Yoni Goldstein

A portrait of life in the radioactive desert on the Navajo Reservation. Spanning a landscape perforated by orphaned uranium mines in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, the film follows a group of indigenous scientists, elders, and activists as they work to protect a vital living space on contaminated land.

The Baron in the Trees is a short narrative film about a pair of identical twins: one of them is playing a role in a children’s theater and the other one is a spectator of theshow. The identical appearances and different behaviors create a motif for the film. Along with Anahita’s previous short films When the Kid was a Kid and Needle, The Baron in the Trees will be the last piece to a trilogy of short films with young protagonists. Growth, gender-identity and family dynamics are the main themes of this trio.

In this wildly inventive hybrid documentary, the feature debut from experimental film and installation artists Yoni Goldstein and Meredith Zielke, viewers are transported to the space-age city of Brasília. A modernist architectural marvel, the city is a sparkling wasteland of machine dreams and aging monuments to a utopian future. Highlighting the sacred geometry of triangles and symmetry of lines, this sci-fi flick interrogates the semiotic structures that undergird the Martian outpost. With striking visuals and a thumping, electronic soundtrack, A Machine to Live In is a transcendent, transcendental voyage through Brazil’s cosmic capital.