Sundance DocSource » DFP Grantees

Donde Estan

Maria Rodriguez — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 01:23:15 +0000

Director: Maria Teresa Rodriguez

Logline: Three people are torn from their families during the Salvadoran civil war and attempt to find reconciliation.

¿Dónde Están? is a documentary about the search for children who disappeared during the Salvadoran civil war. Many were survivors of massacres carried out by US-trained battalions of the Salvadoran army; they were taken from the scene by soldiers, to grow up in orphanages or be raised by strangers, not knowing their true history or identity. Through three separate yet intertwined journeys, ¿Dónde Están? tells the story of war survivors whose lives reflect the troubled reality of a country still in transition from war to peace. Jamie, 28, was adopted from El Salvador as an infant and raised in a Washington suburb; she searches for her birth family. Miguel, 26, was separated from his father after an army attack killed his mother; unable to earn enough to support his own family, he illegally immigrates to the US for work. His father, survivor of a massacre in which his previous family died, searches for justice. Margarita’s mother was murdered in a massacre and her four siblings, children at the time, disappeared; she’s an investigator for Pro-Búsqueda, a human rights organization that tracks down and reunites disappeared children with their families. Their stories of struggle and hope reveal the larger issues of how a society heals itself from the scars of a civil war.

Links: (More to come in the coming months!)

www.probusqueda.org – Pro Búsqueda
www.museo.com.sv – Museo de la Palabra y la Imagen

Waiting To Inhale

Jed Riffe — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:07:46 +0000

Director: Jed Riffe

Logline: Waiting to Inhale takes the viewer from underground cannabis clubs to the United States Supreme Court; from Israeli science labs to government approved cannabis gardens outside London. It features leading experts and researchers from all over the world on both sides of the controversy over the therapeutic potential of cannabis.

Synopsis: Waiting to Inhale examines the heated debate over marijuana and its use as medicine in the United States. Twelve states have passed legislation to protect patients who use medical marijuana. Yet opponents claim the medical argument is just a smokescreen for a different agenda– to legalize marijuana for recreation and profit. What claims are being made, and what are the stakes?

Waiting to Inhale takes viewers inside the lives of patients who have been forever changed by illness—and parents who lost their children to addiction. Is marijuana really a gateway drug? What evidence is there to support the claim that marijuana can alleviate some of the devastating symptoms of AIDS, cancer and multiple sclerosis? Waiting to Inhale sheds new light on this controversy and presents shocking new evidence that marijuana could hold a big stake in the future of medicine.

http://www.waitingtoinhale.org/thefilm.htm

The Shock Doctrine

kfeeley — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:06:16 +0000

Director: Michael Winterbottom and Mat Whitecross

Logline: Closely based on the book by award-winning journalist Naomi Klein, Shock Doctrine exposes how shock is used to implement economic policy in vulnerable environments.

Synopsis: Based on the best-selling book by Naomi Klein, The Shock Doctrine seeks to explain the rise of disaster capitalism: the exploitation of moments of crisis in vulnerable countries by governments and big business. The film traces the doctrine’s beginnings in the radical theories of Milton Friedman at the University of Chicago, and its subsequent implementation over the past 40 years in countries as disparate as Augusto Pinochet’s Chile, Boris Yeltsin’s Russia, Margaret Thatcher’s Great Britain, and most recently through the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Filmmakers Michael Winterbottom and Mat Whitecross use a brand of artistic license to present a cinematic experience that takes this theory to a new audience. They make heavy use of archival images, offset with new footage of Klein’s interviews and lectures. Warning: After viewing this film, you may interpret our world history in a new light.

Casino Nation

Laure Sullivan — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:04:23 +0000

Directors: Laure Sullivan, Terry Jones and Paul Wilson

Logline: Despite prophesies that gambling would destroy them, the Seneca Nation of Indians takes its biggest gamble ever, and opens a casino, leading to factional violence and open civil war.

Synopsis: The film Casino Nation is a snapshot of a Native American tribe at a crossroads. After having endured a long and bloody struggle over tribal gaming, the Seneca Nation of Indians is now in the casino business. In production now, this film highlights the impact of sudden prosperity on this small sovereign nation that has historically struggled with crushing poverty. Will the distinctive culture and identity of these native people be able to withstand the onslaught of American culture’s promise of big and easy money? And will the tribe be able to heal the deep rifts created by conflict over casinos? The film explores these and other issues facing the Senecas during this critical time of sweeping change.

