The 8th Annual MadCat Women’s International Film Festival
September 14 – October 3 in Oakland!

The MadCat Film Festival screens the best cutting-edge experimental and independent films from around the world. Featuring shorts, documentaries, narratives and animated works selected from more than 900 submissions. This year’s lineup includes 12 programs of timely, insightful, humorous and deeply moving experimental and independent films by some of the finest up-and-coming and established women filmmakers.

Filmmakers include: Christina Battle, Yael Braha, Valie Export, Sharon Greytak, Gretchen Hildebran, Joell Hallowell, Marie Losier, Katherin McInnis, Julia Meltzer, Yoko Ono, Dana Plays, Angela Reginato, Carolee Schneemann and Jacalyn White.

PREMIERES GALORE!
MadCat will screen 93 films. 24 filmmakers will be in attendance to participate question and answer sessions. There are 15 world premieres, 13 US premieres, 11 West Coast premieres and 9 other assorted premieres! A total of 48 premieres! Over half the films in the fest are premiering at MadCat.

THE VELVET VAMPIRE Sept 14 * El Rio * 8:30pm Movies * 6:30pm Free BBQ
A glamorous seductress meets a handsome young man and his vapid, but pretty wife at an art showing. Lesbian love, sex and violence pervade this kitschy 70’s classic. This is the first vampire movie directed by a woman!

THE EXPERIMENTALISTS Sept 15 * El Rio * 8:30pm movies * 6:30pm Free BBQ
Directors manipulate the medium and share visual delights in this series of contemporary avant-garde films. Local filmmakers Joell Hallowell and Jacalyn White present the West Coast premiere of their humorous and devastating found footage extravaganza, Neptune’s Release. Also in attendance with spectacular cinematic treats: Elizabeth Block, Angela Reginato and Chelsea Walton.

THE ABILITIES WE HAVE Sept 17 * ATA * 7pm movies
A selection of films by and about people with disabilities, featuring Sharon Greytak’s groundbreaking documentary, Weirded Out and Blown Away. Greytak’s film challenges victim/superhero stereotypes of the disabled through frank interviews with five physically challenged professionals, including the filmmaker herself. Also included is the revealing Shining Into by local videomaker, Thanh Diep. This intimate piece reveals Diep’s own struggles as an adult with cerebral palsy.

HOW TO FIX THE WORLD Sept 17 * ATA * 9pm
This program takes viewers on a trip from environmental utopia to drastic contamination to a dreamlike allegory about life and hope for the future. An animated pile of stones represents the earth’s response to the build up of thousands of years of human activity in Amy Harrison’s Monument. How To Fix The World by Jacqueline Goss illustrates the cultural conflicts between speaking and writing, drawing and photography, and Soviet Socialism and Islam. Also screening the world premiere of EE Miller & Bernadine Mellis’ Farm-in-the-City.
Co-presented by FecalFace.com

HOME SWEET HOME Sept 21 * El Rio * 8:30pm movies * 6:30pm Free BBQ
Riveting documentaries from India, Australia, Germany, the UK and the US that chronicle the lives of communities and individuals as they navigate their search for new homes. Featuring the world premiere of Gretchen Hildebran’s The Smallest Space.

GROWING UP IS HARD TO DO Sept 22 * El Rio * 8:30pm movies * 6:30pm Free BBQ
Side-splitting educational films spanning the 1950s to the 1980s about growing up, sexuality and finding independence. Co-presented by Hi lo Film Festival and Cinefemme.

THE ART OF PERFORMANCE Sept 23 * Yerba Buena * 7pm movies
Both humorous and chilling, these performance art pieces were created some of the most fearless and innovative women artists of our time. Filmmakers include: Yoko Ono, Valie Export, Carolee Schneemann and Amy Taubin. Co-presented by SF Cinematheque

ART ON ARTISTS Sept 23 * Yerba Buena * 9pm movies
These portraits reveal the political ideologies and personal quirks of various emerging and established artists and filmmakers. Featuring the world premiere of Marie Losier’s Electrocute Your Stars about the films and life of underground filmmaker George Kuchar – who will be at the screening! Also screening Carve by Gretchen Hildebran about artists Carolyn Cooley and Sara Thustra and their exploration of body cutting as a personal and political practice. Also including: Lil Picard by Silvianna Goldsmith and French Fries by Ellen Lake.

THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER Sept 24 * ATA * 7pm movies
Using animation, documentary and experimental filmmaking, this series reveals how these artists question their governments and challenge their actions. From corrupt links between corporate America and the US government to the staging of unnecessary military actions abroad, The Truth of the Matter is a chilling yet humorous, look at our world. The Invisible Hand is a hand-drawn history of corporate corruption from Enron and Halliburton to Marthagate.

PATRIOT ACTS Sept 24 * ATA * 9pm movies
From Vietnam to El Salvador to the atrocious Clarence Thomas hearing, Patriot Acts uncovers some of the US’s most embarrassing moments. Including Carolee Schneemann’s seminal Viet-Flakes –arguably the first film to question the US war in Vietnam. Using stop motion to animate one man’s nightmare of hotdogs, Joyce Wieland takes a humorous approach to criticizing blind Patriotism. Caroline Avery’s Mr. Speaker starring, Newt Gingrich. Co-presented by Whispered Media

Films of GERMAINE DULAC Sept 28 * El Rio * 8:30pm movies * 6:30pm Free BBQ
Live original music by Secrets of Family Happiness and Paper Boats
MadCat celebrates the sublime French avant-garde maven Germaine Dulac with a screening of her avant-garde masterpieces Seashell and the Clergyman and The Smiling Madame Beudet.

A TURNING POINT Oct 3 * Parkway Theater * 6pm movies
Characters in Taiwan, Korea, the US and Australia search for meaning to their lives. Featuring the world premieres of Krescent Carasso’s Lucy and Homecoming by Sarolta Jane Cump. Co-presented by BAVC