Rooftop Films Presents Up With Me Free Screening

When:Thursday March 3, 2011
Time:7pm
Where:Bruckner Bar & Grill
1 Bruckner Blvd
Bronx, NY
Cost:Free

From Rooftop Films:
Join Rooftop films at the Bruckner Bar and Grill for Greg Takoudes’s gritty and gripping drama UP WITH ME, where love and loyalty are put to the test when a Harlem teenager is offered a prep school scholarship upstate. The film is a remarkable collaboration between director Greg Takoudes and at-risk youth at the East Harlem Tutorial Program and is part of our monthly screening series at the Bruckner. There is no charge to attend the screenings and they are open to the public.

UP WITH ME (Greg Takoudes | New York, NY | 76 min.)
“In school, they taught us about great civilizations. But one day, they’ll count Harlem as one of them, and they’ll count us. No billionaire wants so much as us. . . . No one ever loved like I love Francisco. There were no better friends than ours.” But when Francisco, a teenager from Harlem, is admitted to an upstate boarding school on scholarship, he is torn between his life at home—his loyal girlfriend and his jealous best friend—and the new environment.

This gritty, charming and dynamic narrative feature was created as a collaboration between director Greg Takoudes and at-risk youth at the East Harlem Tutorial Program. The screenplay is based on months-long writing workshops with the teenagers, who then starred in the movie, and—when they weren’t acting in scenes—helped crew the set. “I wanted to turn these teens into filmmakers,” Takoudes said in IndieWire, “to teach them film skills, and make our movie in a way that the creative responsibility for the film rested as much with the teens, as with me. I thought that if they understood this responsibility, that they would rise to the occasion. And they did.”

7:00 PM: Doors open
7:45 PM: Films begin
9:15 PM: Q and A with the filmmaker Greg Takoudes