Voces
Almost American
A Salvadoran family rooted in D.C. fights to stay together after The Department of Homeland Security revokes the Temporary Protected Status of six countries.
Brothers Hypnotic
The brotherhood of the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble is literal. Not-always-willing participants in an unorthodox upbringing, the eight boys were forged into a band as children by their father, Chicago jazz maverick Phil Cohran. Now as young men, making their way on the streets of New York and in the music business, with stardom on the… Show more
- Series
- Independent Lens
- Premiere Date
- April 7, 2014
- Length
- 60 minutes
- Funding Initiative
- Open Call
Producer/Director
Reuben Atlas
Reuben Atlas is a filmmaker selected for DOC NYC’s inaugural 40 Under 40 and is an Impact Partners Documentary Producers Fellow. His work includes: producing Bill Russell Legend (Netflix), co-producing and co-directing ACORN and The Firestorm (PBS), co-directing Sour Grapes (Netflix), and producing and directing Brothers Hypnotic (PBS).
- Other ITVS Films
- ACORN and The Firestorm
- Almost American
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The Film
The eight young men who make up the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble are all sons of Phil Cohran, a legendary Chicago trumpeter who turned his back on commercial music to pursue astral jazz (with Sun Ra), proto-funk, and Black Power.
Cohran's ultimate avant-garde experiment, however, was his own sons. They lived an insular, communal existence on Chicago's South Side with Cohran and their two mothers — "Mama Maia" and "Mama Aquilla" — complete with homemade clothes, veganism, and invented holidays. Starting at age four, the boys also joined the family band. Rehearsals began each morning at 5 AM. But unlike the Jackson 5, Cohran's sons would not be bred for pop stardom, and instead would be taught to "create sounds to fuse with the body and heal the soul," and to serve as an inspiration for all families seeking something better.
Now the boys are young men, in their 20s and 30s and when they raise eight brass bells to the sky, they make transcendent music that ties currents from jazz to funk to hip hop. But while working together as their father had hoped, either playing for quarters in Times Square or negotiating with managers and record labels, they find the ideals their father bred into them tested and tested again. Indeed, they must question whether their fathers' values are really their own.
Brotherhood, whether biological or ideological, is never easy; Brothers Hypnotic is a coming of age story — for eight young men, and for an ideal.
