Director Jessica Oreck in attendance for 10/26 screening!
10/26 screening is a presentation of Science on Screen, an initiative of the Coolidge Corner Theatre, in partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Botany, famine, and love collide against a bitter Russian winter. Inspired by 1940s events but updated to a thoroughly relevant present day, two botanists defend the world’s only seed bank, while fighting starvation and savagery, and finding themselves falling in love. MFF2014 alum Jessica Oreck makes her fiction feature debut with this strange and beautiful film, harkening back to Tarkovsky while also serving as a dystopian tale for today’s world of climate change and food shortages.
10/26 Screening Discussion:
As part of the Science on Screen program, our 10/26 screening will be accompanied by a talk from Dr. Tracey Heatherington (UWM), an anthropologist whose work explores seed banks, climate change and the public (and scientific) imaginary of all of those things. Dr. Heatherington will provide a talk prior to the screening, issuing a number of provocations to the audience about seeds, seed banks, food security anxieties and more, allowing them to view the film with a new lens. Returning to those provocations, Dr. Heatherington will also participate in a Q&A with the filmmaker after the screening. Go to the head of the class and prepare for this screening by reading Heatherington's reflections on the seed bank in Svalbard or SEEDS to learn more about seeds and seedbanking in 2019 contexts.