Beth B
Directing
Biography
During the late 1970s-early 1980s, Beth and Scott B were among the most significant proponents of the No-Wave, no-budget style of underground punk filmmaking. The feature films Beth B has since made on her own are ambitious in content.
Known For
Blank City
In the years before Ronald Reagan took office, Manhattan was in ruins. But true art has never come from comfort, and it was precisely those dire circumstances that inspired artists like Jim Jarmusch, Lizzy Borden, and Amos Poe to produce some of their best works. Taking their cues from punk rock and new wave music, these young maverick filmmakers confronted viewers with a stark reality that stood in powerful contrast to the escapist product being churned out by Hollywood.
The Deadly Art of Survival
Real-life kung fu master Nathan Ingram stars in this gritty, low-budget martial arts epic as a local karate school owner who clashes with a gang of drug traffickers posing as the owners of a rival dojo. Director Charlie Ahearn (who helmed the landmark hip-hop film Wild Style) used the housing projects next to his New York Lower East Side apartment as his central location in this 1979 classic, shot on a vintage Super 8 camera.
Vortex
A film noirish atmosphere is created to show detective Lunch (a popular underground musician and poet) plow her way through the plans of a corporate businessman who seeks government defense contracts through real "corporate wars" and the manipulation of politicians.
Richard Kern - Portrait: Live From New York
Haxan Films-produced documentary on Richard Kern's work around 1997. Footage from his photo sessions, interviews with Kern and his models, etc. Features associates such as Lydia Lunch, Beth B and more.
Letters to Dad
The almost lyrical Letters to Dad, is a meditation on authority that superimposes the spectre of Jonestown over the relatively fresh faces of the parapunk art world; the film takes on a musical form - like a 20th-century ballad composed of subliminal behavior cues, advertising testimonials, and the text of the National Enquirer