Movie Notes – Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

Screening at the Detroit Film Theatre, 26^th November 2011, 2pm

Hats off again to the Detroit Film Theatre for their bold scheduling, which has seen a great selection of movies this fall. Next up is the Chantal Akerman masterpiece, Jean Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, (2005) a compelling work which chronicles the life of a widow, mother and prostitute in middle age, whose hours are dominated by routine. The routines by which Jean Dielman is enslaved become a framework for the cinematography, and through this technique the viewer comes to know something of the monotony the protagonist experience, providing a powerful metaphor for the feminist undertones of the piece. DFT summarises the piece as “a singular blend of feminism, modernism, and the avant-garde whose hypnotic editing and rigorous attention to detail make for a riveting, unforgettable experience.” There are no blockbuster emotional freebies with this film; it is uncompromising in its demands on the viewer, but the rewards are there for those who like something a little different from their night out at the cinema.

The Director – Chantal Akerman

Akerman is quoted as saying that she decided to become a film director at the age of fifteen, the night she saw Pierrot Le Fou, by Jean Luc Godard. Clearly a remarkable child, she enrolled in the impressively named Institut National Supérieur des Arts du Spectacle et des Techniques de Diffusion a film school in her native Belgium. Rebelling within her first term, however, she left and made a 13 minute long black and white film called Saute ma ville in 35mm format, which she funded herself, partly by doing administrative work. The film was premiered at the Oberhausen short-film festival in 1971 and Akerman’s film career took off from that point. She moved to New York where she became strongly influenced by the work of artists such as, Jonas Mekas, Stan Brakhage, Andy Warhol and, in particular Michael Snow. These structural film influences began to become apparent in her subsequent works, which became characterized by static framing and long takes.

The Movie

The plot for this movie is a simple one, following as it does the life of Jean Deilman (Delphine Seyrig), a middle-aged woman trying to get by. The routines that her life is dominated by provide the metaphor for her inability to break free from her condition, which consists of domestic duties, visiting her teenage son Sylvain (Jan Decorte) and being visited as a prostitute by her clients (Henri Storck, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, and Yves Bical). The clients’ visits are shown to be as routine and monotonous as all her other tasks, and yet, as the film progresses over a period of three days, Jean Dielman’s life slowly begins to unravel. Each change in the rigid routine is what one viewer described as ‘powerful and meaningful barometers of the titanic emotions going on behind her blank mask.’ Akerman forces the viewer, through her use of long duration shots and a refusal to use reverse shots, to enter the world of Jean Dielman in a very powerfully emotional way. Without engaging in her routines as viewers we cannot know the significance of their disruption and we cannot feel the weight of the ‘titanic emotions’ she is hiding. Discomforting as it may be at times, this certainly makes for intense engagement, which proves shocking at its climax.

Critical Acclaim

Jean Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles was highly critically acclaimed on it release in 2005. The New York Times called it “the first masterpiece of the feminine in the history of cinema.” It was named the 19th-greatest film of the 20th Century by The Village Voice.

Should You Go And See It?

If you are interested in seeing ground-breaking films, then yes, this is indeed an important piece of work. As such it is challenging and demands your full attention for its duration, which is lengthy at 201 minutes. But without entering fully into Jean Dielman’s world, and experiencing the routines that govern it holding her together, you would be denied the experience of her unraveling. Akerman dares you to lose concentration, and every piece of dialogue and incident is rich with meaning and significance for the events to come. Delphine Seyrig is as beautiful as ever in the lead role, which she plays to perfection. For me, it’s a worthy finale to the fall season at the Detroit Film Cinema, and one you won’t forget in a hurry.

His first film was Following, an extremely low-budget (damn near guerrilla) film that made the festival circuit but never broke the mainstream. Then came Memento; it was unlike anything audiences had ever seen before. Insomnia, the Prestige, Batman Begins and the Dark Knight…Nolan is one of the most celebrated and accomplished contemporary filmmakers working today. His films are dark and sophisticated, complex and intense. He gets huge box office draw working with themes and structures that in any other hands would be considered too esoteric, too abstruse for the common (American) audience. His work is consistently critically and commercially successful, and yet he has succeeded in retaining his own unique voice in his films, his auteurism, despite the fact that he is now working from deeply within the Hollywood machine. Not unlike Hitchcock himself, really.

