Produced, written, directed, and edited by Marjorie Sturm

Cinematography by John Church

Assistant Direction/Sound by Amy Happ, Maja Manlojovich, Claudia Lehan

Starring Chantel Lucier, Kate Thompson, and Joe Rivera

Music by Ernesto Diaz-Infante, Blue Gum Art, and d. elder

Smoke the Pipe Dream 40mts., digital video, narrative, c2003

"Grand Festival Award" for short feature at the Berkeley Video and Film Festival

This film is a sojourn through Northern California that contemplates the colonization of our land and bodies. Amanda and Denise pick up Norman and travel through real estate, beaches, bacchanal orgies, highways, and homeless forests in an adventure of sex, drugs, music, and marginalization.

Inspiration for the film:

In my mid-twenties, I went on a road trip down the coast of Oregon and picked up a Native American hitchhiker. His story and our experience together stuck with me. Compared to the Germans repenting the Holocaust, Americans haven’t even begun contemplating the history that has occurred here. After all, a statue of Columbus stands in Coit Tower in San Francisco. I think any sensitive person might find this disturbing. After watching my friends get evicted during the dot-com years in the Bay Area, I saw the parallel with the Native American genocide. There was little defense against greed and capitalism. As well, after sitting through countless films where women were portrayed as "desire and beauty," I became inspired to create a film where women could gaze back at the aesthetics and beauty of the male body. "Smoke the Pipe Dream" is an expression of my experiences, fantasies, and fears around living in American culture.

Marjorie Sturm’s bio:

Filmmaker/writer lives and works in San Francisco, CA USA.

Born and raised in NY, Marjorie Sturm later studied psychology and art at the University of Michigan. She has lived for extended periods in Mexico, Nepal/India, and Israel studying poetry, film, music, and religion. She has worked with the mentally ill homeless in the Tenderloin for the last seven years. She received her MFA in filmmaking from San Francisco State University in 2003 and completed the films Smoke the Pipe Dream, Honey and Eggs, and Treehouse. Pax Recordings is releasing a DVD compilation of her work.

—Mel Vapour, Director Berkeley Video and Film Festival Director

contact: Purplemaze Productions, P.O. Box 591138, SF, CA 94159-1138