John Atlas

Fresh from 3 prestigious film festivals, Reuben Atlas’s feature length documentary, Brothers Hypnotic, will have its New York premier at
Metrotech Commons
5 MetroTech Center, Brooklyn, NY 11201
May 17
For more info you can email me at jatlas4@comcast.net

About the film: It's coming of age story about 8 young real life brothers, part of an extended family of 24 siblings, who grew up in the mean streets of south Chicago, in a utopian family experiment that included a vegetarian diet and band practice at 5am. Their father, jazz maverick and activist, Phil Cohran, forged the eight boys into a band, while playing with Sun Ra, mentoring Earth Wind and Fire and organizing to support creative African-American musicians.

An official selection at the SxSW film and HotDocs film festivals, the NJ screening is part of the Montclair Film Festival. If folks want more info they can call me at 973 746 6239. If you can't come but want to know about the New York premier and other theatrical dates please email at jatlas4@comcast.net

More about The Film: This is a powerful, emotional, and humorous story about brotherhood, family, and ambition. Five years in the making, Atlas captures the brothers struggling to make a living in the streets of New York, while at the same time respecting their father’s sound and his ideal to make music that will uplift the community. Players in the industry, including Mos Def, Damon Albarn and Prince, drawn to the way the group is reinventing horns, funk and hip-hop, ask them to open for their acts, and feature them on album tracks. Meanwhile, Atlantic Records offers to sign a record deal. With stardom on the horizon, they must test their father’s ideals against their own vision in this thumpin’ look at the struggle to create and control.

“When a film successfully footnotes heavy-hitters like Prince, Sun Ra, Earth, Wind & Fire, Mos Def, and Damon Albarn (Blur, Gorillaz), the main subject's gotta be tight…Director Atlas wisely lets the music play, capturing the ecstatic, rational exuberance of young men finding their own long tone.” - Austin Chronicle’s review of Brothers Hypnotic premier at the 2013 South by Southwest film festival.

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR: Reuben Atlas, grew up in Montclair, NJ and is a NYC based producer, director, and lawyer. "Brothers Hypnotic" which premiered at the SXSW Film Festival is his first feature documentary and has received support from ITVS, the Jerome Foundation, the NBPC, NYSCA, and NTR Dutch TV. Currently, with funding from the Sundance Institute Documentary Fund and the IDA’s Pare Lorentz grant, he is co-directing and producing a film with Sam Pollard about the controversial community group, ACORN. He has also worked in Bonaire, Netherlands Antilles, taught English in Costa Rica, and worked at a maximum-security prison and at Legal Aid.


I have been on a book tour for the last year. I've spoken at dozens of conferences, colleges, and book stores. Did 62 radio interviews all over the country. This fall my book tour included U of North Carolina, Catholic University. Next stop U. of Albany, then to England: October 28: Manchester, England-- keynote speech kicking off Manchester Metropolitan University’s look at the UK government’s Big Society legislation,and a book signing at Blackwells.
October 31: 2 pm. University of London, November 2, University of Glasgow. Then 2 weeks at various colleges in California. If you know of any book stores, colleges or other forums that might be interested in inviting me to speak contact me at
Jatlas4@comcast.net
John Atlas
74 Clinton Ave.
Montclair, NJ 07042
973 746-6239



After 22 years as the Exec. Dir of Passaic County Legal Aid Program, I decided to become a writer and journalist. My new book is SEEDS OF CHANGE.The Story of Acorn, America's Most Controversial Anti-Poverty Community Group. The back story to the explosive Fox News headlines on the path-breaking grassroots organization.

Reviews:
"From Vanderbilt University Press comes one of the most acclaimed, important, myth-busting books of 2010, a book that achieves nothing short of shattering misconceptions about one of the nation’s leading anti-poverty organizations. Seeds of Change goes beyond the headlines of the last Presidential campaign to expose what really happened in ACORN's massive voter registration drives, why it triggered an unrelenting attack by Fox News and the Republican Party, and how it confronted its internal divisions and scandals.

Fox News branded this organization “Pimp’s Best Friend.” Liberals recoiled from the headlines, without understanding the full story. Says author John Atlas at the beginning of this book: “For 40 years I worked on the frontlines of anti-poverty and social justice efforts and discovered how hard it is to make a difference.” He is the writer best suited to tell this tale, and this is the definitive account.
“A must read..." --William Julius Wilson, author, Harvard University

"... John Atlas combines scholarship, political insight, and powerful narrative writing in this essential book." --Robert Kuttner, author of Obama's Challenge, and co-founder, The American Prospect.
(Available at Amazon and the Progressive Book Club; http://www.progressivebookclub.com/pbc2/viewBook.pbc?id=2651&srcKey=21E9b2)

I also blog for the Huffington Post and the Star Ledger.

Graduated from U. of Miami; Boston U. Law School , George Washington Law Center (Masters of Law), Columbia Univ. (Revson Fellow.)