WEDNESDAY, MAY 21, 2008 - 7 p.m.
Film Festival: Hunka Junk 5, Butler Institute of American Art North, Wick Avenue at Spring Street, Youngstown; 330-719-2172. www.youngstownfilm.org
Toronto's "Hunka Junk" film festival makes its Youngstown debut after a European and Canadian tour that boasted sell-out and capacity crowds. The "no-format" film festival showcases long lost celluloid shorts from educational films, commercials, animation, musical performances, and instructional films pulled from the Conflict Archives, Canada's most eclectic private film collection.
The program will be presented by Youngstown Film, Michele McBride and Dion Conflict. "Hunka Junk" began in the 1990s at Toronto's Rivoli Club (the same venue for "Kids in the Hall"), when a hodge-podge of educational films were saved from the dumpster and screened.
This installment features "You're the Salesman," which teaches service station workers how to sell kitschy items to unsuspecting motorists; "Light Unto All" - a strange film about mobsters knocking down city officials who end up having visions of Jesus (by director Sid Davis who directed the 1950s anti-homosexual instructional film "Boys Beware"); psychedelic Australian ice cream commercials; instructional films on looking prettier for your boss and learning how to talk on the telephone; and an animated cartoon with a bicycle singing in a girl's dreams. Film Youngstown notes: "Conflict Archive presentations are not simply screenings, but events.
Audience participation is encouraged – sometimes with a "Rocky Horror"-type atmosphere." Audience members are also given the opportunity to win prizes, which run the gamut to thrift-store items, bargain-basement DVDs, and original movie scripts. "I’m excited to return to Ohio and check out Youngstown, for the first screening of "Hunka Junk 5" there," said Dion Conflict.
“Ohio has provided me with many good times, and hopefully I can return the favor with exposing my oddball films archive. It should be a fun night indeed!” 7 p.m. $5.