Inception is Nolan’s latest achievement, and in many ways it is almost an homage to his earlier work. Written, produced and directed by Nolan himself (as he has done with the majority of his films, save for the script for the adapted Insomnia), Inception is the latest entrant into Nolan’s spiraling world of colliding realities, multi-layered and ever-shifting. Here Nolan goes back to his basics: delving deep into the fractured minds of damaged men to explore their own delicate and imbalanced realities.

Inception is the bigger, glossier, more sci-fi oriented brother of Memento, which was more of a straightforwardly (though non-linear) psycho-drama film noir. But Inception echoes of Memento at every turn: a man whose entire sense of reality is in question, whose own memories can’t be trusted, who has lost a wife and is desperate to bring her back, even though he knows he cannot. Sci-fi action thriller or psychological mindfuck, the question Nolan is ultimately asking is this: how much do we lie to ourselves to preserve our own fragile psyches? Or, in a pedantic theoretical sense, if we construct our own realities how can we ever really know what’s real…and is there even such a thing?

It would be a mistake to compare this film to emotionally void yet visually stunning action flicks like The Matrix, though the multi-tiered layers of so-called reality make the comparison inevitable (Cronenberg’s eXistenZ also comes to mind, as does Sergei Lukyanenko’s concept of the Gloom in his Day Watch novels, in which each layer is increasingly more dangerous and unstable, threatening to claim its victims and make them forget their own realities). But what could have been just another frivolous summer blockbuster, a sci-fi companion to Ocean’s Eleven, is instead a fairly intricate character study.

Cobb – the name itself taken straight from the duplicitous main character in Nolan’s own Following – is an Extractor: he steals people’s dreams. Or, rather, he breaks into people’s dreams in order to steal information, a kind of high-stakes cerebral heist. For reasons that are revealed as the plot unfolds, Cobb (played coolly by Leonardo DiCaprio, with a hint at the inner turmoil about to bubble over) decides to take on a very risky assignment, one which promises to free him once and for all so he can return to his children: an inception, planting an idea rather than stealing one. He enlists the help of other professional thieves and scientists (including Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Cillian Murphy, Ken Watanabe, and Nolan regular Michael Caine), and together they contrive a plan for inception which ultimately requires multiple layers of dreams-within-dreams, numerous faux-realities to construct, and increased levels of danger with every dream level traversed. But during the course of the planning and implementation of the inception, Cobb’s own destructive past is slowly revealed, making him a threat to himself and his team.

And this is where Inception fails: in all of Nolan’s films, each character is given a level of depth too little seen in mainstream films. Here, the characters simply are not developed enough for the audience to feel true empathy. The lack of development could have been salvaged by strong performances, but auxiliary cast members were forgettable (except perhaps Murphy, as the inception target), and our lead actor Leonardo DiCaprio – a fierce talent in certain roles – lacked the intensity necessary to carry the film. The audience does not feel the same self-deluding desperation that Guy Pearce gave us in Memento, or the same torturous obsession Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale exhibited in The Prestige, or even just the internal conflict of Bale as Batman. Nolan’s films are by trademark psychologically probing character studies, regardless of what kind of genre they’re packaged in; here it felt as if Inception tried to be both fully a mind-bending sci-fi thriller AND a quiet descent into the darkest depths of men’s minds…without ever really succeeding at being either.

The one exception here is Marion Cotillard, who plays Cobb’s deceased wife Mal (“evil”) who remains very much alive in his subconscious. Cotillard (whose delightfully wicked turn in Love Me If You Dare should not be missed) is exactly what she needs to be, playing the haunted memory of a troubled wife whose death Cobb is somehow responsible for. She is not a fully-developed character, nor is she supposed to be. Instead, she is a fully-developed obsession, a culmination of all of Cobb’s desires and regrets. She is angry, vengeful, and destructive. She is love and revenge. Her eyes are wild, a feral foil to Cobb’s attempted placidity, betraying his own turmoil roiling beneath the quiet surface. DiCaprio plays Cobb’s secrets discreetly, losing control only when at his most vulnerable – in his dreams, with Mal.

