Author: representmedia

Sammy’s Final Arrangement at 2024 Silicon Valley Asian Pacific FilmFest

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Sammy’s Final Arrangement, directed by For Us, By Us fellow, Chad Santo Tomas, screened at the 2024 Silicon Valley Asian Pacific FilmFest as part of the Bay Area Shorts program on October 19.

In Sammy’s Final Arrangement, Samuel Go must come to terms with the stresses and the dwindling creative freedom that have resulted in his decision to end his practice and begin a new life. As Sammy directs his own cycle of self preservation, he must navigate the final stages of packing the remnants of his studio, a 2nd child with his wife, and the stresses of a final large scale wedding.

Saranam Gacchâmi – Richmond Library Screening

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For Us, By Us fellow, Priyanka Suryaneni, is screening her film, Saranam Gacchâmi, with the Richmond Public Library.

Sat, October 5, 3:30pm
Richmond City Council Chambers
440 Civic Center Plaza, Richmond, CA 94804

This special screening will include a musical performance by renowned Tibetan artists, a panel discussion, and Tibetan tea and food.

Register here.

Saranam Gacchâmi is a documentary film about an enterprising Buddhist Monk who defies all odds to set up one of the largest Tibetan Monasteries in the Bay Area to preserve the endangered Tibetan culture and traditions.

PARAMITA screenings at Mill Valley Film Festival & Queer Voices NYC Film Festival

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PARAMITA, directed by Re-Take Oakland filmmaker Kirthi Nath, is currently screening at festivals.

Part poetry, part memoir-style reflection and part prayer, PARAMITA bears witness to Prajna Choudhury’s 25-year coming out process with her traditional Bangladeshi mother. Told with intimacy, tenderness and a quiet power, PARAMITA invites us into a meditative spiritual experience as Prajna connects with Buddhist practices and nature as gateways for intergenerational healing.

EAST COAST PREMIERE

Queer Voices: NYC Film Festival

Shorts Block 2: We Fight Back

Saturday, September 28 @ 5 pm EST
LGBT Center in NYC – 208 W 13th St, NY, NY 10011
TICKETS

WEST COAST PREMIERE

Mill Valley Film Festival

FREEDOM shorts program

Saturday, October 5 @ 3 pm AND Wednesday, October 9 @ 3:30 pm PST
Smith Rafael Center – 1118 4th St, San Rafael, CA 94901
Post-Screening Q&A with filmmaker and subjects.
TICKETS

Learn more on PARAMITA’s website.

Jessica Jones and Pallavi Somusetty awarded Berkeley FILM Foundation Grants

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Two Re-Take Oakland filmmakers were awarded a 2024 Berkeley FILM Foundation Grant. Congratulations to Jessica Jones (Women Who Ride) and Pallavi Somusetty (The Aunties – working title)!

Women Who Ride is an intimate portrait of D’Vious Wayz Motorcycle Club, Oakland’s first Black all-women motorcycle club. Led by Tish Edwards, this group has been together for 20 years, but as membership dwindles during COVID and family responsibilities mount, multiple challenges will need to be addressed on the journey ahead.

The Aunties tells the story of Berkeley-based historian and artist, Barnali, who spearheads a grassroots campaign to rename a street after Kala Bagai, one of the first South Asian women to organize South Asian communities in California against intense racial discrimination, over a hundred years ago.

Coach Emily awarded Sundance Documentary Fund Grant

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Congratulations to Re-Take Oakland filmmaker, Pallavi Somusetty, for being awarded a Sundance Institute Documentary Fund Grant for her film, Coach Emily.

Coach Emily is a feature documentary that follows Emily Taylor, an Oakland-based Black and queer rock climbing coach, as she battles systemic racism in her professional and personal life. Through her Brown Girls Climbing program, Emily trains young girls of color, including her own daughter, as they resist discrimination in the climbing world and work to define themselves in the outdoors.

Home Court festival screenings

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Re-Take Oakland filmmaker Jenn Lee Smith, is a producer on the new film, Home Court, which is currently screening at festivals. Home Court is a feature documentary that traces the ascent of Ashley Chea, a basketball prodigy whose life intensifies amid recruitment, injury, and triumph throughout her high school years.

Festivals

August 1-11, 2024 | Asian American International Film Festival | NYC

June 26-30, 2024 | Austin Asian American Film Festival* | Austin

*Winner of Jury Award – Documentary Feature Film

June 25-30, 2024 | Cambodia International Film Festival | Cambodia

June 14-23, 2024 | Shanghai International Film Festival | Shanghai

May 30 – June 14, 2024 | HAPPIFEST | Houston

May 9-19, 2024 | CAAMFest | San Francisco

May 5, 2024 | Visual Communications Film Festival | Los Angeles

Learn more on Home Court’s website.

