Born in Flames

Restored 35mm Print

In Conversation

  • Mel Y. Chen is an associate professor of Gender & Women’s Studies at UC Berkeley and Director of the Center for the Study of Sexual Culture.

featuring

Honey, Jeanne Satterfield, Flo Kennedy, Adele Bertei,

Born in Flames is set in a near-future New York City on the tenth anniversary of a “social-democratic war of liberation,” where self-congratulatory government messaging on mainstream media is countered by critical broadcasts on pirate radio and violence and unrest in the streets, and a Black-led “women’s liberation army” advised by Zella Wylie—played by real-life lawyer and activist Flo Kennedy—roams. “Applying the visual cues of experimental and documentary filmmaking, this explosive work offers a speculative, feminist polemic set in a potential future that mirrors both the present in which it was made and ours. . . . Borden’s fevered 1983 film is absolutely one we should be watching right now” (Yasmina Price, Vulture).

Kate MacKay
FILM DETAILS 
Screenwriter
  • Lizzie Borden
  • Ed Bowes
Cinematographer
  • Lizzie Borden
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 80 mins
Source
  • Anthology Film Archives
Permission
  • Janus Films
Additional Info
  • Preserved by Anthology Film Archives with restoration funding from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and The Film Foundation