Pittsburgh Film Festival
September 9-17, 2005Sunday, September 11
5:30 pm and 8:15 pm Melwood Screening Room
BOXERS AND BALLERINAS
5:45 pm Melwood Screening Room
STATE OF FEAR
8:00 pm Melwood Screening Room
BHOPAL: THE SEARCH FOR JUSTICE
Directors: Mike Cahill and Brit Marling
Documentary. 2005. Cuba/USA. 88 min. Spanish, subtitled.
Pittsburgh Premiere
Boxers and Ballerinas is about four young people forever united by their cultural heritage and forever divided by 90 miles of water and over 40 years of political conflict.
The documentary traces the lives of a boxer and a ballerina in Miami, Florida, and Havana, Cuba: their triumphs and failures, their power and powerlessness, and the singular intensity and violence of being young.
Boxers and Ballerinas cuts through the romantic mystery of Cuba, the neon stereotype of Miami, and the political noise of US-Cuba relations to tell a simple story of four young adults, fighting and dancing for success and freedom under two competing systems of government. Does what side of the Florida Straits you live on determine the shape and color of your dreams?
Filmmakers/Distributors Contact Information:
info@boxersandballerinas.com
Sunday, September 11th, 5:30 pm and 8:15 pm, Melwood Screening Room
Director: Pamela Yates
Documentary. 2005. Peru/USA. 94 min. English and Spanish, subtitled.
Pittsburgh Premiere
How can an open society balance demands for security with democracy? State of Fear dramatizes the human and societal costs a democracy faces when it embarks on a "war" against terror, a "war" potentially without end, all too easily exploited by unscrupulous leaders seeking personal political gain.
The film follows events in Peru, yet it serves as a cautionary tale for a nation like the United States. Filmmakers Pamela Yates, Paco de Onís and Peter Kinoy masterfully blend personal testimony, history and archival footage to tell the story of escalating violence in the Andean nation and how fear of terrorism was used to undermine the democracy, making Peru a virtual dictatorship where official corruption replaced the rule of law.
Terrorist attacks by the Shining Path guerrillas provoked a military occupation of the countryside. Military justice replaced civil authority, widespread abuses by the Peruvian Army went unpunished, and the terrorism continued to spread. Nearly 70,000 civilians eventually died at the hands of the Shining Path and the Peruvian military.
On Saturday, September 10th the film will be followed by a discussion with Mel Packer, a supporter of Center for Constitutional Rights and a longtime activist for human rights internationally.
Filmmakers/Distributors Contact Information:
Paco de Onis
paco@skylightpictures.com
Saturday, September 10th, 8:00 pm, and Sunday, September 11th, 5:45 pm, Melwood Screening Room
Directors: Lindalee Tracey & Peter Raymont
Documentary. 2004. Canada. 52 min. English.
East Coast Premiere
On December 2, 1984, the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India leaked poisonous methyl isocyanate gas killing 15,000 men, women and children. Bhopal was and remains the world's worst chemical industry disaster.
Twenty years later, survivors are being re-victimized by the deliberate thwarting of scientific and medical studies concerning the damage. Exploring charges of corruption and greed, Bhopal: The Search for Justice follows Raajkumar Keswani, a local journalist whose prediction of the Union Carbide leak proved prophetic.
Keswani documents the legacy, the continued pollution of drinking water sources, "gas widows" trying to survive on inadequate settlements, and the possibility that the second and third generation of children are growing up with genetic abnormalities that some claim are caused by the gas.
The film will be followed by a discussion with Folabi Olagbaju, director of Amnesty International USA's (AIUSA) Mid-Atlantic Region. Prior to this he was the director of AIUSA's Just Earth! (Human Rights and the Environment) Program.
Filmmakers/Distributors Contact Information:
John Sirabella
j.sirabella@nfb.ca
Sunday, September 11th, 8:00 pm, Melwood Screening Room