The Maritime Film Festival: Celebrating Long Island’s Coastal Culture
A celebration of Long Island’s coastal culture, the multi-day Maritime Film Festival will explore topics such as Long Island’s bay houses, the first all-female crew of sailors to circumnavigate the globe, and the Bungalows of Rockaway. Screening at Huntington’s Cinema Arts Centre starting in June 2022, the festival will feature a number of special guests including filmmakers, subjects of the films, and experts on Long Island history.
Dating back to the 1700s, settlers on Long Island made their livings and sometimes their fortunes from the bounty of the sea, but in the last 50 years the surrounding waters have changed greatly. While there are fewer commercial baymen and fishermen today, there is still a powerful history being carried on.
The Cinema Arts Centre will host three film screenings as part of the Maritime Film Festival, each paired with a discussion and audience Q&A, in June and July. The three films ‘The Bungalows of Rockaway’, ‘A World Within a World: Long Island’s Bay Houses’, and ‘Maiden’, each explore a unique aspect of maritime culture.
The Maritime Film Festival is presented in partnership with Long Island Traditions and The Plaza Cinema & Media Arts Center.
Film Screenings:
The Bungalows of Rockaway:
June 14th at 7:30 PM.
Featuring discussion and audience Q&A with director Elizabeth Harris.
Tickets: $17 Public | $12 Cinema Arts Centre Members
Synopsis: Narrated by Academy-Award winner Estelle Parsons, The Bungalows of Rockaway tells the 100 year long story of New York City's largest summer bungalow colony, that of the Rockaways. With enticing vintage postcards, archival photography, Marx Brothers home movies, hilarious boardwalk tales, personal accounts recounted by bungalow residents and Rockawayans alike, all grounded by historians, the film brings viewers close to the highs and lows of a large, thriving, affordable, urban seaside resort.
A World Within a World – Long Island Bay Houses:
June 21st at 7:30 PM.
Featuring discussion and audience Q&A with directors Greg Blank and Barbara Weber and folklorist Nancy Solomon.
Tickets: $17 Public | $12 Cinema Arts Centre Members
Synopsis: A World Within a World: Long Island Bay Houses explores, the lives, history, and experiences of bay house owners in the Town of Hempstead from both a historical and contemporary perspective. Based on fieldwork by folklorist and maritime ethnographer Nancy Solomon of Long Island Traditions, local filmmakers Barbara Weber and Greg Blank capture the essence of how bay house owners have persevered and endured through severe storms and hurricanes as well as eroding marshlands all while preserving traditions that began in the early 19th century. The film profiles Long Island families who have owned bay houses for over 100 years including the Muller, McNeece, Burchianti, Warasila, Jankoski families
Maiden:
July 12th at 7:30 PM.
With Q&A with Maiden Captain Tracy Edwards and Maiden sailor Dawn Riley, now Director of Oakcliff Sailing School in Oyster Bay.
Tickets: $17 Public | $12 Cinema Arts Centre Members
Synopsis: An inspiring documentary film, Maiden, tells the story of Tracy Edwards, a 24-year-old woman who creates an all-female crew (including Long Islander, Dawn Riley) to compete in the Whitbread Round the World Race, a yacht race that covered 33,000 miles and lasted for nine months in 1989.
You can also purchase tickets or find more information about these and other events on the Cinema Arts Centre website: www.cinemaartscentre.org