Dowload Complete 2007 Festival Schedule (pdf)
Friday May 11
12:00 Noon
Crossing Arizona
Directed by Joseph Mathew
running time: 75 minutes
Discussion with Producer Dan DeVivo
(Note: this screening is for high school students as well as a general audience)
An estimated 4,500 illegal border-crossers pass through the treacherous Arizona desert each day. Most are men in search of work, but increasingly the border-crossers are women and children seeking to reunite with their families. “Crossing Arizona” examines the crisis through the eyes of those directly affected by it.
Dan DeVivo, Director/Producer:
After graduating from Harvard University in 1999 with a B.A. in Social Anthropology, Dan spent several years honing his documentary filmmaking skills in New York City working on several projects including: “Counting On Democracy,” which documents Florida's 2000 election scandal and “Refusing To Die: A Kenyan Story,” which chronicles Kenya’s struggle with post-colonial dictatorship. In 2004, he partnered with Joseph Mathew to co-direct and produce Crossing Arizona, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2006.
2:00 p.m.
The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
Directed by Faith Morgan
running time: 53 minutes
"Try to imagine an airplane suddenly losing its engines. It was really a crash"... A crash that put Cuba into a state of shock. There were frequent blackouts in its oil-fed electric power grid, up to 16 hours per day. The average daily caloric intake in Cuba dropped by a third... So Cubans started to grow local organic produce out of necessity, developed bio-pesticides and bio-fertilizers as petrochemical substitutes, and incorporated more fruits and vegetables into their diets. Since they couldn't fuel their aging cars, they walked, biked, rode buses, and carpooled.
3:30 p.m.
Street Witness
Directed by Soraya Umewaka
running time: 46 minutes
Followed by moderated discussion with Renata Stepanov, a 2006 graduate of Princeton with a BA in Politics. She works at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office as a paralegal (through Project 55) after spending half a year in Santiago, Chile through Princeton in Latin America working for the English language daily Santiago Times.
With soaring unemployment in Ecuador, people are compelled to engage in the informal work sector. Yet the police constantly harass making it even harder for the poor to make an honest living. Seventeen year-old Hilario Navarrete, a former drug addict, talks about the complexity of addressing who is the victim and who is the perpetrator. Street Witness shares testimonies of the street youths in Ecuador. The documentary includes commentary from the former VP of Ecuador, the police and street rappers.
5:30 p.m.
The Last Graduation: The Rise and Fall of College Programs in Prison
Directors/Producers: Barbara Zahm, DeeDee Halleck, Benay Rubenstein
running time: 55 minutes
Speaker: Matt Sheridan served time at New Jersey State Prison and received his degree there. He now teaches at several New Jersey colleges.
"The Last Graduation is a provocative documentary to that traces the history of college programs in prisons through the lives of men who graduated from these programs. America's prison population is swelling at an alarming rate -- tripling in just 15 years. Education in prison has proven to be one of the most effective tools for turning an inmate's life around. So why have federal and state governments rushed to cut off funds for effective college prison programs?
The Last Graduation frankly explores the issues involved in this vital question --from the advent of higher education in prison in the wake of the 1971 Attica uprising to the last graduation from the Marist College program at Greenhaven Prison in 1995.
The Last Graduation eloquently advocates reinstatement of college programs by letting the educators and prisoners tell their own stories.
7:30 p.m. -- OPENING NIGHT
Crossing Arizona
running time: 75 minutes
Discussion with Director Dan DeVivo
Reception
Light refreshments will be served
An estimated 4,500 illegal border-crossers pass through the treacherous Arizona desert each day. Most are men in search of work, but increasingly the border-crossers are women and children seeking to reunite with their families. “Crossing Arizona” examines the crisis through the eyes of those directly affected by it.
After graduating from Harvard University in 1999 with a B.A. in Social Anthropology, Dan spent several years honing his documentary filmmaking skills in New York City working on several projects including: “Counting On Democracy,” which documents Florida's 2000 election scandal and “Refusing To Die: A Kenyan Story,” which chronicles Kenya’s struggle with post-colonial dictatorship. In 2004, he partnered with Joseph Mathew to co-direct and produce Crossing Arizona, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January of 2006.
Saturday May 12
10:00 a.m.
Cartoons for Peace and Justice
For children ages 5-12, teens and general audiences.
These short, nonverbal, animated films are designed as flexible tools to explore conflict resolution.
These will be followed by moderated discussion with librarian, Susan Roth
The Dingles
Director/Animator: Les Drew
running time: 8 minutes
Doris Dingle and her three cats survive a dangerous storm by working together and helping each other.
The Dog Who Was a Cat Inside
Directed by Siri Melchior
running time: 5 minutes
The dog and the cat who is inside of him have to learn to live together peacefully, even though they want very different things.
Journey of the Blob
Directed by Bill Maylone
running time: 10 minutes
In this live action film, a boy creates a green glob and throws it in a stream of water where it begins its long journey through the ecology of the water cycle.
The Sandbox
Directed by JoDee Samuelson
running time: 13 minutes
Two children create an entire world in their sandbox for their small friend bear, but lose him when more and more people, buildings and machines come into their world.