Another issue lies with the development of the Cobb character: his motivations are never really clear – or just don’t entirely make sense. By the end of Memento, it was clear that Leonard Shelby had actively made the decision to continue believing the story he himself created – that his wife had been killed when he was attacked and lost his short-term memory and he was trying to avenge her death – when it reality it was HE who killed her, he was Sammy Jankis, and he conscious mind could not accept what he had done so he continued perpetuating his own false reality in which he plays the avenging hero with a conveniently unreliable memory, leaving himself planted clues to the “killer’s” identity. Inception unravels here (SPOILER ALERT: SKIP TO NEXT PARAGRAPH): if Cobb were indeed still in a dream at the end, what is his motivation for staying there? In this dream world Mal is dead and his children are lost to him; if he could make the decision to descend to another dream level in which they were all together why wouldn’t he do so, if he were already choosing to stay in a dream as it was? A true Memento-era Nolan twist would have been that Cobb became convinced their world wasn’t real, killed his wife to prove it only to find out he was wrong, and decided to escape to a dream world in which she committed suicide instead. This begs the question: has Hollywood softened Nolan?

Nolan’s trademark devices are all in place: an eerily epic score that conveys as much emotion as the actors’ faces; softly-lit flashbacks of tender moments tinged with longing and regret; repeated refrains and images which seem innocuous enough at first until they gain a heavy significance as the plot progresses. But with his newly developed skills as an action film director, Nolan pulls out a gorgeously orchestrated piece of cinematic choreography as characters in a second-tier dream fight inside a rolling hallway, where all sense of orientation is lost and they leap from ceiling to floor to wall. Visuals such as the city of Paris rolling over onto itself are stunning, yet also oddly deemphasized. This visceral film is less about manipulating dream cities and walking on walls and more about navigating the realms of subconscious desires.

Though not quite as non-linear as its precursor Memento, Inception’s resolution is less clear, and less satisfying. No doubt this will benefit from a second viewing, but despite its flaws Inception is another solid example of Nolan’s quiet character studies delving into the darkest natures of man packaged in all the pretty Hollywood glitz to get popcorn audiences in the door and keep academics referencing it in film journals for years to come. A weak film from an auteur of this caliber is still a towering achievement over most others, and even if Hollywood has softened Nolan (or, more likely, forced him to soften himself), a film like Inception is still more daring than most other big-budget blockbusters. You may not get the emotional investment you’ve come to expect from Nolan, but he still does not disappoint the intellect.

Now playing in theatres everywhere.

Detroit has been alight with discussions of and proposals for large-scale Urban Agriculture projects. In addition to land use, local economic and community engagement concerns, large-scale Agriculture in an urban setting provides us an opportunity to look into the environmental impact of farming. After the screenings we’ll discuss the films and share info on local groups working in Environmental Health.

On the third Wednesday of every month Eastern Market Corporation, Great Lakes Bioneers Detroit and Detroit Evolution partner to present DETROIT ABIDES – A FREE Movie Night in Eastern Market. Detroit Abides screens a movie on a sustainable topic, explores the topic at the local level through discussion and support from regional groups and businesses, and creates a space to meet like-minded people from all walks of life & grow an active, healthy community. For this casual event, please bring a comfortable seat. Shed 5 is located at the corner of Russell and Alfred St. Parking is available in the lots adjacent to the Shed.

Big River – A King Corn Companion
http://www.bigriverfilm.com
Following up on their Peabody winning documentary, the King Corn boys are back. For Big River, best friends Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis have returned to Iowa with a new mission: to investigate the environmental impact their acre of corn has sent to the people and places downstream. In a journey that spans from the heartland to the Gulf of Mexico, Ian and Curt trade their combine for a canoe––and set out to see the big world their little acre of corn has touched. On their trip, flashbacks to the pesticides they sprayed, the fertilizers they injected, and the soil they plowed now lead to new questions, explored by new experts in new places. Half of Iowa’s topsoil, they learn, has been washed out to sea. Fertilizer runoff has spawned a hypoxic “dead zone” in the Gulf. And back at their acre, the herbicides they used are blamed for a cancer cluster that reaches all too close to home. Run-time: 27 minutes

HealthyTown – Detroit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIYASqPAF6g
Bill Couzens, the film’s Director, will join us for this screening. HealthyTown – Detroit documents organizations working to bridge the numerous Environmental Health gaps in Detroit through prevention. The film features Earthworks at the Capuchin Soup Kitchen, Local Motion Green, Childrens Hospital of Michigan, the Kresge Foundation and Kids Kicking Cancer. Run-time: 25 minutes

NEXT MONTH: join us in Shed 5 on June 16th when we will feature the full-length documentary Fierce Light: When Spirit Meets Action. “Fierce Light is a journey around the world looking at a vast range of people protesting social issues and examines the notion that social action is most effective when it is deeply rooted in some form of spirituality.”

