ON THIS PAGE: |
Ticket Info
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About the Film
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Trailer & Media
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Awards
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Filmmaker Bio
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Post-Film Discussion
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About MR/DD
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W H A T :
W H E N :
Doors open at 30 minutes before each screening
W H E R E :
click for Directions & Map
T I C K E T S :
$7 tickets are ONLY available online, by phone, at the Museum, and at the door subject to availability.
ADVANCE TICKETS:
...and at these locations:
($9 tix only, cash only),
click the links below for maps:
1520 Madison Road, East Walnut Hills 45206
513 559 6672 or 513 794 3300
Sitwell's Coffee House
513 281 7487
Lookout Joe Coffee Roasters
513 871 8626
Shake It Music & Video
513 591 0123
Coffee Emporium
513 651 5483
Tickets will also be available at the door, subject to availability.
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Trailer Please select a video player: Windows Media This version requires the free Windows Media Player. - High 9.7MB - - Dial Up 1.2MB - Quicktime This version requires the free Quicktime Player. - High 10.5MB - |
Joe Erpenbeck & Bob Moore
Joe Erpenbeck
Mr. Erpenbeck is the supervisor of the Asset Based Community Development (ABCD) Team of the Hamilton County Board of MRDD.
Joe's work with people with disabilities spans more than twenty years and covers a broad range: sheltered workshops, supported employment, group homes, and case management. In addition, he sits on the Board of the Ohio Self-Determination Association.
For the past eight years he has assisted in serving 5700 people with disabilities determine out how to shift personal control and choice to the individuals served. Currently Joe connects people in the community based on their gifts and talents.
Bob Moore
Mr. Moore is the executive director of the Interfaith Hospitality Network, a position he has held for the past seven years. IHN is a national organization, whose Cincinnati branch was established in 1991, that provides shelter, meals and support services to families without homes.
Filmmaker Bio
Linda Hattendorf
For Linda Hattendorf, coming to Cincinnati and speaking with film audiences at the screening of her film has the excitement of a homecoming - the Queen City is where it all began for her.
She puts it this way: "We've traveled to Europe, Japan and across America with this film, but coming home is special - my family, old friends, familiar places, this is great!"
"We lived in College Hill when Linda was little," says Linda's mother Ruth, "and I remember taking her to the Cincinnati Art Museum each week for drawing lessons." Later, the family moved to the East Side, and Linda graduated from Anderson High School. After that, she attended college and graduated Summa Cum Laude from the University of Cincinnati with dual majors in Art History and English Literature.
After college, Linda served vegi-burgers at the New World Food Shop on Ludlow Avenue before joining the staff at Dramatics Magazine, published by the International Thespian Society. And she also worked at Prologue, the newsletter of Cincinnati's Playhouse in the Park.
Linda left the familiar confines of Cincinnati to attend Radcliffe's Publishing Procedures Course at Harvard University, and then moved to New York City to work at Time Inc. There, she earned a master's degree in Media Studies from the New School for Social Research, and began to work in documentary film.
For more than a decade now, Ms. Hattendorf has been working in the New York documentary film community and has had the opportunity to interact with outstanding documentary directors such as Ken Burns, Barbara Kopple, Josh Pais and Julia Pimsleur. Linda's editing work has aired on PBS, A&E, and The Sundance Channel as well as in theatrical venues and at many festivals.
Film Credits
Director & Co-Producer:
The Cats of Mirikitani
Editor:
7th Street, dir Josh Pais
Brother Born Again, dir Julia Pimsleur
Jin Shin Jyutsu, dir Nancy Recant
On the Road Home: A Spiritual Journey Guided by Remarkable Women, dir Christina Lundberg
In Debt We Trust, dir Danny Schechter
Associate Editor:
Bearing Witness dir Barbara Kopple
The Choice '96, dir Helen Whitney
Contributing Editor:
American Aloha: Hula Beyond Hawaii, dir Lisette Flanary
Camera:
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm Take 2 1/2, dir William Greaves
Researcher:
The West, dir Ken Burns
Mr. Erpenbeck is the supervisor of the Asset Based Community Development (ABCD) Team of the Hamilton County Board of MRDD.
Joe's work with people with disabilities spans more than twenty years and covers a broad range: sheltered workshops, supported employment, group homes, and case management. In addition, he sits on the Board of the Ohio Self-Determination Association.
