1999

Official Selection, Visions du Réel 2018
Official Selection, Hot Docs 2018

“one of the most haunting documentaries I’ve ever seen... a philosophical mediation on memory, sorrow, uncertainty, adolescence, and rebellion"
— Astra Taylor, Filmmaker Magazine

The Film

Directed by Samara Grace Chadwick / 2018 / 90 min

When death haunts a high school in a small town in the late 1990s, everyone is forever transformed. In this gentle, prismatic film, Samara returns to the town she fled as a teen to re-immerse herself in the memories still lurking there, in its spaces and within the dusty boxes of diaries, photos and VHS tapes. 1999 is not a ghost story, but the ghosts are palpable at every turn. The snow-covered streets, the school’s hallways and lockers are preserved as in a dream. The absences left by the relentless teenage suicides still shimmer with questions, trauma and regret. Samara encounters people who are as breathtaking as they are heartbroken, and, finally, 16 years later, the community strengthens itself by sharing the long-silenced memories. Ultimately the film weaves together multiple voices in a collective essay on how grief is internalized—and how, as children, we so painfully learn to articulate our desire to stay alive.

Post-Screening Q&A

Samara Grace Chadwick (Director) grew up in Moncton, New Brunswick, and left the city at age 16. She earned a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies and has spent more than 15 years working in the field of documentary film throughout Europe and North and South America, primarily as a filmmaker, editor, and festival programmer. She is currently Senior Programmer for the Points North Institute and the Camden International Film Festival, and formerly worked with the Hot Docs festival in Toronto, the RIDM festival in Montreal, and Philip Gröning Filmproduktion in Berlin.

Terra Jean Long (Editor) is a filmmaker and editor of award winning shorts and features. She creates tapestry like works that draw on personal narratives, deep time and the interstitial spaces between the real and the imaginary. Her work has screened at film festivals including TIFF, Hot Docs, International Film Festival Rotterdam, CPH: DOX, IDFA, and the Edinburgh International Film Festival among others.

Tickets

Doors 6:30pm | Event 7pm | No admittance after 7:30pm

Connect

This event is part of the Fall 2018 season of DCTV Presents, DCTV’s signature screening and event series that champions groundbreaking nonfiction film.