North By Current

Three years after the unexplained death of his niece Kalla, artist and filmmaker Angelo Madsen Minax returns to his Mormon family’s home in the small town in Michigan where his father’s sawmill is located. His sister Jesse, who had found temporary stability as a mother after a difficult youth and addiction problems, is suspected by the authorities of being responsible, along with her partner David, for the death of their daughter Kalla. While Jesse struggles with her trauma and depression, her mother gradually opens up to the camera. Everything is brought out into the open during emotional discourses including, time and again, the filmmaker’s transition which has been the cause of much upheaval in the family.
The distances the filmmaker covers on long car journeys to his family are emblematic of the slow process of rapprochement. The chronology of their meetings is enriched by home video footage and voiceover dialogue with Kalla’s imagined spirit. A personal essay that spans a broad arc, negotiating the topics of depression, domestic violence, motherhood and transgender masculinity in what turns out to be cathartic family therapy.                                 

details

  • Runtime

    86 min
  • Country

    United States
  • Year of Presentation

    2021
  • Year of Production

    2021
  • Director

    Angelo Madsen Minax
  • Cast

  • Production Company

    Hardflow Media
  • Berlinale Section

    Panorama
  • Berlinale Category

    Documentary Film

Biography Angelo Madsen Minax

The filmmaker and interdisciplinary artist was born in Petoskey, Michigan in the USA in 1983. He studied art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and at Northwestern University. His work, which encompasses documentary, fiction and hybrid film forms, sound and music performances, text and media installations, has been presented at the European Media Art Festival, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, in the Anthology Film Archives in New York and at numerous film festivals.

Filmography Angelo Madsen Minax

2010 Riot Acts: Flaunting Gender Deviance in Music Performance | 2012 The Year I Broke My Voice (short film) | 2014 My Most Handsome Monster (short film) | 2015 Separation of the Earth (By Fire) (short film) | 2017 The Source is a Hole (short film) | 2017 Kairos Dirt & the Errant Vacuum | 2018 The Eddies (short film) | 2020 At the River (short film) | 2021 Two Sons and a River of Blood (short film)