Bully Dance
Directed by Janet Perlman
running time: 10 minutes
In the film a community is disrupted when a bully victimizes a smaller member of the group. Eventually, the whole community becomes involved in dealing with the bully, who is himself a victim in his own house.
Dinner for Two
Directed by Janet Perlman
running time: 7.5 minutes
A simple dispute between two small animals grows into a violent struggle that disrupts everyone around them. As they battle over "territory," these two small animals realize that their conflict affects not just them, but their whole environment.
Elbow Room
Directed by Diane Obomsawin
Running time: 9 minutes
In this animated short, we watch as a simple dispute between a pair of office workers is played out four different ways, each of them reflecting a common real-life approach to conflict: retreat, denial, aggression and negotiation
11:30 a.m.
Invisible Children
Directed by: Jason Russell, Bobby Bailey and Laren Poole
running time: 55 minutes
In the spring of 2003, 3 young Americans from California left in search of such a story. What they found was a tragedy that disgusted and inspired them.
Every night in northern Uganda, tens of thousands of children, known as night commuters, flow into town centers. They come seeking safety in shelters set up by aid agencies, with the Ugandan government unable to end a brutal 18-year war and protect them from rebel attacks. The LRA abducts children from their village homes and forces them to join the rebel ranks. Once the children are under rebel control, they are trained to kill under the threat of death and mutilation. Young girls are taken as sex slaves.
These children are invisible because they roam distant battlefields away from public scrutiny, because no records are kept of their numbers or age, and because their own armies deny they exist.
1:30 p.m.
Last Ghost of War
Directed by Janet Gardner
running time: 57 minutes
Last Ghost of War was made possible in part by a grant from the New Jersey Council for the Humanities, a state partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations in this film do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities or the New Jersey Council for the Humanities.
Discussion with director Janet Gardner and producer Pham Quoc Thai
(Vietnam News Agency)
Producer/director Janet Gardner is an award-winning documentary producer known especially for her work on Southeast Asia. Ms. Gardner's interest in Southeast Asia began thirteen years ago, when she covered post-war Vietnam and the Agent Orange issue for The New York Times, Boston Globe Magazine, and other publications. She is a veteran of NBC News' The Today Show, WNBC's NewsCenter 4, WRC's News4Washington, Conde Naste Publications, and The Cleveland Plain Dealer. Other publications she has contributed to include The New York Times, The Boston Globe Magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Magazine, and The Nation.
Born in Vietnam, Pham Thai came to the U.S. in 1971 to attend SUNY-Buffalo. He joined The Gardner Group as an assistant producer in 1992 for the production of Vietnam: Land of the Ascending Dragon (International Video Network). As an associate producer, he collaborated with The Gardner Group on A World Beneath The War, a PBS documentary about the secret tunnels of Vietnam, broadcast on 18 PBS stations. The program won a Silver Apple at the National Educational Film & Video Festival and broadcast worldwide by Discovery International in 1998. A World Beneath The War is distributed by NAATA and Filmakers Library, Inc. He is currently co-producing a history of the babylift entitled Precious Cargo, which is supported by Independent Television Service.
At Tu Du Hospital in Saigon, babies in a special unit have enlarged heads or are missing limbs. Pham thi thuy Linh, born without arms, writes with her feet. Thirty years after the end of the Vietnam war, they are among several millions of victims of Agent Orange.
3:00 p.m. NOTE NEW TIME
Salud! What puts Cuba on the map in the quest for global health…
Directed by Connie Field
running time: 93 minutes
Speaker: Ellen Bernstein, IFCO/Pastors for Peace
TOPIC: Is health care a commodity or a human right?
Ellen P. Bernstein, Princeton University alumnus, has served as Associate Director of the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) since 2003. She has led 18 Congressional delegations to Cuba, traveling with more than 20 members of Congress and 40 key Congressional aides. It was during a Congressional Black Caucus visit that the offer was made of full scholarships for medical school study to low-income and minority students from the United States. IFCO has been administering the US admissions program for the Latin American Medical School in Havana.
Ellen Bernstein and Teresa Thomas, 6th year student at
Latin American Medical School.
¡SALUD! traces the conflicting agenda in the quest for global health. Filmed in Cuba, South Africa, the Gambia, Honduras and Venezuela, ¡SALUD! challenges us to think about the larger questions: How do we get enough doctors and health workers to where they are needed most? Do governments have a responsibility for the health of their citizens? ¡SALUD! depicts the philosophy and people involved in making what the BBC calls ‘one of the world’s best health systems’ and a leader in the movement for healthcare for all.
5:15 p.m. NOTE NEW TIME
Open Mic: Story Telling: New Orleans
Those affected by Hurricane Katrina as well as those involved in relief efforts are invited to share their experiences at a special film and open mic program. The evening will also feature four short films shot during or just after the disaster.
Speakers: Filmmakers Mary Beth Black and Walidah Imarisha, Professor Melissa Harris-Lacewell and members of the student organization Got Guts.