ALIVE IN BRONZE: Huey P. Newton – VC x BGDM Shorts Showcase 2024

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ALIVE IN BRONZE: Huey P. Newton, directed by Re-Take Oakland filmmaker A.K. Sandhu, will be screened in the VC x BGDM Shorts Showcase 2024 presented by the Video Consortium and Brown Girls Doc Mafia. They are hosting in-person screenings across NYC, LA, SF, and Atlanta, curated by VC x BGDM and featuring in person Q&As.

VC x BGDM Shorts Showcase: Bay Area

Tuesday, July 9, 2024, 7pm
The New Parkway

In ALIVE IN BRONZE: Huey P. Newton, sculptor Dana King’s hands and activist Fredrika Newton’s memories come together to build a new monument that honors the Black Panther Party’s vital place in American history.

More info and tickets: https://browngirlsdocmafia.org/VC-x-BGDM-Shorts-Showcase-2024

IDA – Storytelling Our Way: Filmmakers of Color Forge Their Path

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Re-Take Oakland filmmaker, Pallavi Somusetty, will be a panelist for Storytelling Our Way: Filmmakers of Color Forge Their Path. This panel is part of the IDA Logan Elevate Public Program, a series of panels where IDA Logan Elevate 2023 filmmaking fellows open a conversation about cultural exchange within the film industry.

Storytelling Our Way: Filmmakers of Color Forge Their Path

Tuesday, July 2, 2024, 9 am PST

How can we be supported to tell stories outside of the dominant gaze, if most formative spaces for international artists are trying to make a film “accessible” to a mass audience? How can we create new Global South and diaspora forms for our specific audiences, particularly during a time when resources are scarce and the sustainability of our work is threatened? 

Join moderator Monika Navarro, Senior Director of Artists Programs at Firelight Media, and filmmaker panelists Jude Chehab, director of Q (2023),  Zippy Kimundu, co-director and co-producer of Our Freedom, Our Land (2023), and 2023 IDA Logan Elevate grantee Pallavi Somusetty, as they discuss ways to make room for their storytelling and reimagine their audiences.

More info and registration: https://www.documentary.org/event/storytelling-our-way-filmmakers-color-forge-their-path

A Human Rights Approach to Media Accountability

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Sherizaan Minwalla

Sherizaan Minwalla is a human rights lawyer and researcher who has been based in Iraq for more than a decade. She has worked closely with the Yazidi community and survivors since the 2014 genocide.

 

Individuals featured in documentaries or media reports may be exposed to physical, social, or psychological risks

The concept of informed consent as a legal requirement is rooted in ethical principles to ”do no harm”

We encourage filmmakers to integrate informed consent … while ultimately working towards structures and mechanisms of societal and legal accountability.

Advancing a Global Human Rights Approach to Media Accountability
By SHERIZAAN MINWALLA, Founder of Taboo LLC

Global attention on unethical media practices has intensified in recent years, leading to greater scrutiny of harms that occur to sources and participants. Individuals featured in documentaries or media reports may be exposed to physical, social, or psychological risks in the process of gathering their stories and in the aftermath of public exposure, requiring legal protection from and accountability for retaliation, stigma, and trauma. This is particularly important when sensitive or controversial issues are covered.

Media makers, including documentary filmmakers and video journalists, are increasingly considering the voluntary ethics and guidelines that apply to their work. However, towards the creation of a long-term solution to media accountability at the societal and legal levels, a framework for engaging with survivors should be based on informed consent, trauma-informed, survivor- and community-centered practices. From a human rights lens, implementing informed consent practices is a step toward ensuring that media makers can be held to account legally and socially, providing a safeguard against exploitative practices.

The concept of informed consent as a legal requirement is rooted in ethical principles to ”do no harm” and to safeguard the rights of participants in medical research, starting with the Nuremberg Code of 1947. It followed the disclosure that the Nazi regime conducted medical experiments on prisoners and other marginalized groups that amounted to atrocities. The Nuremberg Code was expanded by the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and the 1979 Belmont Report, stressing the importance of confidentiality, assessment of risks and benefits, and the autonomy of research participants. These ethical codes have been codified in laws across the world, making informed consent a legal requirement for medical providers, researchers, lawyers, and other professionals working with human beings.

These principles are also the basis for guidelines such as those set forth in the Murad Code on documenting sexual violence in conflict and the Dart Center Europe’s guidelines for Reporting on Sexual Violence in Conflict. However, since these are not legally enforceable rules, participants engaging with the media need legal protections. We encourage filmmakers to integrate informed consent into their filmmaking practices, while ultimately working towards structures and mechanisms of societal and legal accountability.