For more information or to get involved call Detroit Evolution at 313.316.1411

Theatres attending auditions will be Abreact Performance Space (Detroit), Blackbird Theatre (Ann Arbor), Breathe Art Theatre Project (Detroit/Windsor), Magenta Giraffe Theatre Company (Detroit), Matrix Theatre Company (Detroit) Performance Network (Ann Arbor), Planet Ant Theatre (Hamtramck), Project Theatre (Detroit), Who Wants Cake? Theatre (Ferndale) and Williamston Theatre (Williamston).

Male and female actors over the age of 18 from all racial and ethnic backgrounds are encouraged to attend. Appointments are required; walk-ins are welcome but are not guaranteed a slot. Actors must make appointments by e-mailing frannie@magentagiraffe.org, including in the body of the e-mail full name, desired appointment time and phone number. Headshots and résumés should not be attached to the e-mail. No appointments will be made by phone. There will be a first-come, first-served waiting list at the theatre each night of auditions; we will do our best to see everyone. Actors should also bear in mind that several theatres will be holding additional general auditions, and all theatres will hold callbacks for individual productions.

Actors should prepare two contrasting contemporary monologues no longer than three minutes total. Actors should bring ten sets of headshot/résumé and all schedule conflicts for the season (one set for each attending company).

All roles offered will be paid. Most theatres may offer Guest Artist Equity contracts. Performance Network is an Equity house – SPT 3; paying non-equity $125/week for rehearsals and performance weeks. The Williamston Theatre is an SPT-4 Equity house, and non-Equity actors are paid $200 per week for rehearsals and performances.

Information about the companies:

THE ABREACT (Detroit)
www.theabreact.com
The Abreact is Detroit’s most dynamic and exciting FREE performance spaces! We are dedicated to creating an open forum/venue for Detroit performing artists and audiences. The Abreact, formerly the Abreact Playhouse was founded in 2000 by two Detroit actors whose goal was initially to hone their craft by creating their own artistic dojo of sorts. What blossomed as a result was a theatrical venue unparalleled in its freedoms and resourcefulness. Seven shows later the venue changed hands and the mantle has been passed on to the next generation. We pledge to do our best, to do our worst, to cut our teeth, to share our wit and skills, and learn together. Come join us!

BLACKBIRD THEATRE (Ann Arbor)
www.blackbirdtheatre.org
Ann Arbor’s daredevil professional theatre. Also home of the Blackbird Theatre Academy, a free theatre arts program for youth. More intimate. More exciting. More fun.

BREATHE ART THEATRE PROJECT (Detroit/Windsor)
www.breathearttheatre.com
Committed to the principle of contemporary programming through the collaboration of Windsor/Detroit actors, directors and designers, Breathe Art Theatre Project’s mission is to advance the spirit of contemporary social theatre in its community by nurturing and supporting artists, encouraging repeatable creative relationships, and offering a skilled environment for established and developing artists from the Windsor/Detroit community. Breathe Art is dedicated to perpetuating an ethic of mutual respect within our communities and across our borders.

MAGENTA GIRAFFE THEATRE COMPANY (Detroit)
www.magentagiraffe.org
The Magenta Giraffe Theatre Company acts to eliminate apathy, violence, prejudice and barriers to education through theatre productions, projects and programs; and further acts to reestablish and expand Detroit’s theatre district.

MATRIX THEATRE COMPANY (Detroit)
www.matrixtheatre.org
Matrix Theatre Company uses the transformative power of theatre to change lives, build community, and foster social justice. It creates opportunities for children, youth, adults and elders, especially those in isolated or challenged communities, to become creators, producers, and audience of original theatre.

PERFORMANCE NETWORK (Ann Arbor)
www.performancenetwork.org
Performance Network is Ann Arbor’s resident professional theatre company, featuring Off-Broadway quality productions in an intimate 139 seat theatre. Our mission is to provide uncompromising artistic leadership in the region and produce works that engage, challenge and inspire audiences and artists.

