Dawson City: Frozen Time

Director: Bill Morrison

2016 / 120min / 35mm

In 1978, in Canada’s sparsely populated Yukon Territory, a backhoe digging around in a former swimming pool unearthed a treasure trove of 533 volatile nitrate film reels dating from the silent era, among them Hollywood films, newsreels, and locally produced documentaries showing the area in the midst of the Klondike Gold Rush. Drawing on the rich resources of what was dubbed the “Dawson Film Fund,” Morrison produced this, a freewheeling retelling of the history of a one-time boom town, making use of an abundance of stranger than fiction stories, exhumed images, intertitles, and an evocative score by Sigur Rós collaborator Alex Somers. “Filled with as many twists and turns as a first-rate thriller… An instantaneously recognizable masterpiece.”—The New York Times

Introduction and Q&A with filmmaker Bill Morrison, moderated by author and filmmaker Laurie Gwen Shapiro on Saturday, June 15th