by Beverly Aarons
Long before the internet gave instant access to America’s hidden history (to anyone willing to search for it), Bob Marley’s hit single “Buffalo Soldier” raised collective awareness about the forgotten Black regiments who fought in some of America’s earliest wars. Set over a steady, smooth beat, Bob Marley’s song sums up the formerly enslaved soldiers’ predicament in these refrains:
Buffalo Soldier, dreadlock Rasta …
Fighting on arrival, fighting for survival.
by Beverly Aarons
Piero Heliczer, Beat poet, experimental filmmaker, and publisher, was a central figure in the 1960s and ʼ70s underground art scene. He published dozens of poems, produced at least 24 films, and participated in Andy Warhol’s Film-Makers’ Cooperative. But in the early 1990s, while reading his poetry at a venue on the famous St. Marks Place, Piero was something much smaller and ordinary: a drunk, disheveled, absentee father under the critical gaze of his 19-year-old daughter, Thérèse Heliczer.
Continue reading A Seattle Filmmaker’s Search for ‘The Invisible Father’by Bunthay Cheam
In 1997, Many Uch first walked into what was the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS) building in the International District after being transferred directly from the Department of Corrections (DOC) custody after serving a three-year prison sentence. He faced an indefinite detention in an INS facility.
On Friday, Jan. 22, Uch walked out of the Department of Homeland Security building in Tukwila, WA to the applause of a dozen supporters and organizers. This time, with a Certificate of Citizenship in hand after being sworn-in as a naturalized citizen.
“This is one of the three achievements in my life that I’m proud of,” Uch said upon his release.
Continue reading Khmer Organizer Many Uch Becomes U.S. Citizen After Two-Decade Journeyby Sharon H. Chang
Editor’s Note: We want to acknowledge that there remains disagreement in the martial arts community over who is properly credited as Bruce Lee’s senior-most student. In light of that fact, we’ve chosen to refer to Taky Kimura as Bruce Lee’s senior-most instructor.
Taky Kimura, Bruce Lee’s best friend and senior-most instructor, has been lovingly safeguarding Lee’s memory and legacy in Seattle for almost five decades. Many people know and admire legendary martial artist Bruce Lee, but few know about the close friend who helped Lee start his first martial arts school in Seattle’s Chinatown-International District (CID) and carried on Lee’s legacy after he tragically passed. Kimura turned 96 last month and Thursday, May 7, a new short film about his life and relationship to Lee, “Taky Kimura: The Heart of the Dragon,” will premiere online for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month.
Continue reading “The Heart of the Dragon” Tells the Story of Taky Kimura, Bruce Lee’s Best Friend and Senior-Most Instructorby Carolyn Bick
Baljit Sangra is the writer and director of Because We Are Girls, a documentary film about three sisters who suffered sexual assault at the hands of a trusted relative. Sangra talked with the South Seattle Emerald about the making of the film, the difficulties in breaking away from a culture that teaches girls and women that they are lesser than their male counterparts, and how cultural dynamics between older and younger generations play into the narrative.
by Jacob Uitti
The new documentary, Q Ball, is the story of a group of incarcerated men hoping to find redemption through basketball. It screens as part of the Seattle International Film Festival at the Ark Lodge in Columbia City on Friday, May 17 at 6:30 p.m. and at the SIFF Uptown theater in Queen Anne May 18 at noon and May 21 at 3:30 p.m.
Continue reading SIFF Presents Documentary on Prison Basketball Team at Ark Lodge
by Carolyn Bick
Tomasz Biernacki is a West Seattle photographer, documentarian, and former architectural graphic designer. His first film, Trickle Down Town, follows several different people who are experiencing or have experienced homelessness in the Seattle area. The film first premiered in October, and has since been shown around the Seattle area. The Meaningful Movies Project will screen Trickle Down Town at Centilia Cultural Center, 1660 S. Roberto Maestas Festival Street Jan. 8 at 7 p.m.
Biernacki spoke by phone with the Emerald from Camp Second Chance, where he was building tiny homes.
Continue reading New Documentary Examines Homelessness in Seattle
