INTERNATIONAL LENS, a film series with a global perspective, provides a forum to promote conversation among Vanderbilt’s diverse students, faculty, staff, and the greater Nashville community. International Lens endeavors to transcend geographic, linguistic, ethnic, religious, and political boundaries by encouraging conversation and greater cross-cultural understanding through cinema.
The series is organized by the Department of Cinema & Media Arts in collaboration with College of Arts and Science, Dean of Students offices, and other departments, centers, and programs across the University.
There is no charge for admission.
Films are screened in Sarratt Cinema at 7:30 p.m. unless otherwise noted.
FALL 2024 Schedule of Films
Last Things
Thursday, September 12 @ Rothschild Black Box Theater
Presented by Jonathan Rattner, Associate Professor of Cinema & Media Arts and Art
USA, Portugal, France (2023) Dir: Deborah Stratman
This film looks at evolution and extinction from the perspective of the rocks and minerals that came before humanity and will outlast us – imagining what time might look like from the perspective of a mineral, and how rocks might conceive of memories. An eerily exquisite film about our planet carved out of science and speculation, poetry and geology, unfolding with remarkable images that range from microscopic forms to vast landscapes, and seeking a picture of evolution without humans at the center. English, French. 50 min
Filmmaker Deborah Stratman will be in attendance for the introduction and post-screening discussion. Sponsored by Vanderbilt’s Studio Arts department
RBG
Thursday, September 26 @ Rothschild Black Box Theater
Presented by the film’s Cinematographer, Claudia Raschke, who will be in attendance for the introduction and post-screening discussion
USA (2018) Dir: Julie Cohen, Betsy West
An intimate portrait of an unlikely rock star and unexpected pop culture icon, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. With unprecedented access, filmmakers explore the unique personal journey of RBG’s rise to the nation’s highest court, and how her early legal battles changed the world for women everywhere. This revelatory documentary is a definitive look at Ginsburg’s exceptional life and career. English. 98 min.
This event is sponsored by Canon USA and Synergy Communications.
A Decent Home
Thursday, October 3
Presented by Claire Sisco King, Associate Professor of Communications and Cinema & Media Arts
USA (2022) Dir: Sara Terry
This film addresses urgent issues of class and economic inequity through the lives of mobile home park residents who can’t afford housing anywhere else. As private equity firms and wealthy investors buy up mobile home parks – making sky-high returns on their investments while squeezing every last penny out of the mobile homeowners who lack rights and protections under local and state laws and must pay rent for the land they live on – this film hopes to be a tool to help drive awareness and action in support of manufactured housing owner rights, centering affordable housing in a broad public forum for debate, discussion and advocacy. English. 84 min.
Filmmaker Sara Terry will be in attendance virtually following the screening. Also, former Nashville mayor Bill Purcell, and Emily Thaden, president of Resident Owned Communities USA (ROC), will join Claire King for a conversation about the affordable housing crisis in Nashville.
This screening is offered in conjunction with the Cities Grand Challenge Initiative.
Jacir
Thursday, October 17
USA (2022) Dir: Waheed AlQawasmi
This film is a glance at the divided U.S. political system through the eyes of a Syrian refugee facing the harsh realities of chasing the American dream while living in poverty on the streets of Memphis, TN. Knowing very little English and far from the ideal new American life he imagined, Jacir stops a late-night robbery that brings him face-to-face with Meryl, his conservative, racist, and opioid-addicted neighbor. The two neighbors embark on a fraught journey to grow beyond each other’s prejudices, in this gritty look into the refugee crises in America. English, Arabic. 105 min.
This film screened in collaboration with the Engine for Art, Democracy, and Justice (EADJ) and their Fall 2024 Public Program Series, “Somewhere We Are Human,” celebrating immigrant communities shaping the city of Nashville and the American South.
Concrete Utopia
Thursday, October 24
Presented by Bohyeong Kim, Assistant Professor of Communication Studies
South Korea (2023) Dir: Tae-hwa Eom
Seoul is devastated overnight by a major earthquake. Everything has been reduced to rubble, and no one knows for sure how far the ruins stretch or what the cause of the earthquake may be. In the heart of Seoul there is only one place that remains intact: Hwang Gung Apartments. Residents begin to feel threatened as external survivors who have heard of this haven flock to the apartments. They unite for survival, and with a new resident leader, Yeong-tak, they create new rules for residents and prevent entry to outsiders. Thanks to this, unlike the hellish world outside, the utopian apartments remain safe and peaceful. However, in an endless crisis for survival, an unexpected conflict begins among them. Korean. 130 min.
On Becoming a Guinea Fowl
CANCELED – will be rescheduled during the Spring term
Thursday, November 14
Special Presentation: Nashville pre-release screening from A24 films
UK, Zambia, Ireland (2024) Dir: Rungano Nyoni
On an empty road in the middle of the night, Shula stumbles across the body of her uncle. As funeral proceedings begin around them, she and her cousins bring to light the buried secrets of their middle-class Zambian family. Blending absurdist humor and playfully surrealist imagery to capture contemporary Zambian society at a generational impasse between staunch tradition and social progress, this Cannes award-winner rages at a middle-class Zambian family’s shameful silence and the lies we tell ourselves. English, Bemba. 95 min.
This screening made possible by a partnership between A24 Films and International Lens.
Night of Kings
*Newly programmed film to replace previous listing*
Thursday, November 14
Côte d’Ivoire, France, Canada, Senegal (2021) Dir: Philippe Lacôte
A young man is sent to “La Maca,” a prison in the middle of the Ivorian forest ruled by its inmates. As tradition goes with the rising of the red moon, he is designated by the Boss to be the new “Roman” and must tell a story to the other prisoners. Learning what fate awaits him, he begins to narrate the mystical life of the legendary outlaw named “Zama King” and has no choice but to make his story last until dawn. French, Dyula, Nushi with English subtitles. 93 mins.
Made possible by a partnership between NEON Films and International Lens
Blade Runner 2049
Thursday, December 5
Presented by the Department of Cinema & Media Arts
USA (2017) Dir: Denis Villeneuve
It is 2049, thirty years after the events of the first Blade Runner film. Humans are now bioengineered, and they are also enslaved. Officer K, a new blade runner for the Los Angeles Police Department whose job is hunting and killing replicants who have fallen foul of the law, unearths a long-buried secret that could start a war between humans and replicants and plunge what’s left of society into chaos. His discovery leads him on a quest to find Rick Deckard, a former LAPD blade runner who’s been missing for 30 years. English. 163 min.
This screening is a prelude to events in Nashville and at Vanderbilt over the weekend with acclaimed cinematographer Roger Deakins.
Films are 7:30pm in Sarratt Cinema unless otherwise noted
There are no longer masking requirements inside of Vanderbilt campus buildings or at Sarratt Cinema. In order to keep our community safe, please do not attend any of our screenings if you are feeling unwell.