Houston Cinema Arts Festival screening of the restored 1972 Harlem Renaissance documentary by William Greaves.
DeLUXE Theater is screening Once Upon a Time in Harlem this Thursday, October 8, at 7 PM. It's part of the Houston Cinema Arts Festival, the city's annual celebration of independent and creative voices in film.
The film is a restored documentary by William Greaves, who shot the footage in 1972. It took another fifty years to finish, with his son David Greaves completing it. It premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January and later made the Directors' Fortnight at Cannes.
As for what it actually is: the movie works like a time capsule of 1970s Harlem. It's built around a dinner party Greaves hosted at Duke Ellington's Harlem residence, and the whole thing unfolds through the real-life conversations and interactions of the artists and intellectuals who gathered there. It's less of a traditional documentary and more of a window into a specific room full of people talking, which is why it feels like such a tribute to the cultural tapestry of the neighborhood at the time.
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If you're into film history or just want to see a piece of Harlem from fifty years ago that finally made it to the screen, this is a good one to catch. The screening is at DeLUXE Theater in Houston, starting at 7 PM on Thursday, October 8.
