AMPHETAMINE Ascending: Warren Sonbert's Groundbreaking Debut Finds New Life on Digital Platforms and in Academia

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AMPHETAMINE Ascending: Warren Sonbert's Groundbreaking Debut Finds New Life on Digital Platforms and in Academia

Gartenberg Media Enterprises is proud to announce the release of a new digital restoration of Warren Sonbert’s groundbreaking debut film AMPHETAMINE (1966), which is currently available for institutional sale and clip licensing through GME. The film is also available for rental on a digital format through The Film-Makers’ Cooperative, where Sonbert originally distributed his early films on 16mm. This digital restoration of AMPHETAMINE, which theatrically premiered at Metrograph in New York City on June 8th, 2025, follows a period of renewed scholarly interest in Sonbert’s debut film. Namely, Dr. Maurice Nagington’s 2025 publication The Moral Lessons of Chemsex: A Critical Approach (Routledge), Juan Suarez’s 2024 book Experimental Film and Queer Materiality (Oxford University Press), and GME associate Matt McKinzie's 2024 film program The Motown Sound and the Queer Underground (presented by Spectacle Theater and The Film-Makers' Cooperative), invoke AMPHETAMINE as a key filmic text integral to discourse surrounding 1960s avant-garde cinema, queer representation on film, popular music, chemsex, and connection.

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The Sonbert Renaissance

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The Sonbert Renaissance

In recent years, the work of filmmaker Warren Sonbert has experienced a renaissance among film critics, scholars, cinephiles, and the general public. Sonbert’s films have proven especially popular with younger audiences around the globe who are discovering his work for the first time.

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Early British Films by Alfred Hitchcock

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Early British Films by Alfred Hitchcock

GME is proud to distribute five lesser-known, early films by Alfred Hitchcock, made in his native England prior to his relocation to Hollywood in the early 1940s. These features find the director working in various genres outside of the thriller territory that eventually made him a household name and earned him the moniker “The Master of Suspense.”

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Warren Sonbert's AMPHETAMINE Screens at the KW Institute of Contemporary Art in Berlin June 7th-9th

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Warren Sonbert's AMPHETAMINE Screens at the KW Institute of Contemporary Art in Berlin June 7th-9th

From June 7th to 9th, Warren Sonbert’s debut film AMPHETAMINE (1966, co-directed with Wendy Appel) will screen in Berlin at the KW Institute of Contemporary Art, as part of Billy Bultheel and James Richards’ multimedia exhibition Workers in Song. Bultheel and Richards’ show premiered at WIELS last year, and was co-commissioned by WIELS, Batalha Centro de Cinema, Mudam Luxembourg – Musée d’Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean, and the KW Institute.

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Warren Sonbert Retrospective at the National Gallery of Art June 8th-9th

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Warren Sonbert Retrospective at the National Gallery of Art June 8th-9th

A series of films by Warren Sonbert, curated and presented by GME President Jon Gartenberg, will screen at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. in June as part of the museum’s annual Pride Month event We Have Always Been Here. Gartenberg adapted these Sonbert programs from the Sonbert retrospective that played at The Museum of Modern Art in May of last year.

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