• Opening Thursday, January 24, 2013
    throughout GERMANY!!!

    • January 24 - 30 @
    Metropol Kino, Düsseldorf
    Werkstattkino, München
    Abaton, Hamburg
    Mal seh'n Kino, Frankfurt a. M.
    Kino im Dach (KID), Dresden
    Filmgalerie, Regensburg ** 2 nights only - 24/1 & 25/1 **
    Central Kino, Berlin
    Eiszeit Kino, Berlin
    Lichtblick Kino, Berlin
    Babylon, Berlin
    Moviemento, Berlin

    • January 24 - February 6 @
    Kino in der Brotfabrik, Berlin
    Filmrauschpalast, Berlin
    Kino im Walzenlager, Oberhausen

    • January 25, 2013 (one night only!!) @
    Stranger Than Fiction Film Festival, Köln

    • January 25 - 31 @ Top Kino, Wien (Österreich)

    • January 27 - 29 @ Filmstudio Glückauf, Essen

    • January 29 (one night only!!) @ Endstation, Bochum

    • January 31 - February 3 @ 3001 Kino, Hamburg

    • January 31 - February 6 @ Lichtspiel Kino, Bamberg

    • January 31 - February 13 @ Kino Zukunft, Berlin

    • February 1 - 6 @ Filmhaus, Saarbrücken

    • February 3 - 6 @ Filmpalette, Köln

    • February 7 - 13 @ City 46, Bremen

    • February 3 - 6 @ sweetSixteen, Dortmund

    previous screenings

  • Previous Screenings

    Austin Film Society, Austin, TX
    Riverside Studios, London
    Ultimate Picture Palace, Oxford UK
    Cube Microplex, Bristol UK
    Michigan Theater, Ann Arbor, MI
    Flatpack Festival, Birmingham UK
    Queens Film Theatre, Belfast UK
    ICA, London
    Rio Cinema, Dalston, London
    Artists Television Access, San Francisco, CA
    The Screening Room, Tucson, AZ
    MOVIATE, Harrisburg, PA
    The Light Factory, Charlotte, NC
    Yukon Film Society, Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada
    FilmBar, Phoenix, AZ
    Harwood Museum of Art, Taos, NM
    Pleasant Street Cinema, Northampton, MA
    Winnipeg Cinematheque, Winnipeg, Canada
    Mayfair Theater, Ottawa, Canada
    Northwest Film Center Theater, Portland, OR
    UW Union Theater, Milwaukee, WI
    Gallery Connexion, Fredericton, Canada
    Take-Up Theater, Minneapolis, MN
    Vancity Theater, Vancouver, Canada
    Le Cercle, Quebec City, Canada
    Broadway Theatre, Saskatoon, Canada
    The Big Picture, Redmond, WA
    Indiana University Cinema, Bloomington, IN
    Cinematique of Daytona, Daytona, FL
    The Royal Theatre, Toronto, Canada
    Crest Theater, Sacramento, CA
    Jacob Burns Film Center, Pleasantville, NY
    Facets Cinematheque, Chicago, IL
    Landmark Ken Theater, San Diego, CA
    Guild Cinema, Albuquerque, NM
    Alamo Drafthouse, Austin, TX
    Detroit Film Theatre/DIA, Detroit, MI
    Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL
    Miami Beach Cinematheque, Miami Beach, FL
    Landmark E Street Cinema, Washington, DC
    Zeitgeist Arts Center, New Orleans, LA
    Landmark Theater, San Francisco, CA
    Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT
    Landmark Ritz at the Bourse, Philadelphia, PA
    Oklahoma City Museum of Art, Oklahoma City, OK
    Texas Theater, Dallas, TX
    Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH
    Portland Museum of Art, Portland, ME
    Theatre N, Wilmington, DE
    Tropic Cinema, Key West, FL
    Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis, TN
    Cinema Paradiso, Fort Lauderdale, FL
    Mountain Cinema, Hunter, NY
    Landmark Shattuck, Berkeley, CA
    Frontier Cafe, Brunswick, ME
    The Webster Film Series, St Louis, MO
    Landmark Nuart, Los Angeles, CA
    IndieScreen, Brooklyn, NY
    Cable Car Cinema
    Criterion Theater, Bar Harbor, ME
    Murdock Theater, Wichita, KS
    Cinema Village, New York, NY
    Mos'Art Theater, Lake Park, FL
    Landmark Kendall Square, Boston, MA
    Mississippi Film Institute, Jackson, MS
    Paramount Center for the Arts, Peekskill, NY
    IFC Center, New York, NY
    Plaza Theatre, Atlanta, GA
    Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA
    Magic Lantern Theater, Spokane, WA
    Little Theater, Rochester, NY
    Denver Film Center, Denver, CO
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

