Portland Documentary & eXperimental Film Festival

A meditative look at homelessness through filmmaker Linas Phillips experiences befriending ten homeless individuals he met on the streets of Seattle. Each of Phillips’ subjects has experienced great misfortunes that have helped land them on the street but most also face personal demons that have made them resort to drugs and alcohol. One man, Tomey Smith, who becomes a central figure in the documentary, was sent to prison at the age of 16 for a crime he didn’t commit and contracted HIV while incarcerated. After prison and a long period of being employed and happily married, Tomey’s life again spirals out of control leaving him back on the street. Phillips’ and Tomey’s relationship deepens as they work together to document both his struggles and those of the other homeless subjects in the film as they struggle to kick drugs, get housing, and regain faith in a world that has wronged them for so many years. Phillips’ asks each of his subjects to recite a famous speech from history, powerfully linking their personal struggles to the historical struggles of mankind.

“Phillips explains that a professor in college once told a photographer friend of his that he should never take pictures of homeless people: "It’s been done." In Great Speeches from a Dying World, Phillips is interested in doing things that have been done—getting reacquainted with phrases so common that your eyes would normally slide over them, your ears would barely acknowledge their substance. Speeches like the Sermon on the Mount are so familiar that they have been reduced to cliché. Phillips wants to reinvest those words—and the people reciting them—with meaning.”
-Annie Wagner, The Stranger

Linas Phillips: A graduate of New York University’s Experimental Theater Wing, Linas Phillips started out as a live performer of experimental theater and alternative comedy while living in New York City. He burst onto the independent film scene with his first feature length film, Walking to Werner, a personal documentary about his 1200 mile walk from Seattle to Los Angeles in homage to legendary filmmaker, Werner Herzog. Walking to Werner won the special Jury Prize at the Seattle Int’l Film Festival and landed Linas in Filmmaker Magazine’s 2006 list of 25 New Face of Independent Film. Linas was recently awarded The Stranger’s 2007 Genius Award in Film.