The University of New Mexico Center for the Southwest presents the 2006-07 “Southwestern Film Series,” monthly, starting Monday, Oct. 2, at 7 p.m. in the Student Union Building Theatre on the UNM campus. All the films shown during the series were produced in the Southwestern United States. The viewings are free and open to the public.
“We want to provide public and university audiences with a greater awareness of the historical, cross-cultural and social values found within the region’s rich film production and dynamic past,” said Cathleen Cahill, director, Center for the Southwest in the UNM Department of History.
The first film, from 1913, is “The Rattlesnake: Psychical Species,” directed by Romaine Fielding.
“The Rattlesnake” is a shorter silent movie filmed on location in Las Vegas and Montezuma, N.M. for Lubin Films (1897-1917), an independent production company formed by Siegmund Lubin in Philadelphia, Penn. Fielding was an unusual actor and Lubin Film’s leading male star for a time. He became popular for the psychological implications of films he made in the Southwest. The authenticity of the westerns he made for Lubin Films earned him the reputation as “The Man Who Put ‘Real’ in Realism.” He made history when he wrote, produced, directed and played the only two roles in a film titled “The Toll of Fear,” itself a film of daring subject matter and innovative treatment.
“The Rattlesnake” will begin with a short introduction by Gabriel Meléndez, associate professor and chair of American Studies at UNM. Meléndez teaches courses at UNM on autobiography, Latino/a-Chicano/a film and the politics of identity in the Southwest. He has a particular interest in the representations of ethnicity and culture in film and is currently working on a manuscript titled, “Film Dramas in New Mexico: Encounters On and Off the Screen.”
For more information visit: Scripps Blogs (full schedule listed under the article 'Slithering Along the Trail') or Duke City Fix (on the calendar the week of the event). Interested individuals may also call 277-7688 or contact cntrsw@unm.edu.
Media Contact: Carolyn Gonzales, (505) 277-5920; e-mail: cgonzal@unm.edu