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UID:Indybay-30463
SEQUENCE:30463
CREATED:20040208T035200Z
DESCRIPTION:HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH, the largest U.S.-based international human rights 
 monitoring and advocacy organization continues their outreach with the 
 fourth Human Rights Watch International Film Festival (HRWIFF) in the Bay 
 Area.  Taking place at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley from February 
 26-28 and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco on 4 
 consecutive Fridays in March (5, 12, 19 and 26) this year offers twelve 
 provocative films which help put a human face on threats to individual 
 freedom and dignity, and celebrate the power of the human spirit and 
 intellect to prevail.    Human Rights Watch's International Film Festival 
 has become a leading venue for distinguished fiction, documentary and 
 animated films and videos with a distinctive human rights theme. Through 
 the eyes of committed and courageous filmmakers, we showcase the heroic 
 stories of activists and survivors from all over the world.  We seek to 
 empower everyone with the knowledge that personal commitment can make a 
 very real difference.  The festival schedule is as follows:  PACIFIC FILM 
 ARCHIVE  Friday Feb, 27 – 7:00pm  WAR TAKES Directed by Patricia Castano 
 and Adelaida Trujillo  Produced in Colombia/England, 2002/ Running Time:78m 
  For many people Colombia is associated with guerillas, cocaine and a 
 variety of political buzzwords that may or may not reflect the daily 
 reality of its citizens. Through the very intimate and personal video 
 diaries of three filmmakers, we as outsiders are given a look inside the 
 daily reality of a certain group of Colombians. The impact of the political 
 landscape on these individuals lives' and relationships help us to 
 understand the complexity of Colombia and its society. In the face of all 
 of it, these three filmmakers retain their sense of humor and their ability 
 to act in difficult and even dangerous circumstances.  In WAR TAKES three 
 Colombian filmmakers turned their cameras on themselves for over four 
 years, using personal stories to expose the tough reality in their violent, 
 war-ravaged country. According to these filmmakers, Colombia has been 
 functioning for many years in the gray area between legalism and 
 lawlessness. Their portrayal does not aim to confirm the image the outside 
 world has of Colombia as a hotbed of excessive political violence and drug 
 traffic, but instead draws out the beauty and warmth amidst the larger 
 turmoil within their homeland. The humor borders on surreal as the film 
 moves between conversations in the jungle with guerrillas to elegant dinner 
 parties with society's elite. War Takes allows the real lives of its 
 heroes, forever changed by war, to break through the stereotypes, forcing 
 us to rethink our own conceptions, or misconceptions, of the beliefs and 
 values by which these Colombians live.  8:45pm  FORD TRANSIT Directed by 
 Hany Abu-Assad  Produced in Palestine, 2002/  Running Time:80m  Director 
 Hany Abu-Assad (NAZARETH 2000, HRWIFF 2001; RANA'S WEDDING, HRWIFF 2003) 
 follows cab driver Rajai and his passengers in Ramallah and Jerusalem, as 
 they detour around roadblocks and speed through short cuts. Rajai's 
 passengers form a heterogeneous group of ordinary people and local 
 celebrities-including politician Hanan Ashrawi and filmmaker B.Z. Goldberg 
 (PROMISES, HRWIFF 2001) -who, with humor and sincerity, express divergent 
 opinions about the situation in Palestine and views of the conflict with 
 Israel while being bused around in his van. Interwoven with these powerful 
 interviews is Rajai's life and dreams: we hear about his family, his 
 sideline pursuit of smuggling illegal CDs, his view of the political 
 situation and solutions for it, his dreams of a future abroad. Winner of 
 the 2003 HRWIFF Nestor Almendros Prize for courage in filmmaking  \n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2004/02/07/30463.php
SUMMARY:Human Rights Watch Film Festival
LOCATION:Pacific Film Archives
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2004/02/07/30463.php
DTSTART:20040228T030000Z
DTEND:20040228T070000Z
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