To Catch A Dollar: Muhammad Yunus Banks On America

Gayle Ferraro — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 00:01:28 +0000

Director: Gayle Ferraro

Logline: Tapping into the success of Muhammad Yunus after winning the Nobel Peace Prize (2006), Grameen America has opened in Queens, NY replicating the banking model program Yunus first started in Bangladesh.

Synopsis: What prevents poor people from getting ahead? Banks refuse to give credit without collateral. Where commercial banks see insolvency, Nobel Prize–winning economist Muhammad Yunus sees opportunity. His groundbreaking Grameen Bank was built on the radical notion that if you loan poor women money within the context of peer support, not only will they repay and sustain the bank, but they’ll elevate their communities in the process.

With millions of microloans to rural entrepreneurs in developing countries, Grameen is now audaciously importing its methods to the bastion of first-world capitalism: the U.S.A. First stop: Queens, New York. With an intimate camera capturing both buoyant and despairing moments, To Catch a Dollar chronicles the evolution of the tiny new branch. Will the solidarity principles translate to a diverse group of inner-city women? As the banking industry collapses, will these intrepid social-justice financiers succeed? One thing’s clear: we need new models to ensure prosperity for all.

Howl

Rob Epstein — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 23:54:39 +0000

Director: Rob Epstien

Logline: A drama centered on the obscenity trial Allen Ginsberg faced after the publication of his poem, Howl.

Synopsis: In San Francisco in 1957, an American masterpiece was put on trial. Howl is a feature film about this pivotal moment in the birth of the counter-culture—the opening volley in the coming “culture wars.”

The story is told through three interweaving threads: the trial, filmed as a widescreen 1950’s courtroom drama; a re-created “interview” with the young Allen shot in the style of a 1960’s documentary; and the poem itself, read by the real Allen Ginsberg and animated by graphic novelist and Ginsberg collaborator Eric Drooker as a Beat FANTASIA. Cumulatively, the three threads tell the story of the creation of a groundbreaking work of art, the work itself, and society’s reaction. Documentary interviews with actual participants and witnesses are used as interstitial punctuation. The genre-busting form of the film echoes the startling originality of the poem itself. The trial is the narrative spine of the film, playing out themes that are still resonant today: definitions of obscenity, the limits of free expression, the purpose of art, and more broadly, the forces of the past fearing what they don’t understand, and the inevitability of generational change. It veers from the comically absurd to a passionate defense of freedom of speech and creative expression. The hero is defense attorney Jake “The Master” Ehrlich, a snappy dresser and celebrity civil liberties lawyer who out-maneuvers the opposition with his mental and verbal agility. The prosecuting attorney, Ralph McIntosh, tries to prove that the work is obscene, while struggling to understand it. The presiding judge is Clayton Horn, who delivers a surprisingly impassioned decision.

A Small Act

Jennifer Arnold — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 19:05:02 +0000

Director: Jennifer Arnold

Logline: A young Kenyan’s life is changed dramatically when his education is sponsored by a Swedish stranger. Years later, he founds his own scholarship program to replicate the kindness he once received. But can he have the same impact on a new generation?

Synopsis: When Hilde Back sponsored a young, impoverished Kenyan student, she thought nothing of it. She paid roughly $15 dollars per term to keep him in primary school. She certainly never expected to hear from him, but many years later, she does, Chris Mburu has been thinking of his “angel” Hilde since he was a boy. The small contribution she made paid off – Chris went all the way to Harvard. Now, he’s a respected UN human rights lawyer, dedicating his life to battling genocide and crimes against humanity. Chris decides to replicate Hilde’s generosity by starting his own scholarship fund, and he names it after her. This scholarship will educate bight kids in his village so they can also succeed and give back. But Chris is stunned when Kenya’s public schools start failing, and only two new students qualify for sponsorship. Simultaneously, Kenya falls into ethnic-based election violence. After working on conflicts in neighboring countries, Chris knows that ignorance fuels ethnic hatred. Education has never been more important. Chris must decide what to do.

http://www.asmallact.com/

25 To Life

Mike Brown — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 19:02:19 +0000

Director: Mike Brown

Logline: William Brawner was infected with HIV before he turned two and kept it a secret for over twenty years. Now he seeks redemption from the women of his promiscuous past and embarks on a new phase of life with his pregnant wife, who is HIV-negative.

