Billy Woodberry: Retrospective & Carte Blanche at CINEMATEK

This spring, CINEMATEK and Courtisane are hosting a retrospective of American filmmaker Billy Woodberry. From 15 to 31 May, Bless Their Little Hearts (1984), And When I Die, I Won’t Stay Dead (2015), and his recent film Mário (2024) will be screened, along with a programme of his short films. The retrospective is accompanied by a carte blanche selection, featuring Notre musique (Jean-Luc Godard, 2004), O movimento das coisas (Manuela Serra, 1985), Ceddo (Ousmane Sembène, 1977), among others.

“Born in Dallas in 1950, Billy Woodberry was one of the few African-American students who found a way to attend the UCLA Film School. Few other young Africans or African-Americans graduated from the film school at the famous University of Los Angeles in the 1960s. Charles Burnett and Haile Germa, an Ethiopian film-maker living in Chicago, paved the way for a cinema that radically departed from the Hollywood canon to depict the social reality of Black people in the United States: racism, the experiences of Black women, the civil rights movement, etc. UCLA Film School was the centre of a movement called L.A. Rebellion, whose strength lies in the fact that the films were produced and directed collectively.” – Courtisane

You can find more information on the website of Courtisane or CINEMATEK.