Call Her Applebroog

Call Her Applebroog

2016 · 70 min · Documentary

This deeply personal portrait of acclaimed New York–based artist Ida Applebroog was shot with mischievous reverence by her filmmaker daughter, Beth B. Born in the Bronx to Orthodox Jewish émigrés from Poland, Applebroog, now in her 80s, looks back at how she expressed herself through decades of drawings and paintings, as well as her private journals. With her daughter’s encouragement, she investigates the stranger that is her former self, a woman who found psychological and sexual liberation through art. As Beth B finds a deeper understanding of her mother as a human being, Applebroog shares a newfound appreciation for her own provocative work.

Directed by Beth B

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Ida Applebroog

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1h 21m together

Call Her Applebroog

Letters to Dad

Both from Beth B.

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Belladonna

Belladonna · 1989

An experimental short by Beth B. It consists of rapidly intercut close-ups of talking heads reading statements from a Sigmund Freud case history; affidavits attesting to the atrocities of Dr. Josef Mengele, the Nazi war criminal; and journals from the trial of New Yorker Joel Steinberg, accused of killing his adopted daughter.

Letters to Dad

Letters to Dad · 1979

The almost lyrical Letters to Dad, is a meditation on authority that superimposes the spectre of Jonestown over the relatively fresh faces of the parapunk art world; the film takes on a musical form - like a 20th-century ballad composed of subliminal behavior cues, advertising testimonials, and the text of the National Enquirer

The Offenders

The Offenders · 1980

A punk savage satire about a kidnapping.

The Trap Door

The Trap Door · 1980

A Nietzschian parable on the fate of innocence, THE TRAP DOOR follows the mishaps of Jeremy (John Ahearn) as he is fired by his boss (Jenny Holzer), gets laughed out of court by Judge Gary Indiana, loses his girlfriend to sleazy Richard Prince, is hustled by prospective employer (Bill Rice) and mauled by predatory bird-women. Finally, he seeks the help of a shrink (the legendary Jack Smith) who turns out to be the most demented of all.

Salvation!

Salvation! · 1987

A troubled young woman hooks up with a money-crazed televangelist and becomes a rich, heavy-metal Christian rock star.

The Deadly Art of Survival

The Deadly Art of Survival · 1979

The Deadly Art of Survival

Real-life kung fu master Nathan Ingram stars in this gritty, low-budget martial arts epic as a local karate school owner who clashes with a gang of drug traffickers posing as the owners of a rival dojo. Director Charlie Ahearn (who helmed the landmark hip-hop film Wild Style) used the housing projects next to his New York Lower East Side apartment as his central location in this 1979 classic, shot on a vintage Super 8 camera.

Vortex

A film noirish atmosphere is created to show detective Lunch (a popular underground musician and poet) plow her way through the plans of a corporate businessman who seeks government defense contracts through real "corporate wars" and the manipulation of politicians.

Black Box

Black Box · 1979

An innocent youth is abducted and dragged down into a dystopian nightmare where teenage Lydia Lunch throws him into the Black Box.

Two Small Bodies

Two Small Bodies · 1993

Two Small Bodies

MovieMysteryDrama

Eileen Maloney, a hostess at a strip joint, has woken up to find her two children are missing. Lieutenant Bramm suspects that she killed them herself. He questions her for days about her lifestyle, her children, her ex-husband, men and women, and life in general. He forces her to re-enact her last moments in the children's room hoping to shock her into giving more information. The lieutenant's infatuation is not merely professional, however, and soon they are reversing roles.

Visiting Desire

Visiting Desire · 1996

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MovieDocumentary

Complete strangers meet in a room to act out their sexual desires.

Exposed

Exposed · 2013

MovieDocumentaryComedy

Beth B takes us into the 21st century underground and reveals a secret world where cutting-edge performers are taking hold of a taboo art form, Burlesque, and driving it to extremes that most people have never seen. It's satire. It's parody. It's a populist blend of art and entertainment that gives new meaning to the word "transgression." Above all, it's a lot of fun, and it will blow your mind.

American Nightmare

American Nightmare · 1991

American Nightmare

A video full of swastikas, human skulls on American flag backdrops, girls frenching on department store mannequins and burning themselves with candles, military helmets and clomping boots, dudes masturbating under crucifixes, and a bunch of crotches.

Amnesia

Amnesia · 1992

A stark and uncompromising portrayal of the escalation of xenophobic sentiment in a neo-conservative climate. Beth B refuses to preach and, by extension, to divide. The work trusts the ambiguity of art, rather than to assume a condescending position of knowledgeable correctness from which moral superiority might be inferred.

Stigmata

Stigmata · 1991

A half dozen men and women, each addressing the camera directly and alone, speak of their involvement with drugs.

Voices Unheard

Voices Unheard · 1998

Documentary feature by Beth B.

Glowing Evelyn

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A viscerally poetic and sonically revelatory portrait of performance artist Evelyn Franti, the film brings the concept of pain and beauty into a searing work of physicality. Franti’s vocals are woven through the music of Jim Coleman creating a sonic foundation for the visual landscape.

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