Synopsis: 25 To Lifeis a startlingly fresh look at HIV and AIDS in America. It is a retrospective of a young man’s life with HIV/AIDS and a document of his struggle to carve out an open honest future. At 18 months old, William Brawner was severely burned and received a blood transfusion, through which he contracted the HIV/AIDS virus. Fearing his death year after year and the inevitable stigma and discrimination of an AIDS diagnosis, his young mother, grandmother and aunt agree to keep his HIV status a well-guarded secret. After life-changing events, William can bare his secret no more. In the summer 2006, 26 year-old William finally discloses his HIV-status, provoking an eruption of emotions from family, ex-girlfriends, friends, and strangers alike. Everyone had questions they wanted – and in some cases, needed answered immediately. How did this heterosexual African-American man contract this virus? Did he have sex with other men? Did he do drugs? How many women had he slept with? Had he infected other people? What kind of person keeps something like this a secret? In 25 To Life, William battles with these questions, head on. Seeking redemption, William attempts to confront past girlfriends, quits his job to start an organization for HIV positive youth in Philadelphia; marries Bridgette, who is HIV-negative and makes plans for his first child. Through day to day coverage of William’s life, first hand accounts from those he’s impacted, and the use of evocative archival material, 25 To Life paints a very unique, and intimate portrait. It tackles the tough social issues of sex, race, and manhood, while providing unprecedented access into a life and a family LIVING with the AIDS virus.

My Good Name Is Stalin

Kavita Pillay — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 18:57:26 +0000

Director: Kavita Pillay

Logline: Through the eyes of young Keralites named Stalin and Lenin, My Good Name Is Stalin is a tragicomic portrait of this unique corner of the global south as it grapples with shifting notions about capitalism and communism, migration and migrants, individual needs and their global consequences -– all against the backdrop of seismic shifts in the world economy and the largest cross-border movement of people in human history.

Synopsis: Unbeknownst to most people, Stalin and Lenin are alive and living in Kerala, India – the verdant, southwesternmost corner of the world’s largest democracy and home of the world’s first democratically elected communist government. With literacy levels, birth rates and life expectancies rivaling those of wealthy, industrialized economies, development experts have long regarded Kerala as a rare example of “well being without wealth”. Yet Kerala – like so many parts of the global south – is increasingly dependent on money sent home by those who have emigrated. Today, one in six Malayalis (a reference to Malayalam, Kerala’s official state language) of working age lives abroad. 90% of these emigrants are in the Persian Gulf.

My Good Name Is Stalin is a tragicomic examination of the personal and societal costs of this mass outmigration, seen through the eyes of young Malayalis named Stalin and Lenin as they navigate choices that reveal the circumstances propelling millions in the global south to leave home for wealthier parts of the world. Whether trading life in “One of the World’s 10 Paradises” (as National Geographic has dubbed Kerala) to toil in Dubai in conditions that range between indentured servitude and slavery or struggling in the economically stagnant but familiar landscape of home, each decision to stay or go extracts a cost. By focusing on Malayalis with notorious, Soviet-inspired names, this film aims to put an unexpected and memorable face on shifting notions about capitalism and communism, migration and migrants, individual needs and their global consequences – all against the backdrop of seismic shifts in the world economy and the largest cross-border movement of people in human history.

Semper Fi: Always Faithful

Rachel Libert — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 18:54:50 +0000

Director: Rachel Libert

Logline: SEMPER FI: ALWAYS FAITHFUL tells the story of a retired Marine’s fight for justice on behalf of U.S. soldiers and their families exposed to toxic drinking water while stationed at North Carolina’s Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base.

Short Synopsis: Marine Corps Master Sgt. Jerry Ensminger was a devoted Marine for nearly twenty-five years. As a drill instructor he lived and breathed the “Corps” and was responsible for indoctrinating thousands of new recruits. When Jerry’s nine year-old daughter died of a rare type of leukemia, his world was upended. As a grief-stricken father, he struggled to make sense of what happened. In his search for answers, he discovered a Marine Corps cover-up of one of the largest water contamination incidents in U.S. history.

http://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/

Sundance DocSource » DFP Grantees

Donde Estan

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Waiting To Inhale

Other Articles

The Shock Doctrine

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Casino Nation

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To Catch A Dollar: Muhammad Yunus Banks On America

Other Articles

Howl

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A Small Act

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25 To Life

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My Good Name Is Stalin

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Semper Fi: Always Faithful

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