    Festival

    Inter-Island Music Docs Film Festival, Honolulu, HI
    Mascara and Popcorn Film Festival, Montreal, Canada
    Melwood Screening Room, Pittsburgh, PA
    BMW Guggenheim Lab, New York, NY
    DocAviv Film Festival, Tel Aviv, Israel
    Planete Doc Film Festival, Warsaw, Poland
    Atlanta Film Festival, Atlanta, GA
    CineMarfa, Marfa, TX
    Belfast Film Festival, Belfast, Northern Ireland
    Gijón Film Festival, Gijón, Spain
    Recontres Internationales du Documentaire de Montreal (RIDM), Montreal, Canada
    Starz Denver Film Festival, Denver, CO
    AFI Film Festival, Los Angeles, CA
    Viennale Film Festival, Vienna, Austria
    Bergen Film Festival, Bergen, Norway
    American Film Festival, Wroclaw, Poland
    2morrow Fest, Moscow, Russia
    Hawaii Film Festival, Honolulu, HI
    No Wave Film Festival at the Danish Film Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark
    Festival do Rio, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
    Calgary International Film Festival, Calgary, Canada
    Cologne Conference, Köln, Germay
    Helsinki International Film Festival, Helsinki, Finland
    Milano Film Festival, Milan, Italy
    Batumi Arthouse Festival, Batumi, Georgia
    Melbourne Film Festival, Melbourne, Australia
    Edinburgh Film Festival, Edinburgh, UK
    HotDocs Festival, Toronto, Canada
    Berlinale Film Festival, Berlin, Germany
    Glasgow Film Festival, Glasgow, Scotland

    back

  • BLANK CITY tells the long-overdue tale of a disparate crew of renegade filmmakers who emerged from an economically bankrupt and dangerous moment in New York history. From the late 1970's through the mid 80's, when the city was still a wasteland of cheap rent and cheap drugs, these directors crafted daring works that would go on to profoundly influence the development of independent film as we know it today.

    Directed by French newcomer Céline Danhier, BLANK CITY weaves together an oral history of the “No Wave Cinema” and “Cinema of Transgression” movements through compelling interviews with the luminaries who began it all. Featured players include acclaimed directors Jim Jarmusch and John Waters, actor-writer-director Steve Buscemi, Blondie’s Debbie Harry, hip-hop legend Fab 5 Freddy, Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, photographer Richard Kern as well as Amos Poe, James Nares, Eric Mitchell, Susan Seidelman, Beth B, Scott B, Charlie Ahearn and Nick Zedd. Fittingly, the soundtrack includes: Patti Smith, Television, Richard Hell & The Voidoids, The Contortions, The Bush Tetras, Sonic Youth and many more.

    more

  • Made on shoestring budgets in collaboration with the pioneering musicians, visual artists, performers, and derelicts that ruled Downtown, the films surveyed in BLANK CITY are fitting documents of an exhilarating and unique cultural moment. This same legendary-but-fleeting period likewise birthed punk rock, hip-hop and Madonna, and brought New York City to the forefront of the international art world. Unlike the revered musical revolution of this era, this epoch of underground film has never before been chronicled.

    BLANK CITY is a love letter to New York, a cultural portrait of Manhattan in the days before Reagan, big money, and gentrification forever altered the fabric of the city. Though a look back, the heart of BLANK CITY does not live in the past. In this new age of digital democracy, the maverick spirit of the New York Underground has risen again in emerging creative communities worldwide. The Do-It-Yourself ethos, audacious storytelling, and sense of urgency guiding "No Wave" and the "Cinema of Transgression" are more relevant and inspiring than ever.

    back

  • BLANK CITY will debut throughout Germany (and Austria) Thursday, January 24th, 2013! (read more in German here)

    BLANK CITY premiered in UK cinemas on Friday, March 2nd, 2012! Director Celine Danhier to attend Premiere! (read more here)

    It's official. Blank City is now available on I-Tunes / VOD & DVD
    Order DVD and Blu-ray from Amazon
    ***Lots of great extras for the DVD!***

    Check out Interviews with Celine here :

    AM New York
    EV Grieve
    Fangoria
    Backstage
    Documentary Channel

    Plus, Interview with Fab 5 Freddy about BLANK CITY in NY OBSERVER

    And listen in on these Radio Podcasts:

    NPR / WNYC including interviews with Celine Danhier, filmmaker Amos Poe, and fierce guitarist Pat Place!

    And East Village Radio /The Holy Sh*t Soundsystem

    Official Trailer now online! On this website of course, and also on Rolling Stone, Filmmaker Magazine & more!

    A huge thank you to Interview Magazine for hosting our premiere event at Madame Wong's in New York and to everyone who came out in the rain!!! And thanks to Kanon Vodka for sponsoring.

    Follow @BlankCityFilm on twitter and tweet about the film's opening in your town. And join the group on Facebook, and mention the film's opening in your status update, newsletters + blogs.

  • Amos Poe Ann Magnuson
    Becky Johnston Beth B
    Bette Gordon Casandra Stark Mele
    Charlie Ahearn Daze
    Debbie Harry Eric Mitchell
    Fab 5 Freddy Glenn O'Brien
    Jack Sargeant James Chance
    James Nares Jim Jarmusch
    JG Thirlwell John Lurie
    John Waters Kembra Pfahler
    JG Thirlwell John Lurie
    John Waters Kembra Pfahler
    Lizzie Borden Lung Leg
    Lydia Lunch Manuel DeLanda
    Maripol Michael McClard
    Michael Oblowitz Nick Zedd
    Pat Place Patti Astor
    Richard Kern Sara Driver
    Scott B Steve Buscemi
    Susan Seidelman Tessa Hughes-Freeland
    Thurston Moore Tommy Turner
    Vivienne Dick

  • "'Blank City' provides a vivid, vicarious tour...[Ms. Danhier] illuninates a hectic and fascinating place and time, bringing it back to life and tracing its continuing influence..."

