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Rising from Ashes

Rising from Ashes

Rising From Ashes, the title of T.C. Johnstone’s uplifting documentary about the creation of the first Rwandan National Cycling Team, has a double meaning. It refers not only to the tremendous spirit displayed by the athletes as they struggle to overcome the horrific legacy of the genocide that occurred a generation earlier, but also the personal redemption of the famed American cyclist who led them.

Opening for a limited theatrical release, the film should garner appreciate audiences upon its inevitable home video and broadcast exposure.

Bicycles assume a prominent role in Rwanda, known as “The Land of a Thousand Hills.” It is a primary means of transportation for the largely impoverished population, although the bikes are usually years old and decrepit. Indeed, one of the cyclists interviewed marvels at the fact that the new bike he’s been given is the first one he’s ridden that was outfitted with brakes.

Famed American bike builder Tom Ritchey explored the country on his mountain bike in 2005 and met a group of cyclists who called themselves Team Rwanda. Inspired by their dedication, Ritchey enlisted his friend and former rival Jock Boyer, who in 1981 made history as the first American to participate in the Tour de France, to become their coach. His championship racing career had been derailed in 2002 when he was convicted of lewd behavior with a minor and sent to jail for a year.

“I overstepped my boundaries with a minor, a girl,” is all the clearly haunted Boyer says in the film about the incident.

The film details his subsequent years-long efforts to whip the Rwandan team into enough shape to qualify for the Olympics. Among his star players was Adrien Niyonshuti, who lost 60 members of his family, including six brothers, in the 1994 genocide.  He eventually became the nation’s flag bearer at the opening ceremony of 2012’s London Olympics, and the segment in which his fellow countrymen gaze at this spectacle with tremendous pride is among the film’s most moving.

Narrated in unobtrusive fashion by Forest Whitaker and featuring a jaunty Afropop soundtrack, the film is crisp and economical, with the filmmaker carefully avoiding extraneous melodramatics. They are, after all, hardly necessary in a tale that already contains such inherently powerful drama.

— Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter

Rising from Ashes

Wed October 30, 2013, 7:00 & 9:15, Muenzinger Auditorium

Rwanda, 2012, English, Color, 82 mins, DP, 1.85:1, NR • official site

recommend

Tickets

10 films for $60 with punch card
$9 general admission. $7 w/UCB student ID, $7 for senior citizens
$1 discount to anyone with a bike helmet
Free on your birthday! CU Cinema Studies students get in free.

Parking

Pay lot 360 (now only $1/hour!), across from the buffalo statue and next to the Duane Physics tower, is closest to Muenzinger. Free parking can be found after 5pm at the meters along Colorado Ave east of Folsom stadium and along University Ave west of Macky.

RTD Bus

Park elsewhere and catch the HOP to campus

International Film Series

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Established 1941 by James Sandoe.

First Person Cinema

(Originally called The Experimental Cinema Group)
Established 1955 by Carla Selby, Gladney Oakley, Bruce Conner and Stan Brakhage.

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(AKA The Rocky Mountain Film Center)
First offered degrees in filmmaking and critical studies in 1989 under the guidance of Virgil Grillo.

Celebrating Stan

Created by Suranjan Ganguly in 2003.

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Established 2017 by Chair Ernesto Acevedo-Muñoz.

Thank you, sponsors!
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Department of Cinema Studies & Moving Image Arts

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