Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art and Block Cinema (Venue Partner)
40 Arts Circle Drive
Northwestern University
847 491 4000
This event has passed.
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Viva
- When
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Friday Nov 6, 2009 (7pm)
- Where
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Directions: On the south end of Northwestern University's campus, just off Sheridan Road. Free parking at NU after 4 pm weekdays and all day weekends. Near the CTA Purple Line Davis and Foster stops and the Metra Davis stop.
- Price
- Links
Inspired as much by 1970s advertisements and Playboy photo spreads as it is by sexploitation classics such as Camille 2000and Suburban Roulette, filmmaker Anna Biller plays Barbi, a naïve housewife, who joins the sexual revolution. Encouraged by her gleefully superficial neighbor Sheila (Bridget Brno), they discover a world of nudist hippies and debauched orgies. Yet despite all of their raucous escapades, Barbi learns that a woman’s role in the swinging 70s may not be so new. Viva is a triumph of design, saturated with deep reds and aqua blues of precise period detail, with a carefully coordinated soundtrack, that echoes the sloppy sound design of low-budget exploitation films. The film also features dead-on casting, where everyone from the playboy artist to a sensitive nude guitarist looks absolutely of the time. Biller has mentioned that her character is a figure reminiscent of Voltaire’s Candide, and as Barbi shimmies further down the rabbit hole, it becomes apparent that Viva is both a loving ode to and a sly satire of the mores of various subcultures. With Anna Biller in person. Viva is shown as part of a double feature with the film Cool It Carol! at 10 pm.
