Master Class with Alan Berliner

This event will proceed as planned, starting at 6:00pm in the Film Center Amphitheater. Walk-up is highly encouraged as we expect drop-off from RSVPs due to the weather.

Alan Berliner’s ability to combine experimental cinema and artistic purpose has made him one of the most acclaimed independent filmmakers in the United States. In this unique master class, Berliner will discuss his use of sound and image metaphors in Intimate Stranger (1991) and Nobody’s Business (1996), both of which are screening in the festival. The lecture will include a presentation of several clips from each film.

Berliner’s experimental documentaries First Cousin Once Removed (2012), Wide Awake (2006), The Sweetest Sound (2001), Nobody’s Business, Intimate Stranger (1991), and The Family Album (1988) have been screened and broadcast all over the world. He has received awards, prizes, and retrospectives at many major international film festivals. The San Francisco International Film Festival called Berliner “America’s foremost cinematic essayist.” Over the years, Berliner’s films have become part of the core curriculum for documentary filmmaking and film history classes at universities worldwide, and they are in the permanent collections of many film societies, festivals, libraries, colleges, and museums. All of his films are in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York. The New York Times has described Berliner’s works as “powerful, compelling and bittersweet . . . full of juicy conflict and contradiction, innovative in their cinematic technique, unpredictable in their structures . . . Alan Berliner illustrates the power of fine art to transform life.”