Through the microcosm of her often hilarious interactions with her mom, Kara Herold’s Bachelorette, 34 examines the pressure society puts on women to find “Mr. Right.”

 

Duration: 30 min | Subtitled for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing

karaheroldmedia.com

 

 

Contact:

Kara Herold, Director/Producer karaherold@gmail.com

For more information and to download press materials, visit http://www.karaheroldmedia.com/press

Distribution:  New Day Films

http://www.newday.com/films/Bachelorette34.html

TOLL FREE: 888-367-9154

 

Critical Acclaim:

 

\  This innovative, funny film deals with a serious subject -  the pressure that family   and friends exert on single women in their thirties to couple, cohabit and marry.    See it, recommend it to friends, show it in your classes. All will lead to a   broader range of options for a satisfying adult life.

                              -E. Kay Trimberger, author of The New Single Woman,

                  and Professor Emerita of Women's & Gender Studies, Sonoma State University

 

\   Part persona, part universal truth serum. And always humoureque: part Harold        Lloyd, part Joan Rivers morphed with Woody Allen on a good day.  But definitely,        all parts Kara Herold, a director with a voicevision to look out for."

-        Peter Wintonick, POV (Point of View) Magazine, Canada

 

\  What it means to be single or married or to live a full and happy life has changed   dramatically over the past decades.  In this funny and poignant film, Kara Herold,   21st century singleton, points her lens through the keyhole of her relationship with her very married mother, and lets her viewers in on a sweeping vista of social    change.

                                                            -Bella DePaulo, author of Singled Out: How Singles Are                                                             Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After

 

\    "Gay? Married?  Even being Republican is a small matter when a mom sets out to        find Mr. Right for her "aging" daughter.  Told with wit, and a basketful of  zany        clips, Kara Herold's own story affirms a lifestyle choice where meeting in the chapel is definitely on the back burner.

                                                -Bill Nichols, author of Introduction to Documentary and other books

 

\    More a work of art than a straight-up documentary, the film explores the relationship between Herold and her mother, and the anxiety the differences in their lifestyles creates, using telephone messages, home movies and footage from '50s and    '60s dating films.  The audience howled with laughter, as an animation showed the beloved artists' hot spot being knocked down and replaced with a Starbucks. Because, really, that scenario is a Mission dweller's worst nightmare.

                                                            -Lisa Hix, San Francisco Chronicle

 

 

 

 

Short Synopsis:

 

Mother:  Kara, I just remembered, I met the perfect man for you.  He’s 30, you’re 30, it’s perfect!.  The only problem is that he’s Catholic and Republican but that’s nothing that can’t be changed.  You might even get him interested in the feminist movement.  CALL ME!!!

 

Kara's mother is obsessed with getting her daughter married. Kara, a single artist and filmmaker in San Francisco, has her doubts. Through the microcosm of her often hilarious interactions with her mom, Kara Herold's Bachelorette, 34 examines the pressure society puts on women to find "Mr. Right."

 

Long Synopsis:

 

Preface

Few things in life are more public than the decision to marry, traditionally followed by a ceremony in full view of the bride and groom’s family and community.  Conversely, few things are more private than the circumstances behind remaining single.  While society rejoices in marriage as the first in a series of happy milestones, it speaks of single people “of a certain age” – especially women – in the hushed tones of pity, worry and regret.

 

Yet more American women today than ever before are, for whatever reason, remaining single.  According to Time magazine, in 1963, 83% of women 25 to 55 were married, but by 1997, that figure had plummeted to 65%. The New York Times in 2007 reports that  "probably the first time, more American women are living without a husband than with one."  In her book Bachelor Girl, Betsy Israel claims that 42% of the adult American female population is single today.

 

The topic of marital status as single women approach their middle years is often prickly.  Bachelorette, 34, uses off-beat humor to navigate a conversation between those who are not married and the loved ones who are desperate that they should be.

 

The film:

Bachelorette, 34 is a 30 min. film about a relationship between a single, 34-year-old filmmaker and her mother’s obsession that her daughter be married before time runs out.  While the mother is certain that the daughter’s life will be a safer, happier and better one if she gets married, the daughter is a study in nearly existential uncertainty.  As the story unfolds, the daughter investigates her mother’s anxieties – and her own – that she’s 34, unmarried, and might have “missed a step in life.”

 

The mother proposes potential mates (“Well, Lan Noble has got this pretty blond hair and with Kara’s red hair, they would make beautiful children”), suggests methods for self-improvement (“Wear your foot-odor pads!”), and raises the specter of spinsterhood (“Where do you see yourself in 10 years, when you are 44?”).  The daughter, in her role as filmmaker, responds by editing archival educational-dating footage and home movies to simultaneously illustrate, comment upon, and poke fun of her mother’s well-intentioned advice.

 

Bachelorette, 34 is one woman’s examination of the ubiquitous belief that marriage equals happiness, laced with poignant irony as the mother yearns for her daughter’s comfort and security at all costs, and the daughter runs the risk of inadvertently falling off the course carved by tradition.

