Co-founders of Miami Beach-based media studio rakontur, Alfred Spellman and Billy Corben discuss the campaign to save O Cinema, following the recent effort by Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner to evict the theater because it screened the Oscar-winning documentary, No Other Land.
The case has been widely covered in The New York Times, Guardian, Miami Herald, NPR, and other news outlets.
The Miami Beach City Commission will vote on O Cinema’s future on Wednesday, March 18.
If you wish to make your voice heard on this issue before the vote, write to the city commissioners with this one-click email.
Filmmakers are invited to add their names to the open letter below. The petition has been signed by over 600 filmmakers including Oscar winners Barry Jenkins, Michael Moore, Barbara Kopple, Laura Poitras, Ezra Edelman, Alex Gibney, Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin, Joseph Patel, Steven Bognar, Dan Cogan, to name just a few.
No Other Land is directed by a collective of two Palestinians and two Israelis. They capture lives of Palestinians in the West Bank village of Masafer Yatta that's been routinely targeted by Israeli settlers and the military with violence and home demolitions. Taking place from 2019 to 2023, the film shows an alliance form between two of the directors – Basel Adra, who lives in Masafer Yatta, and Yuval Abraham from Israel – in their efforts to expose an injustice.
