Joan Baez: I Am A Noise is an unusually intimate psychological portrait of legendary folk singer and activist Joan Baez. Neither a conventional biopic nor a traditional concert film, this immersive documentary shifts back and forth through time as it follows Joan on her final tour and delves into her extraordinary archive, including newly discovered home movies, diaries, artwork, therapy tapes, and audio recordings. Throughout the film, Baez is remarkably revealing about her life on and off stage -from her lifelong emotional struggles to her civil rights work with MLK and a heartbreaking romance with a young Bob Dylan. A searingly honest look at a living legend, this film is a compelling and deeply personal exploration of an iconic artist who has never told the full truth of her life, as she experienced it, until now.
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Following the Film Kate Feiffer will lead a Q&A with Co-Directors Miri Navasky and Maeve O’Boyle.
Miri Navasky is an award-winning filmmaker who co-founded Mead Street Films with Karen O’Connor more than two decades ago. Her films include, The Killer at Thurston High, an investigation of a school shooting that won a Banff Award; the Emmy-nominated The New Asylums, a wrenching portrait of mentally ill prisoners that won the Robert F. Kennedy Grand Prize Journalism Award;The Undertaking,an Emmy award-winning film that follows poet-undertaker Thomas Lynch as he explores mortality and grief in a small Michigan town; The Suicide Plan, an Emmy-nominated film that delves into the hidden world of assisted suicide;and Growing Up Trans, an intimate exploration of the struggles and choices facing transgender children and their parents that was nominated for an Emmy, short-listed for a Peabody, and won a DuPont Columbia award.
Maeve O’Boyle is an Emmy-award winning filmmaker. She edited The Education of Mohammad Hussein, (HBO) which was shortlisted for an Academy Award. She co-produced and edited the Emmy-award-winning and 2014 IRE Award winning, Firestone and the Warlord(PBS). She also edited and co-produced Growing Up Trans(PBS) with O’Connor and Navasky, which won a duPont Columbia award. She co-wrote and edited 112 Weddingsfor Doug Block, which premiered at Full Frame, Hot Docs and Sheffield Doc/Fest and aired on HBO and BBC Storyville, and Do I Sound Gay? for David Thorpe, which had its world premiere at TIFF and was awarded the runner up for People’s Choice Award. Other work includes Left of the Dial(HBO), Heat (PBS), Carrier(PBS) and The Kids Grow Up(HBO), which premiered at IDFA and Full Frame and was awarded a special Jury prize at AFI Docs. In 2020, she directed, produced and edited The 8th which was critically acclaimed in the UK and Ireland and nominated for an IFTA for Best Documentary. She is currently editing a feature documentary The AnimatedMind of Oliver Sacks.
“Anyone with an interest in the key artists of the counterculture movement will find much to appreciate here.”
-Hollywood Reporter
“The fascinating documentary on the tumultuous life and times of Joan Baez, folk singer, balladeer, activist, artist…”
-The Indian Express
“This elaborate documentary navigates adroitly through the professional and the personal aspects of a very full life.”
-Deadline Hollywood Express
