Resurrect Dead
September 6th, 2011 by chocko
Director: Jon Foy
Stars: Justin Duerr, Colin Smith and Steve Weinik
Genre: Documentary
This is not a zombie movie! Resurrect Dead The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles is a documentary about the Toynbee Tiles which have been found on streets in cities along the East Coast and even in some cities in South America since the early 80’s. The tiles often display the message: Toynbee Idea/In Movie 2001/Resurrect Dead/On Planet Jupiter. What does it all mean and who or what is responsible for this cryptic message? Are aliens from another universe involved? What does the historian, Arnold Toynbee and his theory of bringing back dead molecules to life, Stanley Kubrick’s movie 2001 and the planet Jupiter have to do with all of this?
Jon Foy’s debut feature length documentary follows Justin Duerr, a young misunderstood artist who has been obsessed on solving the mystery behind the tiles ever since noticing them on the streets of Philadelphia while working as a delivery boy in the 90’s. He spends years gathering clues, taking photos, and researching in libraries and the internet but things don’t go into high gear until he meets 2 other Toynbee Tile enthusiasts, Colin Smith and Steve Weinik. The trio combine their resources and brain power and come up with a list of possible suspects. Their investigation leads them to a trip to a shortwave radio convention and eventually they find themselves at the South Philly address of a highly reclusive old man who hardly comes out of his boarded up house.
I found the movie highly entertaining and fascinating to watch as the mystery unraveled. It is a movie to be enjoyed and discussed afterwards. The director and three main characters were at a recent screening at the IFC Center in New York City. After the screening they answered some questions and provided more insight into the documentary. They gave away pins with photos of NYC Toynbee Tiles on them and also announced that 2 new tiles have been placed outside the theatre by House of Hades in homage to the original Toynbee Tiles. It is believed that there are no longer any original Toynbee Tiles in NYC. There is a video featuring a portion of the Q&A below. Don’t watch it if you haven’t seen the movie already because the spoilers might ruin your documentary viewing. It’s more fun to watch the movie and be surprised and experience the thrill of the hunt. Go see the movie now…Chocko highly recommends it.
THE TRAILER
Resurrect Dead Q&A at IFC Center NYC
(from left to right: director Jon Foy, Justin Duerr, Steve Weinik and Colin Smith) photo by chocko
Tags: colin smith, jon foy, justin duerr, resurrect dead, review, steve weinik, toynbee tiles
Posted in art, movies, photos | Comments (1)
September 6th, 2011 at 6:16 pm
Thanks for posting the Q&A-, I couldn’t get there.
I’ve spent way too much time looking up stuff on the tiles since I saw the film Saturday, which isn’t good, especially when its at work.
I don’t know if you’re interested but the bit from 4AM is on line. Originall it was linked to from the Resurrect web site, however that link is gone, but the piece is up.
http://convozine.com/1883-inside-the-hotdog-fa/c/5905