Peralta TV can be seen on
Channel 27: Alameda, Berkeley
Channel 28: Emeryville, Piedmont, Oakland
AT&T U-Verse Channel 99
BLOODLINES OF THE SLAVE TRADE
6/04 (Wed) @ 7:30pm
6/09 (Mon) @ 6pm
6/19 (Thur) @ 2pm
A film by Markie Hancock
BLOODLINES OF THE SLAVE TRADE examines the lives of two people whose only connection is a genetic link to John Armfield, one of the most notorious slave traders of the 1830s. Rodney Williams, who is Black, and Susanna Grannis, who is white, each trace their ancestry back to their distant ancestor, detailing the diverging paths their lineages took. While their relationship to this past is fundamentally different, and they never meet in the film, they both share in the telling of the horrific domestic slave trade and the ongoing reverberations of slavery. The film also navigates the lesser-known "second middle passage" referred to as the "domestic slave trade." Starting in Alexandria, VA, where two of the wealthiest and most infamous slave traders of the mid-19th century were headquartered, Williams journeys along the Natchez Trace where, in all likelihood, his ancestors walked before him. In Alexandria, John Armfield and Isaac Franklin would either ship or march the enslaved down south to Mississippi or Louisiana for both future sale and brutal work on southern plantations. These cruel transactions involved separation from family members, long and arduous journeys chained together in coffles, and even more brutal working conditions once sold off in Natchez or New Orleans. His path along the trail illuminates the mechanisms and realities of chattel slavery and illustrates the vast accumulation of wealth created by enslaved people but held by slaveowners and benefiting their descendants. Through these family narratives and this historical tour, BLOODLINES OF THE SLAVE TRADE illuminates how histories develop, become calcified, and perpetuate through generations, and posits a more honest way to discuss and understand the story of America.
THRESHOLD
6/12 (Thur) @ 2pm
6/22 (Sun) @ 7pm
6/28 (Sat) @ 8:30pm
A film by Coraci Ruiz
An intimate autobiographical documentary from Brazilian filmmaker Coraci Ruiz following the revelation that her eldest teenager Noah, then 15 years old, was having doubts about their gender identity. Realizing that she would have to deal with a new and highly challenging theme, she started filming with Noah's permission. This was her way of approaching her son and trying to understand what was happening. From 2016 to 2019, she interviews Noah, addressing the conflicts, certainties, and uncertainties that pervade him during this deep identity search. At the same time, Coraci also goes through her own process of transformation by breaking old paradigms, facing fears, and dismantling prejudices required by the situation that life presents her with. The beginning of her son's questioning and transition process coincides with a legal-parliamentary coup that, by means of an impeachment, removed former President Dilma Roussef of Brazil from power. Thus, the period in which the film was produced is marked by a conservative breakthrough, an authoritarian upsurge, and great oppression of minorities, taken as enemies by President Jair Bolsonaro. The film brings forward an experience that welcomes conflicts but is positive, that leaves the register of suffering, pain, misunderstanding, and vulnerability. It is an exercise in letting go of your certainties.