Pintxo & Cinema: Dead City (Ciutat Morte), docu by Xavier Artigas and Xapo Ortega (2013)

Sunday January 21st 2018. From 18:00, Vegan Pinxto, yes vegan hapjes. From 20:00, documentary screening: Dead City (Ciutat Morte) by Xavier Artigas and Xapo Ortega (2013). 120 min. In Catalan and Spanish. with English subtitles.

We’re screening this film after the recent events on 7 December 2017 in Zaragoza. A fascist dies. Within less than a week, Rodrigo Lanza is all over the news, accused of the murder. The social center Kike Mur is under siege. Rodrigo Lanza again? Isn’t strange considering what is happening in the Spanish State? Rodrigo was sentenced to four and a half years in January 2008 in the 4F case.

Free Rodrigo Lanza! La lucha continúa, y contra el fascismo ni un paso atrás.

Synopsis: 800 people illegally occupy an old movie theater in Barcelona in order to screen a documentary. They rename the old building after a girl who committed suicide in 2011: Cinema Patricia Heras. Who was that girl? Why did she kill herself and what does the city have to do with it? That’s exactly what the squatting action is about: letting everyone know the truth about one of the worse corruption cases in Barcelona, the dead city.

Ciutat Morta (Dead City) is a documentary about the case known as 4F, one of the most controversial cases of police, judicial and governmental corruption experienced in Barcelona in the last years. The case perfectly illustrates the common practices of scapegoating and torturing and the widespread racism within the law enforcement institutions in the Spanish State.

On February 4th, 2006, a flowerpot was thrown from a squat (owned by the City Council) in which a party was taking place, seriously wounding a police agent. There were nine arrests that night. The City Council and the police, in view of the impossibility of finding out who had thrown the flowerpot, decided to mount a case blaming innocent people who were not in the house and some not even in the vicinity.

Patricia Heras was cycling that night and had an accident in a different area. She was taken by ambulance to the same hospital as the police officer. Due to her appearance – punk/squatter – she was also charged with assaulting a police officer and throwing a fence at him. Patricia received three years and the other arrestees were given minor convictions. Patricia committed suicide in April 2011, when she had a prison permit to visit her home.

Rodrigo and his mother Maria have leaded the campaign for justice for the 4-F defendants and promise they will go to the European Court of Human Rights if necessary. Rodrigo was released in December 2012. He’d spent two years on remand, one year on bail and three more years in prison. He received sympathies from the other prisoners and was hated by the screws, however he always declined the favours offered if he pleaded guilty. When he appealed in June 2009, his sentence was incremented from four and a half to five years. Rodrigo will always remember the first words he heard when he encountered the police that unfortunate 4th of February: “los sudacas de mierda por aquí” (those fucking sudacas round here – sudacas is a racist slur against South Americans); Rodrigo immediately knew he wasn’t going to be treated lightly.

Comunicado de Juan Pintos, detenido/encarcelado/condenado por el montaje del 4F26 january 2015  http://barcelona.indymedia.org/newswire/display/493810/index.php

Comunicado por la libertad de Rodrigo Lanza15 december 2017 http://barcelona.indymedia.org/newswire/display/517093

Comunicado de la madre de Rodrigo Lanza
17 december 2017 http://www.alasbarricadas.org/noticias/node/39382

Comunicados de CSO Kike Mur, Metromuster y CGT en apoyo a Rodrigo Lanza y contra la criminalización del antifascismo23 december 2017  http://barcelona.indymedia.org/newswire/display/493810/index.php

A letter from prison, by Rodrigo Lanza2 january 2018 https://www.indymedia.nl/node/42613

Desde las mazmorras, aislado, pero no solo. Rodrigo Lanza 2 january 2018 http://barcelona.indymedia.org/newswire/display/517528

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know.

Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: Pickup on South Street (Sam Fuller, 1953)

Sunday January 14th 2018, Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: Pickup on South Street (1953). Directed by Sam Fuller. 80 minutes. In English. Doors open at 20:00, film starts at 20:30.

A wonderful film noir, and one of the key films in the genre. Director Samuel Fuller gave cinema the punch and brilliance that it badly needed. Here we have wonderful hard-hitting acting performances, razor-sharp dialogue, existentialist situations and a labyrinthine plot that knocks you around as if you were a punching bag.

