“Ethiopiques–Revolt of the Soul” by Maciek Bochniak, US Premiere

The Margaret Mead Film Festival, the longest-running premiere showcase for international documentaries in the United States, is held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. This year’s festival reflects stories of resilience–portraits of strength and action by people who are rising up, breaking new ground, and pushing their communities forward. The festival honors the legacy of Margaret Mead, whose groundbreaking approach to anthropology revealed how our histories, values, and viewpoints inevitably frame our encounters with other cultures and communities. As always, the Mead will feature intimate conversations with filmmakers and film subjects, as well as the presentation of the annual Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award.

“Ethiopiques–Revolt of the Soul” by Maciek Bochniak – the jazz-funk music that came out of Addis Ababa in the 1960s and 70s was complex, fun, original, and nearly lost to the world. Meet the Ethiopian artists who forged this beautiful new sound amid constant political turmoil and repression, and feel the passion that has gone into keeping that sound alive.

Maciek Bochniak is a director and screenwriter. He graduated in screenwriting from the National Film School in Lodz, Poland. His last feature film, Disco Polo, reached audiences of over 860,000 in theaters in Poland over six weeks. The film won him the Janusz Morgenstern award for most promising debut from the Polish Film Association. Maciek created the acclaimed full-length documentary One Billion Happy People (2011, produced by HBO), based on the Chinese adventures of the Polish “disco/folk” band Bayer Full. He made his debut with the short film I Love You So Much (2009) and the documentary Reception (2011) as part of the first documentary program at the Munk Studio. He is the co-author of the feature film The Room which has received many awards including Best Independent Film at the 37th Gdynia Film Festival.