For the past eight years he has assisted in serving 5700 people with disabilities determine out how to shift personal control and choice to the individuals served. Currently Joe connects people in the community based on their gifts and talents.
Bob Moore
Mr. Moore is the executive director of the Interfaith Hospitality Network, a position he has held for the past seven years. IHN is a national organization, whose Cincinnati branch was established in 1991, that provides shelter, meals and support services to families without homes.
Linda Hattendorf
For Linda Hattendorf, coming to Cincinnati and speaking with film audiences at the screening of her film has the excitement of a homecoming - the Queen City is where it all began for her.
She puts it this way: "We've traveled to Europe, Japan and across America with this film, but coming home is special - my family, old friends, familiar places, this is great!"
"We lived in College Hill when Linda was little," says Linda's mother Ruth, "and I remember taking her to the Cincinnati Art Museum each week for drawing lessons." Later, the family moved to the East Side, and Linda graduated from Anderson High School. After that, she attended college and graduated Summa Cum Laude from the University of Cincinnati with dual majors in Art History and English Literature.
After college, Linda served vegi-burgers at the New World Food Shop on Ludlow Avenue before joining the staff at Dramatics Magazine, published by the International Thespian Society. And she also worked at Prologue, the newsletter of Cincinnati's Playhouse in the Park.
Linda left the familiar confines of Cincinnati to attend Radcliffe's Publishing Procedures Course at Harvard University, and then moved to New York City to work at Time Inc. There, she earned a master's degree in Media Studies from the New School for Social Research, and began to work in documentary film.
For more than a decade now, Ms. Hattendorf has been working in the New York documentary film community and has had the opportunity to interact with outstanding documentary directors such as Ken Burns, Barbara Kopple, Josh Pais and Julia Pimsleur. Linda's editing work has aired on PBS, A&E, and The Sundance Channel as well as in theatrical venues and at many festivals.
Film Credits
Director & Co-Producer:
The Cats of Mirikitani
Editor:
7th Street, dir Josh Pais
Brother Born Again, dir Julia Pimsleur
Jin Shin Jyutsu, dir Nancy Recant
On the Road Home: A Spiritual Journey Guided by Remarkable Women, dir Christina Lundberg
In Debt We Trust, dir Danny Schechter
Associate Editor:
Bearing Witness dir Barbara Kopple
The Choice '96, dir Helen Whitney
Contributing Editor:
American Aloha: Hula Beyond Hawaii, dir Lisette Flanary
Camera:
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm Take 2 1/2, dir William Greaves
Researcher:
The West, dir Ken Burns
DVD now available: here
Building on sellout premiere screenings last November, Cincinnati World Cinema is proud to announce that CWC and The Hamilton County Board of MR/DD will present two encore showings of THE CATS OF MIRIKITANI on Saturday April 12.
This event will benefit MR/DD programs and highlight the success of that agency in providing housing, counseling and support services for local individuals with disabilities. Those who missed the initial film dates can now see this truly inspiring and life-changing documentary and also enhance positive outcomes in our own community similar to those shown in the film.
In a simple, honest and personal way, this film conveys
The power of friendship and compassion to combat
injustice, racism, isolation, aging and homelessness.
The healing and restorative power of art.
Summary
LINDA HATTENDORF'S THE CATS OF MIRIKITANI is one of those rare birds in the documentary film world -- a first directorial work, made on a limited budget, that engages and entertains while addressing serious subjects. Although the film is sobering, "Cats" has a lot of character thanks to the film's principal persona, colorful octogenerian Jimmy Mirikitani, who tends to be opinionated, stubborn and a bit of a rascal.
WHAT MAKES THIS FILM A "MUST SEE:"
We urge you to see this heart-warming, sensitive and uplifting film while the opportunity exists.
About The Film
THIS IS THE STORY OF TSUTOMU MIRIKITANI, known as "Jimmy," born in Sacramento California, raised in Hiroshima, who returned to the States in 1938 to mount a career as an artist. Jimmy's misfortunes began when he, along with more than one hundred thousand Japanese Americans, was imprisoned in the U.S. government Internment Camps at the outset of World War II. Through Jimmy's eyes, and his story, this film speaks to that ordeal.
