HUMAN RIGHTS FILM FESTIVAL STARTS THURSDAY
Rokhsanna Sadeghi
thought that I should keep passing it along - - -
Documentaries from around the world to be screened during
Fifth Annual Human Rights Film Festival
Oct. 46 at Syracuse University
Award- winning film documentaries from around the globe will be shown
at Syracuse University Oct. 46 as part of the Fifth Annual Human
Rights Film Festival. The festival is part of the 2007 Syracuse
Symposium focusing on justice, presented by The College of Arts and
Sciences, and is co- sponsored by the South Asia Center at the Daniel
Patrick Moynihan Institute for Global Affairs and the South Asian
Students Association, in collaboration with Breakthrough, and the
S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications as part of its yearlong
celebration of the First Amendment.
All films will be shown in Shemin Auditorium in the Shaffer Art
Building and are free and open to the public. Parking is available in
the Booth Garage on Thursday at 7 p.m. for $3.50. On Friday at 7
p.m., parking is available in all non- gated parking lots. On
Saturday
afternoon, parking is available for $7 in the Booth Garage (garage
closes two hours after the completion of the football game). Saturday
evening parking is available in all non- gated parking lots.
The screening schedule, which is also available at http://
symposium.syr.edu, is as follows:
Queering the Frame, Thursday, Oct. 4, at 7 p.m.
· Say Amen! Tagid Amen! (65 minutes, 2005, Israel). David Deri,
the 26- year- old gay son of orthodox Jewish parents, is the central
character in this documentary that reveals the best and worst of the
Deri clan as they join David in his journey toward selfhood.
· Between the LinesIndias Third Gender (94 minutes, 2005,
Germany). Following three hijras, biological men who dress as women
but reject identification with either gender, photographer Anita
Khemka provides deep insights into a social group that is a growing
leader in the struggle for gender and sexuality rights in India.
Inheritance of Our Pasts, Friday, Oct. 5, at 6 p.m.
· Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Roméo
Dallaire (90 minutes, 2004, Canada. Tasked by the United Nations to
maintain peace in Rwanda, Canadian Lt. Gen. Roméo Dallaire and a
handful of soldiers were unable to stop the genocide of an estimated
800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994. After 10 years, Dallaire
returns to Rwanda and recounts the 100 days when Rwandans suffered
not only genocide but betrayal, racism and abandonment by the global
community.
· Leila Khaled Hijacker (58 minutes, 2005, Sweden). In August
1969, Leila Khaled became the first woman to hijack an airliner. This
narrative tells the story of why she became a freedom fighter for
the Popular Front of the Liberation of Palestine and was celebrated
by some and reviled by others. The screening will be followed by a
discussion with the director, Lina Makboul.
Subaltern Stories, Saturday, Oct. 6, at noon
· Inclusion: Makes Everyone Happy (1 minute, 2005, India).
This short, animated film looks at the serious subject of
accessibility and equal rights for people with disabilities by
showing how a ramp may be used by different people in different ways.
· MitumbaThe Second Hand Road (53 minutes, 2005, Italy). A
simple story of a T- shirts journey from the Northern Hemisphere to
the Southern Hemisphere as told by people involved in the second-
hand
clothing trade.
· Bushmans Secret (64 minutes, 2006, South Africa). Hoodia, a
cactus used by Bushmen for centuries, has caught the attention of a
giant pharmaceutical company. Through the eyes of Jan, a traditional
Bushman healer, the documentary shows a world where modernity
collides with ancient ways at a time when each has come to rely on
the other.
Ideologies of the City, Saturday, Oct. 6, at 3 p.m.
· Froth (10 minutes, 2006, India). This short documentary
examines the stereotypes that inform contemporary Islamophobia.
· Q2P (54 minutes, 2006, India). As this film observes who has
to queue to pee, the imagination of gender that underlies shifting
boundaries between public and private space in futuristic Mumbai is
understood.
· John and Jane (83 minutes, 2005, India). A blend of
observational documentary and tropical science fiction, the story
follows six call agents who answer U.S. 1- 800 numbers in a Mumbai
call center.
Children and Inheritance of Our Pasts, Saturday, Oct. 6 at 6 p.m.
· First Lesson in Peace (56 minutes, 2005, Israel). The movie
chronicles 6- year- old Michal and her start of schooling at the only
bilingual Hebrew and Arabic school in Israel for Israeli and
Palestinian children, Neveh Shalom/Wahaht- al- Salam. Her parents
decision to send her to the school was not an easy oneMichals
grandfather is a Zionist and her uncle overtly right wing. As Michal
has her first encounters at the school, her extended family faces
their own conflicts and challenges.
· Our America (84 minutes, 2005, Switzerland and Nicaragua).
In 1979, Nicaragua had just freed itself from a 45- year dictatorship
and was attempting the impossible, hoping to triumph over poverty and
discrimination within a system of political plurality and a mixed
economic system. Twenty- five years after a revolution that no one
believed was possible, director Kristina Conrad returns to the neo-
liberal Nicaragua battered by war and corruption and sketches a
narrative of memories and observations of the current state of
affairs. The film features women who took up arms against the U.S.-
funded Contras and now struggle to survive.
The Syracuse Symposium is a semester- long intellectual and artistic
festival, hosted by SUs College of Arts and Sciences, that
celebrates interdisciplinary thinking, imagination and creation. The
theme for the 2007 series is Justice.
____________________________________________________
Tula Goenka
Assoc. Professor, Television- Radio- Film
S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications
Syracuse University
Tel: 315- 443- 3376
Fax: 315- 443- 3946
Off: Room 445, NCC III