 

Approach

Bachelorette, 34 tells its story entirely through excerpts from “how-to” dating films from the 1950s and 1960s, home movies, audio recordings (conversations with the mother, messages left on the daughter’s answering machine), and a judicious use of text to represent – at arm’s length – a diary of the daughter’s inner thoughts about her mother’s notion of matrimonial bliss.  None of the principals appear on-screen as contemporary characters, although Super-8 home-movies show the mother as a bride and young parent.  All of the main characters – the parents, daughter, family members and friends, and prospective mates – are variously represented by “stand-ins” from period found footage. 

 

The use of vintage footage contrasts the apparent confidence and cheery resolve of an earlier generation, and the filmmaker’s painfully modern ambiguity.  Consistent with their original intent, the archival segments are peppy, optimistic  and condescendingly instructional, creating a sense of an educational filmstrip and vague wistfulness for the simplicity of an earlier era.  While the content about properly guiding a woman towards marriage remains unchanged, the overlay of the personal story both illuminates and subverts it.  For example, the original platitudinous voice-over of the “expert” is replaced by the mother, with her quirky and sometimes over-the-top advice.  The prospective boyfriends, recast as subjects from an educational film and labeled as if they were unwitting participants of a televised dating game, appear eccentric when viewed through modern eyes.  In short, the “how-to” convention is turned back on itself in an ongoing dialogue between a daughter and a mother who is becoming increasingly imaginative and desperate.

KARA HEROLD

 

Kara Herold is a filmmaker whose carefully crafted works examine the intersection of feminism and pop culture with wit and visual flair. She has written, directed and produced everything from short animations to award winning documentaries, and has collaborated extensively with other artists and writers, including Monica Nolan and Andi Zeisler.

 

Herold just finished producing and directing Bachelorette, 34, which takes a humorous look at society’s obsession with marriage, through the lens of a mother-daughter relationship.  The film premiered at the International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam and at the MoMA in NYC.   Taking the visual style from her previous film Grrlyshow, Bachelorette, 34 combines feminist dialogue with punk ideology and collage-like composition. The film is supported by grants from the Film Arts Foundation, the Pacific Pioneer Grant, and the San Francisco Arts Commission.

 

Herold’s previous production, Grrlyshow, premiered at Sundance in 2001. The film told the story of the girl zine explosion, in which women from all walks of life began creating zines to provide themselves and others with an alternative to the homogeneity of mainstream media. Zine makers profiled included the creators of Bust, Bitch, Plotz, Bamboo Girl, Java Turtle and Pagan’s Head. Thriftscore creator Al Hoff called the film “A perky peek at the alternative media community where self-publishing gals are doin' it for themselves.” The film screened around the country and is currently being distributed by Women Make Movies.

 

Herold’s other productions include Tit Chat and Women for Sale. Tit Chat, acollaboration with cartoonist Ariel Bordeaux, is a three minute animation about accepting one’s body, whatever its size. It was a finalist at the Queer Short Movie Awards. Women for Sale takes Beth Lisick’s spoken-word account of a teenage models’ career and sets it to a dazzling montage of exploitation footage from days gone by. The film recently won first place at the 23rd annual Cine-Poetry Film Festival sponsored by the National Poetry Association.

 

 

 

 

 

Awards, Festivals and Screenings

 

Awards:

 

*          William and Flora Hewlett Foundation Honorary Fellowship

*          Pacific Pioneer Grant

*          Djerassi Artist Residency

*          Featured media maker for the Bay Area Video Coalition

*          Individual Artist Commission Grant by the city of San Francisco     

*          Film Arts Foundation Grant

*          Creative Capital Professional Development Workshop, selected participant

*          Digital Directions award from the Bay Area Video Coalition

*          Featured Artist at the Bay Area Video Coalition

 

 

Festivals:

*          Documentary Fortnight Museum of Modern Art, NYC

*          International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam

*          Mill Valley Film Festival

*          International Women's Film Festival in Seoul

*          Women Make Waves in Taiwan

*          Mendocino Film Festival

*          Dallas Video Festival 

*          Other Cinema

 

Community Screenings:

*          San Francisco State University, Bay Area Filmmakers Survey Course, San             Francisco

*          UC Berkeley Women's Studies Class

*          San Francisco Art Institute

*          Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Board Meeting

*          City College of San Francisco Filmmaking Class

*          San Francisco State Filmmaking Class

*          Grace Cathedral

*          UCSC Film and Autobiography class

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Credits:

Kara Herold                                                    Director

Kara Herold and Monica Nolan                     Editors

Monica Nolan                                                 Animator

Kara Herold                                                    Additional Animations

Illustrator                                                        Andi Zeisler

Additional Illustrations                                   Mary Scott

Additional Editor                                            Shirley Thompson

Sound Editor                                                   Paul James Zahnley

Sound Mix                                                       Gibbs Chapman

Camera                                                           Gibbs Chapman

                                                                        Christian Bruno

                                                                        Kara Herold

 

 

Funding and Support:

Pacific Pioneer Grant

San Francisco Art Commission

Film Arts Foundation Grant

Hari Dillon

Julia Parker Benello

 

Bachelorette, 34 is produced by Kara Herold, who is solely responsible for its content.

For more information

karaherold@gmail.com

karaheroldmedia.com

 

 

Distribution:

New Day Films

Sales and rentals of New Day films

are handled by Transit Media Communications

http://www.newday.com/films/Bachelorette34.html

TOLL FREE: 888-367-9154

US:  845-774-7051

ISBN#  978-1-57448-248-5