IT IS THE STORY OF ONE MAN'S STRUGGLE TO SURVIVE mistreatment, and his eventual attainment of modest equilibrium. It is the story of how this delicate balance was disrupted and of Mirikitani's subsequent existence as an aging homeless person, creating art on the street for survival.
IT IS THE STORY OF LIFE in New York City in the months preceding 9-11-2001, and the impact upon the octogenarian Mirikitani as the twin towers came down that September day, echoing the loss of his beloved Hiroshima over fifty years earlier.
IT IS ALSO A STORY WITH A HAPPY ENDING. Mirikitani was literally pulled off the streets and out of the cloud of toxic fallout on that fateful date by a Good Samaritan. As a result we have the story of Mirikitani's reconnection with society, his positive experience with New York's social service safety net; and of his ability, at advanced age, to overcome the wounds of time, to heal, to forgive and find family members lost for decades.
AND, THERE IS A BACK STORY, perhaps as significant as the frontline documentary we see on the screen. The Good Samaritan who befriended Mirikitani encountered Jimmy many months before 9-11 and took an interest in his artwork, his personal history and his well-being. That person was Linda Hattendorf, a film editor, a behind-the-scenes professional whose work involves the shaping and creation of final cuts for a number of prominent documentary filmmakers.
HATTENDORF's EXPERIENCE WITH JIMMY MIRIKITANI moved her to document his story on film. Against the backdrop of changing seasons in New York, this film began as a study of an unconventional artist living on the street. With the advent of 9-11 and the revelation of Jimmy's life history, the project evolved into a detective story with the filmmaker personally involved in searching out facts and solutions that could improve Mirikitani's situation. It seems that Ms. Hattendorf is not a person inclined to seek notoriety or the "lime-light" and this trait is aptly conveyed as she stays off camera while the film focuses on Jimmy, not Linda's role in helping him.
"I want people to feel history ... to understand the lingering trauma of war and discrimination and the healing power of friendship and art. We are all one family." ~ director Linda Hattendorf
WHAT MS. HATTENDORF'S own modesty and humility prevent her from saying, others have said instead:
"Hattendorf's spiritual practice of hospitality proves to be life-transforming. This is the kind of documentary which touches the heart and reveals a genuine reverence for life and those courageous souls who have creatively survived despite great suffering and loss." ~Spirituality & Practice
"With Ms. Hattendorf's generous assistance, Jimmy finally makes the necessary connections to reconcile himself with history's cavalier treatment of all his youthful aspirations. Ms. Hattendorf's is truly and profoundly a "found film," and it is deeply moving enough to be fondly remembered at year's end-and long after."
~The New York Observer
"...a movie that evolves naturally from the filmmaker's compassion for her subject; as much as possible, she remains off camera, and her immense act of charity is never permitted to become the film's focus. Instead this remarkable documentary offers a brief but satisfying look at a defiantly self-sufficient life."
~ The New York Times
"The Cats of Mirikitani, is a treasure of personal filmmaking, ... completely devoid of pretensions or aspirations beyond simple, intimate, storytelling." ~Cinematical
"With Ms. Hattendorf's generous assistance, Jimmy finally makes the necessary connections to reconcile himself with history's cavalier treatment of all his youthful aspirations. Ms. Hattendorf's is truly and profoundly a "found film," and it is deeply moving enough to be fondly remembered at year's end-and long after."
~The New York Observer
"...a movie that evolves naturally from the filmmaker's compassion for her subject; as much as possible, she remains off camera, and her immense act of charity is never permitted to become the film's focus. Instead this remarkable documentary offers a brief but satisfying look at a defiantly self-sufficient life."
~ The New York Times
"The Cats of Mirikitani, is a treasure of personal filmmaking, ... completely devoid of pretensions or aspirations beyond simple, intimate, storytelling." ~Cinematical
Awards
Throughout the U.S. and around the world -- from the Midwest to the Mediterranean, from Dallas to Durbin South Africa, from Tribeca to Tokyo; festival juries and festival audiences (discriminating viewers with high expectations, like those who attend CWC), have consistently recognized The Cats of Mirikitani with their votes.
