As part of the second Museum of The American Printing House for the Blind (APH) Film Festival, which features films with leading characters who are blind, Butterflies Are Free will be screened on Saturday, June 29 at 12:30 p.m.
The APH Film Festival is part of the summer series of Saturday Workshops for Adults and Families. Admission is free, but registration is required. Movies are screened with audio descriptions for the benefit of people with visual impairment or blindness. Bellarmine University Professor Nancy Urbscheit, who has taught a “Disability in Film and Literature” class, will introduce the films and lead discussions after the screening.
The schedule of movies for the summer:
BUTTERFLIES ARE FREE (1972)
Saturday, June 29, 2014 at 12:30 p.m.
Butterflies Are Free (1972) is based on the play written by Leonard Gershe. A blind man (Edward Albert) moves into his own apartment against the wishes of his overprotective mother (Eileen Heckart) and befriends the aspiring actress who lives next door (Goldie Hawn). Nominated for several Oscars, the movie scored one win for Eileen Heckart as best supporting actress.
Rotten Tomatoes gives Butterflies Are Free a 75% rating and notes that Edward Albert’s character is based on a real attorney.
SEE NO EVIL, HEAR NO EVIL (1989)
Saturday, July 26, 2014 at 12:30 p.m.
In See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989), directed by Arthur Hiller, a blind man (Richard Pryor) and a deaf man (Gene Wilder) witness a murder. However, the police are unwilling to accept them as creditable witnesses, so the pair work together to bring the murderers to justice. Lots of farcical situations and broad humor. Not for kids.
Rotten Tomatoes gives See No Evil, Hear No Evil an 18% rating, though 74% of the audience liked it (it’s still Pryor and Wilder, after all).
RAY (2004)
Saturday, August 16, 2014 at 12:30 p.m.
Ray (2004) is an account of the life and career of the legendary rhythm and blues musician Ray Charles. The movie begins with Ray’s early life on a sharecropping plantation in Florida, where he went blind at age seven, and continues through his slow rise to fame in the 1950s and 1960s. Jamie Foxx received an Academy Award for his performance; the film was also Oscar-nominated for best picture, director, sound, editing, and costume design. Rated PG 13.
Rotten Tomatoes gives Ray an 81% rating, though one reviewer warns that it is so “systematically ‘inspirational’” that it almost sabotages itself.
To attend:
Call 502-899-2213 or email kcarpenter@aph.org by noon the day before the screening to register. The APH Museum is located at 1839 Frankfort Avenue, on the second floor of APH.
Photo: Shutterstock Copyright: Pixel 4 Images
