Indie GoGo Presents Pressure Cooker during Internet Week
“Everybody has a story, including me†says Wilma Stephenson bluntly to her overwhelmed senior class of high school Culinary Arts students in the feature-length documentary Pressure Cooker presented by Indie GoGo at IFC Center last night. Life’s not about where you come from, she points out, but where you choose to go.
This delightful documentary follows three inner-city students over the course of a year as they learn the rules of the kitchen from notoriously tough Mrs. Stephenson who’s Culinary Arts program at Philadelphia’s Frankford High School is likened to a boot camp for scholarship success. Each student involved in the program hopes to earn scholarship money through the Careers Through Culinary Arts Program (C-CAP), which provides much-needed financial aid to skilled students who perform in the kitchen under pressure.
Although this story leads to a final test in the kitchen, filmmakers Jennifer Grausman and Mark Becker commented during a Q&A following the film that they weren’t interested in adhering structurally to that of a competition documentary. “We wanted to know everything that led to the moment,†Becker said, “and then ask how do we bring these elements together.†The nature of documentary work is to spot themes and we soon learned the stories and themes that emerged were different than what we originally imagined, he added.
The students featured in Pressure Cooker are not in this class to “stay off the streets†as one may assume. “We wanted to do justice to their lives, said Becker, which is why the film is about hunger, ambition and heart. These students, some more than others, deal with serious family pressures on a daily basis and realize that the only way to start a life for themselves is through a college education. It was so refreshing to see young teenagers so motivated, dedicated and focused. The relationship between the students and Mrs. Stephenson who gives daily doses of tough love was also something special to see on screen. From what I gathered by the audience’s response during the Q&A, we both overwhelmingly agree that Pressure Cooker is a very special addition to independent cinema, and if you have the opportunity to check it out in your city, you should do so immediately!
Pressure Cooker is playing in limited-release nationwide and at will be screening at the IFC Center in New York till Thursday. Please visit this link for additional screening details.
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Comments ( 1 Comment )
PRESSURE COOKER is a wonderful, inspiring, hilarious, touching award-winning documentary that EVERYONE should see. As you can tell from the audience reactions, it’s a winner!!
Deborah added these pithy words on
Jun 02 09 at
3:23 pm
