From left: A.V. Rockwell, Blerta Basholli & Elegance Bratton (Cred: IMDB)
The Criterion Channel has included work from Grad Film community members A.V. Rockwell, Blerta Basholli & Elegance Bratton in their February lineup.
Criterion has proudly included Basholli’s Sundance-winning Hive in their Exclusive Streaming Premieres lineup. Hive, which is the first film in Sundance history to receive the Grand Jury Prize, the Audience Award, and the Directing Award, is a searing portrait of loss and a woman’s uphill journey to freedom. Based on a true story, the film follows Fahrije (Yllka Gashi), who, like many of the other women in her patriarchal village, has lived with fading hope and burgeoning grief since her husband went missing during the war in Kosovo. In order to provide for her struggling family, she pulls the other widows in her community together to launch a business selling honey and ajvar, a popular local food. Together, they find healing and solace in considering a future without their husbands—but their will to begin living independently is soon met with hostility. Criterion called it a “riveting debut feature from Blerta Basholli [that] marks the emergence of a major new talent.”
Rockwell’s Feathers will be included in Criterion’s short-film program. The short follows Elizier, an emotionally-dejected new enrollee at The Edward R. Mill School for Boys, who must overcome memories of a tragic past and the present hazing by his peers in order to tackle larger issues dominating his young life. Criterion praised Rockwell’s “woozily expressionistic use of color, sound, and handheld camera work [that] heightens the shattering visceral impact of this allegorical, dreamlike reflection on the perils and promises of Black masculinity.”
Bratton’s Pier Kids will be featured in the True Stories program. The documentary, which earned Bratton the Truer than Fiction Award at the 2021 Film Independent Spirit Awards, follows Crystal LaBeija, Casper and Desean's transition from being homeless to housed. Criterion calls Pier Kids a “powerfully empathetic documentary [that] is an immersion into the lives of the homeless queer and transgender youth.”
Find the full lineup here.