Joey, a lowlife pickpocket, and his ex-prostitute girlfriend Candy, become involved in what they believe is just a simple two-bit theft involving a secret file. But, as it turns out, the stakes are much bigger than they would ever have dreamed. In true noir form, the action is set in 50s New York – a brooding city of predators and power hungry jerks… of sell-outs and finks, of heartless betrayals and con-artists. But despite all of these icy hearts, Fuller manages to make us feel for his characters. All of this is fueled by the director’s trademark raw energy. Starring Richard Widmark in one of his best roles, and Thelma Ritter who gives a performance of a lifetime.

This will be a high-definition screening.

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net

Movie night: The Crowd (1928)

Sunday January 7th 2018, The Crowd (1928). Director: King Vidor. 98 minutes, black & white, silent. Doors open at 8pm, film starts at 8:30pm.

Regularly described as a masterpiece, one of those films the director had to fight to make. It was a studio production, but it’s not a ‘studio film’.

An ordinary American, John, from a small-town, born on the 4th of July, heads into the big city, believing the American dream that everyone can ‘be Somebody’. He’s in the crowd, and visually so is the film, angular geometry and large architecture abound. You can but see references to this film in so many others that follow it, the worker at his desk, among hundreds, a small part of the bigger machine; the couple a part of the audience. In the end you care about what happens to these characters and their marriage. It might even be hopeful, if not for the American Dream.

Sadly never remastered, this will be a proper low-res experience.

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net

Black Cat Cine presents: “Bikes VS Cars” (Fredrik Gertten, 2015)


Bikes vs Cars from WG Film.

Sunday December 17th 2017, Black Cat Cine presents: “Bikes VS Cars” by Fredrik Gertten, Sweden 2015, 90 min, English subtitles, Film begins at 20:00.

If you are are bicycle owner in Amsterdam you could consider yourself pretty lucky with lots of bicycle paths and car drivers taking care (usually) not to hit you.
You would think all cities are becoming bike friendly but the powerful car-industry is lobbying for more roads and big parkings to accommodate the growing number of (electric) cars, at the expense of public space and the greenest way of transport: the bicycle. A look at what’s happening in some of the world’s big cities like Los Angeles, Sao Paulo and Copenhagen.

As the film explores cities like Los Angeles and Sao Paulo, it becomes clear how urban growth is being steered more by the needs of vehicles than by the wellbeing of the people who live there. It’s not just about traffic or convenience—it’s about the kind of world we want to build: one driven by community and connection or by congestion and carbon emissions.

This broader conversation about space and infrastructure inevitably includes garages—those humble but essential elements of our built environment that often reflect a city’s priorities. While garages have traditionally catered to cars, there’s now an increasing demand for smarter, more adaptable spaces that serve multiple purposes, whether it’s for bike storage, electric vehicle charging, or even as micro-logistics hubs for sustainable delivery services.

That’s where companies like Top One Garage Doors come in. Specializing in high-quality garage doors that are as durable as they are modern, they understand that today’s garage isn’t just a place to park a car—it’s a functional part of the urban ecosystem. Whether you’re protecting your cargo bike in a city that’s just starting to embrace cycle culture or upgrading your garage to support the shift toward cleaner transportation, the right door makes all the difference.

Doors open at 19:30, Film begins at 20:00!!! Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know.

Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: Missing (Costa-Gavras, 1982)

Sunday 12th November 2017, Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: Missing. Doors open at 20.30. Intro + film start at 21.00. Missing – 1982 – Directed by Costa-Gavras. 122 minutes. In English.

They sure don’t make movies like this anymore. This was made in the day when bucking the system was still possible, and if you had some big name actors in your project you could make hard hitting flicks. This one stars Sissy Spacek (Carrie, Badlands) along with Jack Lemmon (Some Like it Hot) in one of his most important roles. It’s directed by the Greek filmmaker Costa-Gavras, and is based on the true story that happened in the 1970s. It follows the journey of a young American journalist who travels to Chile to cover a news story. While he is there, everything goes totally haywire, the country is thrown into turmoil, the government is overthrown and marshal law is declared. While the young boy is reporting the events, he suddenly goes missing. The movie mostly focuses on his wife and father who travel to Chile to try and find him back.

This is a thriller about having firm beliefs about the world, only to have them utterly shattered. Most of the film we spend with the father, a businessman who not only has to deal with a missing son, but also having his world view collapse as dark secrets are revealed. It’s devastating to follow him through a dark journey of dead ends – a maze of hospitals, morgues and police stations. The film is moody and suspenseful, and remains one of the director’s riveting masterpieces. The dreamy synthesizer music track was composed by Vangelis, and it’s considered to be one of his best. This is a movie that gives us some deep insights into history, and reflects a time when edgy movies could still be produced in Hollywood. The film has lost none of its power since it was made, and maybe has become even more relevant than before.