Panelists:
Mary Beth Black (Director: New Orleans East):
Mary Beth Black is an artist and activist. She grew up in the South, got a BA in fine Arts from UC Berkeley in '93, and happily took refuge in New Orleans for the better part of 13 years until the aftershocks of Hurricane Katrina finally forced her dislocation. Her post-Katrina film work has screened at the MOMA in New York, Human Rights film festivals in New Orleans, community arts centers in East LA among others. She is the co-founder of the New Orleans TV collective website, a collaboration of independent videos in the months following Katrina. Currently she teaches basic math skills to adults and is pursuing studies with the ultimate goal of practicing medicine.
Walidah Imarisha (Director: Finding Common Ground in New Orleans):
Walidah Imarisha helped to found and served as the first editor of the political hip hop publication AWOL Magazine. She was one of the editors of the 911 anthology Another World is Possible. The bad half of the poetry duo Good Sista/Bad Sista, She has been featured on PBS, VH1 and has performed with people as diverse as writer John Irving to Chuck D.
Her post-Katrina documentary Finding Common Ground in New Orleans, has screened at the Museum of Modern Art as well as numerous film festivals around the world. She does anti prison organizing with the Human Rights Coalition, a group of prisoners' families and former prisoners and is on the board of the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors, which does anti militarism organizing work.
Melissa Harris-Lacewell: Melissa Harris-Lacewell is a Princeton University political science professor and a group of students from her class on Disaster, Race and American Politics, embarked on a trip to New Orleans to participate in the rebuilding effort. Initiated by students, the experience was deeply memorable for everyone involved.
Emery Whalen: Emily Whalen, Princeton University ’09, went to New Orleans as part of the rebuilding effort, and is an organizer of GOT GUTS.
7:30 p.m.
Reception
Light refreshments will be served.
8:00 p.m.
Black Gold: wake up and smell the coffee
Directed by: Marc Francis and Nick Francis
running time: 77 minutes
Speaker: Rowena Gross, Manager of Ten Thousand Villages will lead a discussion on Globalization and Fair Trade.
Fair Trade Ethiopian coffee will be offered free of charge compliments of Ten Thousand Villages
Multinational coffee companies now rule malls and supermarkets and dominate the industry worth over $80 billion, making coffee the most valuable trading commodity in the world after oil. But while we continue to pay for our lattes and cappuccinos, the price paid to coffee farmers remains so low that many have been forced to abandon their coffee fields.
Sunday May 13
12:00 Noon
Lumo
Directed by:
running time: 52 minutes
(POV preview)
Speaker: Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt,
Director/Producer
In eastern Congo on the Rwanda border, vying militias, armies and bandits use rape as a weapon of terror. Lumo Sinai was just over 20 when marauding soldiers attacked her. A fistula, common among victims of violent rape, rendered her incontinent and threatens her ability to bear children. Cast aside by society, she awaits reconstructive surgery. "Lumo" is her story, tragic for its cruelties but also inspiring for the struggle she wages and the dignity she displays.
1:00 p.m.
Rosita
Directed by:
running time: 58 minutes
The plight of a nine-year-old Nicaraguan girl, who becomes pregnant as the result of a rape, triggers a battle over whose life has precedence.
2:00 p.m.
Suncookers
directed by: Catherine Scott
running time: 18 minutes
Discussion with Ishani Sud, Princeton University junior.
Ishani Sud has combined her interests in engineering and outreach to implement a solar oven project in Africa. The ovens, which she designed with classmate Lauren Wang, were constructed with locally available materials. Sud spent a summer in Kenya continuing previous work on the project and in Tanzania launching a similar program at a school for indigenous people.
"Suncookers" follows Margaret Owino as she trains solar cookers in Nyakach, Kenya and at the Kakuma Refugee Camp in Northern Kenya. Small cardboard solar cookers are clean, smoke free and better for the environment. For millions of people living in dry, fuel scarce regions, solar cookers can literally save lives.
2:45 p.m.
The Shape of Water
Directed by: Kum-Kum Bhavnani
running time: 70 minutes
In an intimate encounter with five very different women in Brazil, India, Jerusalem, and Senegal (narrated by Susan Sarandon with introductory narration co-written by Edwidge Danticat) THE SHAPE OF WATER offers a close look at the far reaching and vibrant alternatives crafted by women in response to environmental degradation, archaic traditions, lack of economic independence and war. By revealing the women’s revolutionary actions THE SHAPE OF WATER offers a unique view of the complex realities faced by these unsung visionaries creating a more just world.
4:00 p.m.
Shut Up and Sing
Directed by: Barbara Kopple and Cecilia Peck
running time: 93 minutes
In 2003, the female country band, The Dixie Chicks, is at the top of their game being one of the most successful bands of all time. However with the US invasion of Iraq about to begin over frustrated worldwide objections about this needless war, one of the Chick vents off the cuff in concert about being ashamed of US President George W. Bush. This statement sparks a firestorm of organized and personal right wing attacks against the Chicks for daring to think they have the right to express a negative personal opinion about the President. This film covers the band's effort to ride out the turmoil that would leave their careers under a cloud, but would eventually give them an opportunity to grow as great artists who bow to no one.
Previous Years' Schedules:
2006 Princeton Human Rights Film Festival
-- print a 2006 schedule of films (pdf)