PLANET ANT THEATRE (Hamtramck)
www.planetant.com
Planet Ant Theatre is an organization founded on the principle of artistic freedom and artistic experimentation leading to the growth of community, to artistic fulfillment, and to artistic success. This has been the main attraction to its artists since its conception and in turn has been the main attraction to its audience.

PROJECT THEATRE COMPANY (Detroit)
www.projecttheatre.com
Project Theatre Company is an ensemble of creative artists that write, direct, produce, and act in original multi-media works that play the emotional strings of the human heart. A group of young, talented and dedicated actors work to create an enriching, original theatrical experience for Individuals in all facets of life; Bringing the hunger and desire for live theatre to the streets of Metropolitan Detroit. No need to travel to Chicago or New York, when you have quality entertainment right in your very own backyard. That’s right, we will come to you! Project Theater Company seeks to impact our community one production at a time. Opening their eyes to the possibilities… the misconceptions, and shedding light on their true potential. A potential within themselves that they didn’t know, or maybe just didn’t believe existed. Showing them how to really LIVE! And how to start a new tradition of stability and love for their future generations.

WHO WANTS CAKE? THEATRE (Ferndale)
www.whowantscaketheatre.com
Who Wants Cake? is dedicated to providing a creative environment for local artists to produce works that challenge, confront, and entertain. Who Wants Cake? is known primarily for staging works that are of the indie/alternative bent.

WILLIAMSTON THEATRE (Williamston)
www.williamstontheatre.org
Williamston Theatre’s mission is to produce professional theatre that excites and engages our audiences while challenging us all to explore our lives. This mission statement is supported by the following objectives:
~ To be an integral part of the cultural fabric of Michigan.
~ To pursue innovative collaboration in every aspect of our work.
~ To establish a home for Midwest artists.
~ To engage audiences of diverse ages, cultures and economic backgrounds.

For more information about Joint General Auditions or to make an appointment, please e-mail frannie@magentagiraffe.org.

Mathilda Washington and candle

Emerging as only the fourth feature in the extra-prolific filmography of Kevin Everson, the images that unfold in Erie can be clearly linked to his ongoing focus upon the struggles of the African-American working class. Erie, unlike many of Everson’s other films, does not recirculate archival footage in order to draw a line connecting the contemporary and historical conditions of African- Americans. Nonetheless, the images he has recorded and compiled here operate within the realm of the ready-made, with nearly the entire film composed of a series of unedited single- takes with sync sound, presented back to back.

Forsaking montage for the most part, Everson refuses to insert an editorial presence through the tropes of narration or text, and instead favours a linkage which pivots upon the only direct dialogue in the film, spoken by three workers from an undisclosed General Motors factory. While their conversation centres upon the fate of the company, a united demand for leadership doesn’t stop at the corporate offices in Detroit, but instead radiates far beyond to all levels of government and the public who are now implicated in the crisis.

Produced during a residency at Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center, the film was photographed in the areas surrounding Lake Erie, primarily Northern Ohio and Buffalo, New York. Following the initial Rust Belt decline in these areas during the 1970s, unemployment again rose in 2008 and 2009 to levels exceeding 20 percent of the population in some areas. The form of Erie developed by Everson depends upon foregrounding the viewer’s awareness of real-time passing; both they and the film’s subjects must wait for the present moment to transform.

Kevin Jerome Everson (b. 1965) is a filmmaker, originally from Mansfield, Ohio, now living and working in Charlottesville, Virgina, USA. Everson’s four feature films and over 50 short films and videos have been exhibited at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, Redcat in Los Angeles, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, the Whitechapel Gallery in London, and many other venues worldwide. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, two NEH Fellowships, two Ohio Arts Council Fellowships, and an American Academy in Rome Prize.

Burton Theatre
3420 Cass Avenue
Detroit, MI 48201
Info: (313) 473-9238 or www.burtontheatre.com
Media City Film Festival: www.houseoftoast.ca
Tickets: $5–$7 (suggested donation)

Do you think Traverse City is great? Of course you do! Do you want to make a short film that shows why? You know it! It could make you and a whole bunch of local folks feel great … and it could land you some cold, hard cash.

FIM Group, in conjunction with the Traverse City Film Festival, is sponsoring a 2010 Bumper Contest. (Bumpers are short films that play before feature films.) Here’s an opportunity for filmmakers of all ages do strut their movie-making mojo by creating a short that illustrates “Why Traverse City.”

