in Peru, or a personal/experimental
work about life in a small town in Wisconsin, we want to see
and hear what you have to say. Works that include alternative
country,
country western, and folk music are encouraged, as are those
that play loud rock in cornfields.
Rural Route Trailer
Rural Route New York 2008
It’s on!!! Rural Route kicks off the 2008-9 season w/summer screenings in New York!
That’s right, the world-wide “Year of the Nomad” starts right here in the Big Apple with Rooftop Films,
in Brooklyn on July 18th - http://www.rooftopfilms.com/. And, it’s NY RR screenings from then on, until
we leave the hemisphere in early November!
Summertime means watching films outside…so following our screening w/Rooftop on the lawn of the
Automotive High School in Williamsburg, we head Upstate to Pawling, NY to project on the side of a barn
for the Greenhorns Midsummer Rabbit Roast – July 26-27: camping, party, bicycle powered rotisserie rabbit
roast, benefit for Severine von Tscharner Fleming’s documentary, this is guaranteed to be THE young farmer
event of the summer! http://thegreenhorns.wordpress.com/
We’ll be screening again outdoors w/ImageNation in St. Nicholas Park @135th St. in Harlem on August 4th as
part of their ongoing Monday night series. Rural Route co-presents the documentary film, “Spirits of the Uhadi”,
about a South African pop star who leaves Johannesburg to learn the musical and cultural traditions of the
amaXhosa people in the villages of the Transkei region on the rural Eastern Cape. This film will be followed
by Charlene Gilbert’s “Homecoming”, a documentary on the history of African-American farmers.
http://www.imagenationfilmfestival.org/pages/main.htm
To add to the mix, we’ll also be screening films from the ‘rooftop of the world’ with the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art in Chelsea. On July 30, catch “A Life with Slate”, a documentary from the slate mines of a remote village in Nepal. On August 22, we’ll screen the legendary spiritual-cinematographic work, “Baraka”, filmed in 24 countries around the world. Then on August 29, we’ll show “Himalaya”, a stunning feature shot on location in Nepal in which rival caravans race from the high plateau across the Dolpo range to the plains, where they trade salt for grain.
And, capping off all this summertime fun will be 2 weeks of rural European film at Scandinavia House
Sept. 24-Oct. 8, along w/a 3 day event at Anthology Film Archives in October (including the “Best of Rural Route” DVD release).
Please do what you can to help with the flood disasters in the Midwest.
Farmers, cities, and small towns will be effected for some time, and need all of our attention.
Please see the following links for news/ways to contribute:
http://www.legionarts.org/ - CSPS arts space, one of our most important and long-standing collaborators,
were evacuated from their building as flood waters engulfed the entire downtown area of Cedar Rapids.
They have set-up a charity online to help area artists.
http://www.kcrg.com/floodwatch - local Eastern Iowa news updates about flood conditions.
KCRG News was broadcasting live following the flood without commercials or regular programming.
We would like to thank them for their dedication to the community.
Rural Route has an ambitious new plan for 2008-2009. We are calling this season, “Nomad,”
because it involves roaming through the ends of the Earth for a full year, screening our
programming and collecting rural stories in a travelogue-style documentary. The “Nomad”
tour is set to kick-off in October 2008, following a New York City festival in which Rural
Route will collaborate with local and international partners to screen a plethora of rural
shorts and features, and launch a brand new “Best of” DVD (subtitled in Spanish and French)
that will be a long-term staple of the festival.
NOMAD TOUR (Screenings)
Rural Route Director Alan Webber will be playing the part of the Nomad, traveling consistently for an entire
year with a backpack, video camera, mini-projector, and stack of DVDs. Webber will stay in hostels, camp,
and accept friendly invitations of lodging. He will be joined by several Rural Route volunteers for stints
along the way. Variables and spontaneity are being factored in, but the general plan is to start off riding
buses around South America (and taking boats across the Amazon and down to Antarctica) with definite screenings
in Chile, Peru, and Argentina. Throughout the voyage, the films will be screened at universities, film centers,
art spaces, and theaters. Webber will also set-up several “Rural Extreme” screenings in places such as jungles,
villages, and on icebergs. The tour continues from South America to Oceania with screenings amidst the beauty
of New Zealand and Australia. Rural Route then flies into India, making a Nomadic path through the Himalayas
(w/a screening in Kathmandu, Nepal), into Tibet and across China to Beijing. From there, it’s down to South
Africa for safari and screenings planned with African diaspora film group, Image Nation, in the townships of
Johannesburg. The tour rounds out with screenings throughout Europe, and side treks into the Middle East and
Western Africa.
NOMAD BLOG/VLOG
Webber will keep an ongoing public blog on the Rural Route website, detailing his travels, the Rural Route
screenings and the people he encounters. Video (vlog) clips will be uploaded whenever possible to supplement
Webber’s writing. A world map will also be featured alongside the blog on the Rural Route website with lines
marking the Nomad’s progress. Mass emails will be delivered every few weeks, summarizing the Nomad blog to the
Rural Route mailing list.
NOMAD DOCUMENTARY
While screening rural films in venues around the world, Rural Route will be documenting its travels on video
to be put together in a comprehensive film and for use with the Rural Route blog and website. The documentary
is at the core of Rural Route’s mission of bringing together and highlighting diverse rural voices from around
the globe. We will look for stories from contemporary farmers, villagers, indigenous people, fellow vagabond
travelers, and urban transplants who are adapting to new ways of life.
Rural Route Tour:
Every
year the Rural Route Film Festival takes highlights from its program
and tours them around the country (and to other countries). It's
a great opportunity for other communities (urban or rural) to
show some of our films.
If you'd like to have the Rural Route Film Festival come to your
town or hamlet, please email filmfest@ruralroutefilms.com w/TOUR
REQUEST in the subject heading and contact info. in the text of
your message. We do screenings at local theatres, colleges, clubs,
community organization centers, libraries, arts spaces, Dutch
squats, museums, and anywhere else with a wall and a screen.
Rural Route T-Shirts for Sale! $12 (includes shipping
and handling!) New 5th Anniversary gold on brown "bark" shirts for $15!
White on black, green, or orange. Also brown, green and orange
women's ringer shirts
Tractor design by former Iowa City artist, Dustin Kelly (who now
resides on an island)
Sizes: S, M, L, XL
State what you want and send with
check made out to “Rural Route Films”
The
Rural Route Film Festival has been created to highlight works
that deal with rural people and places. While the term "rural"
is defined by Webster's Dictionary as: 1) Of or relating to
the country: RUSTIC 2) Of or relating to people who live in
the
country 3) Of or relating to farming: AGRICULTURAL, the creators
of Rural Route Film Festival leave it up to you, the film and
video artists, to explain your own definition of "rural."
Whether it be a documentary about an organic turnip farm in West
Virginia, a fictional backpacking drama set in Peru, or a personal/experimental
work about life in a small town in Wisconsin, we want to see
and hear what you have to say. Works that include alternative
country,
country western, and folk music are encouraged, as are those
that play loud rock in cornfields.
Please do what you can to help with the flood disasters in the Midwest.
Farmers, cities, and small towns will be effected for some time, and need all of our attention.
Please see the following links for news/ways to contribute:
Every
year the Rural Route Film Festival takes highlights from its program
and tours them around the country (and to other countries). It's
a great opportunity for other communities (urban or rural) to
show some of our films. 
Rural Route T-Shirts for Sale! $12 (includes shipping
and handling!)