Christine Noschese's beautiful 'Brooklyn Roses' and a block of new short films come to Bay Ridge for the 2018 Art of Brooklyn Film Festival

Since 2014, the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival has proven that audiences in Southern Brooklyn not only love indie film, but will come out to support it. For their 8th annual edition, AoBFF brings a feature film that looks at a 1950s Brooklyn childhood through new eyes, and a block of shorts that take on the topic of changing times and attitudes in different and unique ways.

In Brooklyn Roses, filmmaker Christine Noschese blends documentary and fiction to re-examine her childhood and her mother’s feminist struggles in the 1950’s and 60’s working class Brooklyn. When her mother dies, Noschese returns to her childhood home to decide what to keep and what to discard. When her mother was still alive, she shot her narrative film, June Roses, in the same house.

Sorting through her mother’s belongings, and props left over from the film, she realizes how her perceptions have changed and that the characterization of her mother in the earlier film did not tell the whole story. Recording new documentary footage, Noschese deconstructs the fictional narrative and asks compelling questions about narrative and documentary storytelling and each form’s unique capacity to convey truth. 

Brooklyn Roses - Friday, June 8 - 7PM PS/IS 30 - 7002 4th Ave Brooklyn NY 11209

Trailer and Tickets

The times change quickly. But can we keep up? The films of the "Everything Is Changing" block explore big and more subtle shifts in personal and political climates.

Under The Weather
Directed by Miriam Weiner
Miriam is a middle-aged Brooklynite and disciple of the inconvenient truth of climate change. The truth gives her nightmares. The truth guides her personal interactions. The truth? She even owns the DVD. But when she scolds some local kids for littering, their trash talk makes her reconsider everything. She may have accepted the truth, but not the inconvenience. The cast and crew are Brooklyn based.

Brooklyn In July
Drama - Directed by Bob Celli
BROOKLYN IN JULY is the story of Frank Walker, an African-American WWII veteran working as a chauffeur. It is the summer of 1945. The War is all but won. The U.S. is riding a wave of triumph even as the undertow of unresolved issues roils beneath. Frank, like so many other African-Americans of the time, is drawn to New York by the promise of better life only to be confronted by the same realities, fear, and hatred he hoped he had left behind. He is a man scarred by a past that is lurking skin deep.

​Cyclone: 90 Years of History on Wheels
Documentary - Directed be Frank Posillico
The famed Cyclone, Coney Island’s historic roller coaster, celebrates it’s 90th birthday this year. In our short documentary, we look at the popular Luna Park ride and its long history, as told through the eyes of the people who have helped operate her, and the frenzied fanatics who ride her day after day.

Head Above Water
Drama - Directed by Eric Shahinian
A devoted husband is forced to confront his doubts about remaining the caretaker of his wife suffering from Alzheimer's disease. The writer/director, as well as the cinematographer Charlotte Dupre, are Brooklyn residents.

​The Heartaches
Romance - Directed by Alex Modlin
A radical black feminist, a phony intellectual, two spinsters, an Israeli, and a libertarian gather to discuss a book, only to violently clash and bring about a profound life experience for all - total annihilation. Filmed entirely in Brooklyn.

Exit Interview
Comedy/Thriller - Directed by Jaclyn Gramigna
Dave's task of firing Christian is going well until Christian starts asking questions that make him reconsider his own happiness. The conversation escalates and Dave's office starts to physically change into the scene of a nightmare. A loud knock on the door pulls Dave from his subconscious and he wakes up, discombobulated, on the floor. Christian, himself, walks through the door, and alights Dave with the same task he began with. The writer, actors, and director all live in Brooklyn.

Everything Is Changing - Friday, June 8 - 9PM PS/IS 30 - 7002 4th Ave Brooklyn NY 11209

Film trailers and tickets

Complete Art of Brooklyn FIlm Festival Schedule and Film Guide