Hot Docs

Winner of Slamdance’s Cinematography prize, General Orders No. 9 is a mesmerizing and mystical contemplation of the loss of the natural world to an isolating urbanism in the Deep South. The film combines stunning pictorial and impressionistic imagery with an hypnotic prose-poem text recited with compelling earnestness by narrator William Davidson. The film gracefully unfolds, first as a series of historical maps, then architectural plans, and finally, a montage of photographically pristine landscape shots. General Orders No. 9 depicts a version of the South likely never heard or seen before. - Shannon Abel

“One last trip down the rabbit hole before it’s paved over. A deep geography. What is above and what is below. What came before and what will come after. Agrarian fantasies, sacrificial rites, and excavations. A story told with maps, dreams, and prayers. A map lesson in three parts. A history of the State of Georgia—or anywhere.” - Robert Persons, Director

Co-presented with Toronto Free Gallery.