The Dryden will screen The Illinois Parables (Deborah Stratman, U.S. 2016, 60 min., 16mm) followed by a discussion with filmmaker Deborah Stratman.

An experimental documentary made up of regional vignettes about faith, force, technology, and exodus. Eleven chapters relay histories of settlement, removal, technological breakthrough, violence, messianism, and resistance—all occurring in Illinois. The state is a convenient structural ruse, its histories becoming allegories to explore how humans are shaped by conviction and ideology. The film uses reenactment, archival footage, observational shooting, intertitles, and voiceover to tell its stories, and it is an extension of Stratman's previous works in which she questions foundational American tenets.

[source: George Eastman Museum calendar, 2017-Apr-10]