Top prizes are $1,000, $500 and $250 (with several $100 runner-up awards). Plus, all winning bumpers will be shown before feature films during the 2010 Traverse City Film Festival.

So for all you aspiring filmmakers who love Traverse City, here’s your chance to shine. Dust off the steady cam, oil up the boom stands and get that casting couch ready … because the deadline for submissions is June 20, 2010.

Visit www.traversecityfilmfest.org/about/?page=contest for complete contest rules, restrictions and submission guidelines.

M-1 Studios in Ferndale is producing several 30-second spots as part of an advertising campaign for a local client.

Auditions are being held to cast these spots. This is a paid job. The auditions will be held at:
The Actors Loft
Friday April 23rd starting at 6PM
Saturday April 24th starting at 1PM

Looking for males and females, 18 – 65, all types. The spots will be shot Sunday May 2nd, so you must be available that day, and be available for a short rehearsal period prior to the shoot. Experience preferred but not required.

Please e-mail casting@m-1studios.com to request sides for the audition. E-MAILS ONLY. DO NOT CALL. Also, please indicate which audition day you plan to attend.

You are invited to attend, one of the top training/Acting workshops in the country, right here in Michigan, right here in Detroit! There are a few seats left! Next week, Monday April 12th! You are invited to sit in on the 1st class of the workshop at NO charge! This is your chance to learn from Movie Producer, Director and Actor, Hugh Gall. This level of training is not offered anywhere!

Just e-mail or call to reserve your seat!

Monday, March 12th – 7PM
The Actors Loft
919 S. Main St.
Royal Oak, MI 48067
(248) 850-8592
www.actorsloft.com

Spring art classes can breathe new creativity into life, or help one retool for a career transition. Underscoring that the BBAC provides “art for all,” the spring roster includes 153 classes for adults as well as children as young as preschool in a variety of art media including painting, drawing, book arts, calligraphy, design, ceramics, metals, fibers, glass, jewelry, photography and sculpture.

There is a series of Welcome Classes for beginners. These are adult classes aimed at those who might say they “can’t draw a straight line.” Students with no experience get to see the world through an artist’s eye and learn fundamental tools that can unlock dormant creativity.

The BBAC faculty brings extraordinary experience and perspective. New classes of note are The Beautiful, The Personal and The Inappropriate and New Directions on Watermedia with noted artist Marilyn Derwenskus; and Designing with Acrylic Plastic with Stephen Caliguiri, who was termed “Prince of Plexi” by Barney’s in New York.

Amy Dietrich brings her Seventh Avenue experience to Flat Sketching for the Fashion Industry where she teaches drawing and design specifically for presentation boards and merchandising. The Floral Still Life is taught the former head of Wayne State University’s painting department, Robert Wilbert. John Murphy will teach Wheel Throwing for all levels, among other pottery classes. Murphy will be assuming the role of director of the Ceramic Arts Department at the BBAC.

There are also classes some might be surprised to find at a visual art center: Getting Personal, Memoirs & Personal Essays; Screenwriting; and Songwriting: Methods & Prompts. For the DIY crowd, there is a perennially popular class in Decorative Painted Furniture with step- by-step instructions. The entire spring program book is online at www.BBArtCenter.org.

Registration is ongoing through the week of April 12. Registration and class details are available online at www.BBArtCenter.org. One can also register in person, or by phone at (248) 644-0866. The BBAC is located at 1516 S. Cranbrook Rd. (Evergreen Rd.), Birmingham, MI 48009 between 14 and 15 Mile Roads.

The seminar is for all who wish to write movies and songs that complement scenes for movies. Learn what’s happening in Detroit’s world of opportunities in film, how to write movies and develop theme music. Be enlightened by Ms. Erica Hill, Film Detroit; Zelmer Bothic III, Screenwriter-worked with Spike Lee; Guitar Center Representative and Herbert Metoyer-, Musician/Poet and Author, topic Music Scoring Equipment & Software

Early Registration: $50.00
Registration at the Door: $70.00

Register on-line www.detroitwritersguild.com or Make money order payable to: DWG, 18508 Greenlawn, Detroit, MI 48221 Attn: Sharon Floyd
(313)213-7329

Wayne State University; 573 Student Center at 5221 Gullen Mall and Reuther Mall