THE CELINE ARCHIVE

Adulteress, traitor, heroine, or prey? In 1932, Celine Navarro was buried alive by her community in Northern California. This film digs up her story. The filmmaker, a grieving mother with a long-term commitment to exploring race, gender and immigration, digs up Celine Navarro’s story alongside those of her family, of community members, and of scholars who know different details about this largely untold event in American history, exposing silences that haunt Filipinx American communities today.

Bay Area filmmaker Celine Parreñas Shimizu does a masterful job of exploring lost histories and the trauma that continues to haunt the impacted communities.  This touching and thoughtful film is a must-see, especially for people who live here and are curious about our shared histories.

Program includes exclusive Q&A with Director Celine Parrenas Shimizu and subjects Catherine Ceniza Choy and Jean Vengua.

Director’s Biography: Producer, Director and Writer Celine Parreñas Shimizu, film scholar and filmmaker, is Professor and Director of the School of Cinema at San Francisco State University. Her work focuses on social theories of power and inequality at the site of race, sexuality and transnationalism. She has written three books, The PROXIMITY OF OTHER SKINS (2020), STRAITJACKET SEXUALITIES (2012), and THE HYPERSEXUALITY OF RACE (2007). She co-edited two anthologies, THE FEMINIST PORN BOOK (2013) and THE UNWATCHABILITY OF WHITENESS (2018), and authored numerous peer-reviewed articles in the top journals in the fields of cinema, performance, ethnic, feminist, sexuality studies and transnational popular culture in Asia and Asian America. Distributed by Progressive Films and Third World Newsreel, her films include THE FACT OF ASIAN WOMEN (2004) and BIRTHRIGHT (2009).

Co-presented by: Balay Kreative, Pistahan, East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation

THIS FILM IS AVAILABLE ON CAAMFEST ON-DEMAND, BUT LIMITED TO CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS.