ALLEN WILLIS ARCHIVES

MARTIN LUTHER KING AND THE STRUGGLE FOR ECONOMIC JUSTICE: THE FORTIETH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATION OF DR. KING'S "THE OTHER AMERICA" SPEECH AT STANFORD

Screening of THE OTHER AMERICA at Stanford University Memorial Auditorium to Commemorate the Fortieth Anniversary of this historic speech, filmed by ALLEN WILLIS.

Sponsored by the AURORA FORUM at Stanford University www.auroraforum.org

15 APRIL 2007 - 2:00 pm - Memorial Auditorium

Followed by a Public Conversation with:

BERNARD LAFAYETTE, cofounder of SNCC, Director of the Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies at the University of Rhode Island.

THOMAS JACKSON, Professor of History at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, andiauthor of From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Struggle for Economic Justice.

MARK GONNERMAN, Director of the Aurora Forum.   

http://auroraforum.org/

http://auroraforum.org/events.php?id=45

      

  photo by Mel Vapour

ALLEN WILLIS has the distinction of being the dean of African American filmmakers in the San Francisco Bay Area. Those who know the rich history of the area's independent filmmaking community acknowledge him as the founding father. He worked for the San Francisco public broadcasting station KQED-TV from 1963 to 1983 and was the first African American news and documentary cinematographers in the Bay Area.

EAST BAY MEDIA CENTER is the official archivist for the works of ALLEN WILLIS. His extensive filmography is currently being catalogued and made available to the general public, museums and collections.

FILMOGRAPHY

Have You Sold Your Dozen Roses? - 1950

Commute -1956

The Wedding; The Pickup Truck; The Boy; -1949 -1953

Annie Lee Ritchie - 1963

The Psychedelic Experience - 1965

The Other America - 1967

Stagger Lee - 1970

Spirit in the Dark - 1971

Drugs in the Tenderloin - 1973

The Great California Land Grab - 1973

1001 Days -1974

Para-Psychology - 1974

Can You Hear Me? - 1975

There Is A There There - 1975

Hurrah for Anything - 1982

Love on the Rocks - 1986

Karla - 1992

San Francisco Beat - 1970 -1993

AWARDS & HONORS

Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame Tribute - 1983

East Bay Media Center Tribute - 1989

Proclamation from City Of Berkeley - 1989

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art -1980

Emmy Award - 1975 - "Can You Hear Me?"

National Educational Television Award for Excellence -1967 "Drugs in the Tenderloin"

DuPont-Columbia University Journalism Award - 1973

Peabody Award - Newsroom - KQED-TV - 1974

Emmy Award -"1001 Days" - 1974

San Francisco International Film Festival - Zellerbach Award - "The Psychedelic Experience" - 1965

Emmy Award - "Spirit in the Dark" - 1971

FESTIVALS

San Francisco International Film Festival - 1965

Edinburgh Film Festival - 1975

Berkeley Video & Film Festivals - 1991-1995

Mill Valley Film Festival - 1994

Lifetime Achievement Award - Berkeley Video & Film Festival - 2003

                                                                                           cover art by Mel Vapour

"Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 'White Backlash' speech, THE OTHER AMERICA, is a classic. It reveals King, the intellectual, coolly analyzing the racist basis of the neo-conservative philosophies, that would influence government policies on the right and left, and the bought media opinion of the 1980's. He foresees the rise of Reaganism and the mainstreaming of the Klan, neo-Nazism, and Yuppie solipsism.

It is a chilling troubled speech made with the background of urban riots, pleas for Black Power, and the Vietnam War. Allen Willis's production of this speech, given at Stanford University in 1967, is masterful, and riveting.

Future Historians will regard this as one of the key speeches in the career of the greatest American statesman of the twentieth century." - Ishmael Reed - 1989

THE OTHER AMERICA is available in VHS and DVD formats at $19.95 each, and can be purchased directly by calling 510.843.3699. Major credit cards and checks acceptable. Please add $6 per video for first class shipping.

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ALLEN WILLIS currently resides in Oakland, California and is an Honorary Member & Board of Director of EAST BAY MEDIA CENTER in Berkeley,California and continues to write a monthly column for NEWS & LETTERS, entitled, BLACK / RED VIEW.

Film Works by ALLEN WILLIS can be purchased in VHS, DVD, Betacam SP by contacting EBMC at: 510.843.3699

Allen Willis titles available on DVD or VHS:

Can You Hear Me? - 1975, 28min, 16mm color. Music by Merl Saunders & Rafael Garrett. A blend of Black oral tradition expressed by young people (age 8-18) in their own poetry, songs, and games. A look into the Black mind juxtaposed with a visually poetic treatment of enviornmental influences on their lives. $29.95

The Psychedelic Experience - 1965, 22min, 16mm color. A film by Allen Willis & Jean Millay. Winner of the San Francisco International Film Festival, 1965, Zellerbach Award, 1965. Original soundtrack by Ravi Shankar & Alla Rahka. Original Timothy Leary introduction commentary. This award winning film was the first film broadcasted nationally on the taking of psychedelic drugs. $29.95

San Francisco Beat - 1970-93, 20min, 16mm color. Beat poet masters Allen Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Michael McClure talk about the guru of the beat movement, Jack Kerouac. Ginsberg recites Kerouac's verse and does an incredible Buddhist chant. $29.95

Stagger Lee - 1970, 58min, 16mm b/w. A documentary on Black Panther leader Bobby Seale during his incarceration in the San Francisco County Jail. "A remarkable interview worthy of national award. Remarkable for the sheer humanity which Bobby Seale projected. The filmmaker-editor was KQED's talented Allen Willis." - Ralph J. Gleason, San Francisco Chronicle. $29.95