That this recognition would accrue to a first effort by a new director speaks immutably to the message and overall impact of this film. Awards earned to-date include:
JURY AWARDS
Best of Festival, Palm Springs International Film Festival
Winner, Grand Prize, Documentary Feature, Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival
Winner, Best Picture, Japanese Eyes Section, Tokyo International Film Festival
Winner, Grand Jury Award, San Diego Asian American Film Festival
Winner, Best New Director, Sun Valley Spiritual Film Festival
Winner, Norwegian Peace Film Award, Tromso International Film Festival, Tromso Norway
Winner, Best Documentary Feature, Bermuda Film Festival
Winner, Best Documentary Feature, Big Muddy Film Festival, Illinois
Winner, Best Documentary Feature, Big Sky Film Festival, Missouri
Winner, Best Documentary Feature, Dallas Asian American Film Festival
Winner, Best Documentary Feature, Durango Independent Film Festival, Colorado
Winner, Best Feature Documentary, Galway Film Fleadh, Ireland
Winner, Best Documentary, Hope and Dreams Film Festival, New Jersey
Winner, Best Feature Documentary, Philadelphia Film Festival
Winner, Best Feature Documentary, Port Townsend Film Festival, Washington
Winner, Best Feature Documentary, Durban International Film Festival, South Africa
Winner, Press Prize Best Documentary, Femmina International Film Festival, Verdal Norway
Winner, Excellence in Filmmaking Award, Documentary, Sedona Film Festival
Winner, Madelyn's Choice Award, Excellence in Filmmaking, Rocky Mountain Women's Film Festival
Winner, Spirit Award, EBS International Documentary Festival, Korea
Honorable Mention, Best Documentary, Boulder International Film Festival
Honorable Mention, Best Documentary, Motovun Film Festival, Croatia
AUDIENCE AWARDS
Winner, Audience Award, Tribeca Film Festival, New York
Winner, Audience Award, Biografilm Festival - Celebration of Lives, Bolognia Italy
Winner, Audience Award, Durango Independent Film Festival, Colorado
Winner, Audience Award, EDOCS, Quito Ecuador
Winner, Audience Award, FilmFestDC, Washington
Winner, Audience Award, Hors-Ecran International Film Festival, Lyon France
Winner, Audience Award, Paris Cinema Fest
Runner Up, Audience Award for Feature Documentary, Palm Springs International Film Festival
Runner Up, Audience Award, Rotterdam International Film Festival
Runner Up, Audience Award, Documentary, Sedona Film Festival
Runner Up, People's Choice Award, Vancouver International Film Festival
About the Hamilton County Board of MR/DD
A Personal Note...
Joe Erpenbeck was sitting in front of Linda Hattendorf's mother at one of The Cats of Mirikitani screenings last November. A conversation ensued and Joe described how he helps disadvantaged and disabled people play a productive and useful role in society. In particular, he mentioned how MR/DD supports programs that allow constituents to develop their artistic gifts and share them with the community.
"That's what this film is about," said Linda's mom, "You'll love it!"
She was right, and later Joe connected with Cincinnati World Cinema to explain about the things he does. Read more about Joe Erpenbeck in the Discussion Leader section in the left column of this web page.
I've known about MR/DD for decades and routinely voted for the levies that sustain their work. But I did not realize the depth of support they provide to dozens of community service organizations as well as individuals, helping to get disabled persons off the homeless rosters and into housing, find meaningful work, and share their talents and gifts with the community at large. Equally impressive, the MRDD takes what they call a "person-centered" approach to providing services - encouraging constituents to practice self determination in choosing and using the services they need.
In The Cats of Mirikitani Linda Hattendorf reached out to Jimmy Mirikitani and one of the things she did was to connect him with caring people who provide housing and support services. The Hamilton County Board of MR/DD is engaged in similar pursuits. Their official info is below, along with a link to their website. Better yet, talk to Kate Hawkins, Joe Erpenbeck, Sandra Jones or others who make MR/DD contributions a reality. You'll learn first-hand about the important things they do and the passion they bring to their work.
~ Tim Swallow, Cincinnati World Cinema
MR/DD...
For over thirty years, the Board has provided educational, vocational, and residential services to thousands of individuals with mental retardation and other developmental disabilities. The needs of individuals and their families have dictated agency growth.
As a result, the Board has been responsive to those needs through added programs, services, and facilities. The growth of the Hamilton County Board of MR/DD represents much more, however, than mere bricks and mortar and programs and staff. Presently, more than 6,000 individuals participate in Board programs and services each year.
Learn more here: www.hamiltonmrdd.org