A highly-charged drama based on real events. Winner of the Palme d’Or at the Cannes film festival.

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Film begins at 9pm, free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net

Other Cinema: Born in Flames

Sunday October 8th 2017, Other Cinema: Born in Flames by Lizzie Borden (1983), 90 minutes. Doors 20:45, Film 21:00. Discussion afterwards

The movie that rocked the foundations of the early Indie film world, this provocative, thrilling and still-relevant classic is a comic fantasy of female rebellion set in America ten years after the Second American Revolution. When Adelaide Norris, the black radical founder of the Woman’s Army, is mysteriously killed, a diverse coalition of women – across all lines of race, class, and sexual preference – emerges to blow the System apart.

(Description from Kanopy)

More information and critical review see here: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/richard-brody/the-front-row-born-in-flames

FREE SCREENING, POPCORN AND DISCUSSION

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Film begins at 9pm, free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net

Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: I was Nineteen (Konrad Wolf, 1968)

Sunday 1st October 2017, Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: I was Nineteen (Ich war neunzehn). Directed by Konrad Wolf. 1968, 115 minutes. In German with English subtitles. Doors open at 8.30, film starts 9pm. Free admission.

Here we dive into East German cinema, which in the 50s and 60s was often actually better than the movies peddled in West Germany! This one is a coming-of-age movie about a teenager in the chaotic insanity of the second world war. The narrative was put together from director Konrad Wolf’s own diaries and personal memories. This moody gem is a searing and intimate life story of a boy whose family left Germany for Russia when he was eight, and later finds himself confronted with the ironic situation of fighting his own people (the Germans) in World War II. We follow him as a young Russian soldier in a squadron that is making its way to Berlin in the final days of the war.

This is a masterpiece of East German cinema, which is not as much concerned with following the logic of war as it is with the weird situations that our main character encounters. There are moments that are chaotic, unpredictable, often senseless, bordering on the surreal, and you find dragged through one amazing, bizarre situation after another. It is a rough journey, sometimes even terrifying, but compared to its Hollywood/Spielberg counterparts this movie is devastatingly poetic and meditative. My god, what has happened to aspects like poetry and mood in movies? In any case, this film has them both still intact. Plus, it of course it offers us a very different view of history than what is depicted here in the West. The b&w cinematography is riveting and helps to create the meditative atmosphere of this beautifully crafted East German DEFA film.

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Doors open at 8pm, film begins at 9pm, free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net

Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: Ace in the Hole (Billy Wilder, 1951)

Sunday 10 September 2017, Can Dialectics Break Bricks Cinema: ACE IN THE HOLE, 1951. Directed by Billy Wilder. Black and White. 111 minutes. In English. Doors open at 8.30, film starts 9pm. Free admission.

This hard-hitting masterpiece is about the American way of turning any tragedy into a sensationalized media circus… complete with rides, cheese burgers and merchandise. It is about hyped-up media frenzies where only bad news, not good news, makes money. Just look at the news today: 95% tragedy, fear and threatening situations. This film is about the media’s ability to manipulate and control the public opinion.

Billy Wilder was a European director who is best known for creating some of the very best movies in the history of Hollywood, like the classic Some Like it Hot and The Apartment. This is an early effort by Wilder, and you can see his willingness to go against the grain, to tackle controversial themes, and to hold a mirror up to the American public and show what is really going on.

Despite the fact it was openly attacked by critics and the public, Ace In The Hole is right up there with Wilder’s best noirs (Sunset Boulevard and Double Indemnity). Our main protagonist, the opportunistic reporter Chuck Tatum (Kirk Douglas, who just turned one hundred years old!), gets a lead about a treasure hunter who is stuck in a cave. Tatum races there to exploit this event to the fullest… turning the poor man, who’s slowly running out of air, into an headline-grabbing attraction. He turns the situation into a sort of Disneyland of fake compassion, sentimentality and dull entertainment devoid of any moral concern. Understandably, American audiences were not amused by this cynical tone which revealed the nation’s obsession for sensationalistic tabloid-like news. Dark, cynical and straight… Wilder brings the story to the screen without pulling any punches, a visionary film that would leave it’s impact on later directors like Spike Lee and Oliver Stone.

This will be a high-definition screening.

Film night at Joe’s Garage, cozy cinema! Doors open at 8pm, film begins at 9pm, free entrance. You want to play a movie, let us know: joe [at] squat [dot] net