2020 - 10/2020 Meeting

The monthly General Meeting of the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County was again held as a Zoom Video Conference as a result of the covid-19 pandemic. Our speaker was Dan Abella on Saturday, October 11, 2020. Mr Abella is the founder and director of the annual Philip K Dick Film Festival in New York City. The Festival was canceled this year but is scheduled to return March 4, 2021 - March 7, 2021. The Festival's website is <https://www.thephilipkdickfilmfestival.com/>.

Mr Abella is also a writer / director / producer (as Daniel Ulysses Abella) whose work can be found on the Internet Movie Data Base at <https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2011821/>. His feature-length science fiction film, THE FINAL EQUATION, is due for video release next year. The work refers to an equation Einstein was unable to complete. Information about the feature can be found at <https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0475272/>.

Our speaker has a degree in Biochemistry and Physics from Columbia University and also founded the short-lived New York Science Fiction Film Festival.

After some opening remarks, our guest presented trailer for five movies (including his own) which had been entered into the film festival The titles and URL's follow:

THE FINAL EQUATION (Trailer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cW8gAMI61i0

Our speaker wrote, produced, and directed this film. It is based on the premise that very bad things would occur if anyone should solve the one equation that Albert Einstein did not complete.

LIVE BITE (Trailer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTBm9H8UcAg

This is a horror / comedy about a couple trapped in their truck during a zombie apocalypse and deals with the couple's interpersonal relationship.

MAGICIANS OF THE GODS (Feature Documentary)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUO9hUb3SB8

This is a documentary about Graham Hancock and the theories he expounded in the book MAGICIANS OF THE GODS. It is in Von Daniken territory with hyper advanced lost civilizations, global catastrophes, and other wild speculations.

VOLITION (Trailer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZQaf-2ZlmA

In this movie a psychic enlists the help of an experimental physicist to prevent his murder with the aid of an experimental time travel machine.

WIDE AWAKE OVER BRIDGEWATER (Trailer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PjYI7ZCwsA

Fifty years ago a pair of adolescent sweethearts trespassed the grounds of a mysterious fenced-in area. The pair became separated when they fled and he never saw or heard from her again. His phone rings and her voice says, "I'm back."

There are many factors which drew Dan Abella to the writings of Philip K Dick. One was the author's reliance on average, ordinary characters as opposed to characters of a heroic nature. A second was Dick's empathic, humanistic philosophy. A third was the tentative, questioning of his work. Our guest felt that even when Dick elucidated his theories about reality, he didn't quite believe them.

Dn Abella believes that a number of Philip K Dick's later works do not receive the attention they merit. He cited THE DIVINE INVASION, THE TRANSMIGRATION OF TIMOTHY ARCHER, and VALIS in particular as works which incorporated elements of gnostic thought which would bring a breath of fresh air to his cinematic body.

The Philip K Dick Film Festival debuted in 2012 and was a steadily-growing project until being derailed in 2020 by the Covid-19 pandemic. The 2021 iteration will be held at The Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens, covid-permitting. There are 17 categories of film including those for trailers, web series, shorts, features, documentaries, virtual reality / new media, screenplay, and more.

The festival's YouTube Channel archives interviews with Charles de Lauzirika, the BLADE RUNNER FINAL CUT Producer; Philip K Dick scholar Erik Davis; science fiction writer David Brin; Tessa Dick, the wife of PDK; RADIO FREE ALBEMUTH writer / director / producer John Alan Simon; and others.

Mr Abella believes that we are living in a Philip K Dick Universe of conspiracy theories, paranoia, ecological collapse, artificial intelligence, and mental illness.

Our speaker also ran the short-lived New York Science Fiction Film Festival and the European Philip K Dick Film Festival The former event sought to present a wider range of movies than those shown at the PKD Festival while the latter had a more international focus. There are differences between the European and American audiences, with Europeans being more familiar with work by Stanislaw Lem and other European writers.

Our thanks to Carol Gyzander for her heroic behind-the-scenes work which made this event a success, to Kathy Holusha for moderating, to Kathjy Cannarozzi for running the post-meeting Virtual Diner Run, and to everyone who attended.