    "The point of 'Blank City' is neither to celebrate the ones who made it big nor to scold the sellouts. The movie aims, rather, to evoke a moment in as much detail and with as much insight as will fit into 95 minutes. In this it succeeds beautifully."
    Read more in the NYT

    - A.O. Scott, New York Times

    “Well-researched doc on the No Wave and Cinema of Transgression scenes of late-'70s/early-'80s New York... Amiable Jim Jarmusch and others wisely temper nostalgia with astute observations 30 years after the DIY heyday...”

    - Melissa Anderson, The Village Voice

    "It's high time someone chronicled the fertile underground film scene" (read more here)

    - David Fear, TimeOut New York

    "Generous glimpses of rare, virtually lost Super-8 and 16mm films, from Jarmusch's "Permanent Vacation" to Beth B's "Vortex," Susan Seidelman's "Smithereens" (the first No Wave film to hit Cannes) and Amos Poe's hilarious cheapo remake of Godard's "Breathless." Other clips feature the then-unknown Ramones and Patti Smith at CBGBs, Debbie Harry wandering vaguely apocalyptic streets and a young Buscemi breakdancing."

    - Ronnie Scheib, Variety

    "Cool movie alert" (read more here)

    - Whitney Matheson, USA Today

    "Blank City is the first movie to tell the definitive story of the downtown New York film scene in the late '70s and early '80s. The overlapping art, music and film movement boomed with the city's cheap rent, the artists' disregard for money and technique, a general nihilist spirit and plenty of drugs." (read more here)

    - Kelley Hoffman, W Magazine

    "…Riveting documentary on the birth of the most exciting explosion of creativity to come out of Downtown New York features archival footage and interviews with key players from the time like Debbie Harry, Jim Jarmusch, John Lurie, Amos Poe, Thurston Moore, and the infamous Lydia Lunch." (read more here)

    - Purple

    "[A] passionate chronicle of cinematic rebellion…A smoldering and riotous work about a time when art seemed dangerous, while leaving open the possibility that it could be so again." (read more here)

    - Chris Barsanti, Film Journal

    "A vivid portrait…" (read more here)

    - Nowness

    Céline Danhier's ‘Blank City’ contains extraordinary footage of downtown Manhattan in the 70s, a burned-out and abandoned cityscape in ruins that formed the perfect backdrop to the bands and film-makers...steeped in exhilarating alienation and mordant wit.”

    - Ben Walters, Guardian.co.uk

    “Fascinating and inspiring documentary...Particularly funny and illuminating are Jim Jarmusch, John Lurie, Steve Buscemi, Lydia Lunch and Nick Zedd in describing the loony lengths they went to make their films.”

    - Dennis Dermody, Papermag

    “BLANK CITY directed by Céline Danhier, is peppered with hilarious anecdotes from the major downtown players... The documentary also shows rare and quite beautiful Super 8 and 16 millimeter footage of the first films directed by Eric Mitchell, Charlie Ahearn, Lizzie Borden and Amos Poe...Often the stars of these Do-It-Yourself films would be musicians like the young Debbie Harry and local slackers Vincent Gallo and Steve Buscemi.”

    - Joy Dietrich, The New York Times Style Magazine

    “Recessions aren't all bad. That's part of the lesson derived from "Blank City"...So inspiring.”

    - Associated Press

    “Blank City served up an excellent history of the post-punk underground New York filmmaking scene from which Jim Jarmusch, Vincent Gallo and Steve Buscemi all emerged.”

    - Alistair Harkness, The Scotsman

    “First-time helmer Danhier deserves instant street credit for this anthemic, high-octane look at two underground film movements: the No Wave and the Cinema of the Transgression.”

    - Adam Eisenberg, Flavorwire

    “French first-time director Celine Danhier seeks to fill this cinematic lacuna with this thorough, entertaining doc...Blank City effectively evokes the bombed-out SoHo and Lower East Side of the late ’70s and the pungent, scummy artistic ferment that spawned both punk rock and what has come to be know as “independent film” in this country.”

    - Andrew Hultkrans, Artforum

    “Critics' Pick: Overbooked with a stellar downtown guest list: Jim Jarmusch, Debbie Harry, Lydia Lunch, Nick Zedd, Steve Buscemi, and many others.”

    - Logan Hill, New York Magazine

    “Celine Danhier’s ode to underground NYC filmmakers in the ’70s and ’80s. Told through interviews with the likes of Jim Jarmusch, Nick Zedd, Amos Poe, Steve Buscemi and John Lurie, the doc excavates an interesting period in independent cinema and features a great soundtrack.”

    - Mark Slutsky, Montreal Mirror

    Read more in the New York Post

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