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Big stars come out for R.I. International Film Fest

Sun, 2 Aug 2009 05:35:01 -0400

By Michael Janusonis / Providence Journal Arts Writer
PROVIDENCE - Demetria Carr, managing director of the Rhode Island International Film Festival, which officially opens its 13th year Tuesday night with screenings of short independent films at the Providence Performing Arts Center, remembers the year they couldn’t get anyone to accept their lifetime achievement award.
In the past, the award had attracted the likes of Patricia Neal, Seymour Cassel and Julie Andrews, who arrived to pick up the award for her ailing husband, director Blake Edwards. So Carr said the festival staff — not ones to declare “all is lost!” — declared the filmmakers themselves the stars of that year’s event “and it was the smoothest, most relaxed festival we ever had.”
This year, however, the RIIFF has found a veritable star gold mine. Ninety-two-year-old Ernest Borgnine, who won the best actor Academy Award for 1955’s Marty and went on to star in the TV sitcom McHale’s Navy, will be at the Columbus Theatre Friday to receive the RIIFF’s lifetime achievement award and to present his latest film, Another Harvest Moon. He will share the stage with some of the film’s other stars — Doris Roberts (of TV’s Everybody Loves Raymond) and Anne Meara, who will attend with husband Jerry Stiller.
The night before there will be a screening of William Shatner’s Gonzo Ballet with Shatner himself on the Columbus stage to introduce his documentary film, which is based on one of his music albums. He’ll also receive the festival’s first Nathanael Greene Humanitarian Award and take part in a conversation with the audience — “William Shatner Unplugged,” he calls it — in which he will discuss his life and career.
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg for the festival, which has grown this year to showing 235 films in six days — seven if you count Monday’s two special screenings: Monsters vs. Aliens for disadvantaged youth at the Providence Place Cinemas in the morning; The Lark Farm, about the Armenian genocide during World War I, at the Columbus in the evening. The films have been culled from more than 3,400 entries, according to RIIFF executive director George Marshall, 24 percent more than last year. With 11 screening locations, the festival has grown to be the largest in New England, moving ahead of Boston’s Independent Film Festival.
Part of the attraction for filmmakers, who pay an entrance fee of between $30 and $45 (depending how far in advance they submit a film), is that the RIIFF is one of only 63 film festivals worldwide accredited by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to qualify films for an Oscar in the short film category. Since 2002 “we’ve had 15 nominations and five wins,” says Marshall proudly.
He hasn’t seen all of this year’s 3,400 entries, but Marshall has seen every one of the 235 films that will be screened. They were selected by more than 100 “community viewer” judges, from different backgrounds but all chosen with the stipulation that they love movies. “The goal is for each film to be seen and judged by three people,” explains Marshall, adding that in the end, the buck stopped with him. “At the end of the day it’s my decision as to what goes into the festival.”
Once a film has made the cut, Marshall says he and his staff keep in “constant communication” with the filmmakers. “If you’re not in touch with them, you’re just a blank face to take their money.”
The films come from all over the world. Spain, Ireland, New Zealand, Israel, Canada and Australia are represented this year, along with the United States. Many of the filmmakers come along. This year the festival will be podcasting many of the interviews done with filmmakers during the festival on the RIIFF Web site — RIFilmFest.org — so the folks back home can keep abreast of what’s going on in Providence.
“Last year 326 filmmakers came from all over the world,” says Marshall, adding that local hotels have pitched in with discount rates. This year Lei Hong, executive director of the Guangzhou Film Festival in China, will be coming. “We’re associated with the Guangzhou Documentary Film Festival,” adds RIIFF producing director Adam Short, and she will be here to represent her festival and to see how an American film festival works. “Every year,” Short continues, “we exchange films with the Guangzhou festival, provided our filmmakers agree to translate their films into Mandarin for China.”
The RIIFF continues to donate tickets to non-profit groups which they can then sell to their patrons — a win-win situation for both the non-profits, which get money from selling the tickets, and for the RIIFF, which can both fill up its shows and develop new audiences. That’s important when you want to have a good showing in a hall such as the 3,300-seat PPAC or the 850-seat Columbus.
But this year, the RIIFF also will be splitting the gate with nonprofits on some of the films. For example, ticket sales from the Aug. 5 screening at the Columbus of local documentary filmmaker John Lavall’s Home Across Lands, which follows refugees of an East African war from their settlement camp in Ethiopia to a new life in Providence, will be split between the RIIFF and the International Institute of Rhode Island, which helped bring the refugees to the United States.
“There’s at least one benefit performance a night,” says Carr, including the Rhode Island Commission for the Humanities and Rhode Island College for a screening of David Bettencourt’s On the Lake: Life and Love in a Distant Place; the Armenian Historical Association of Rhode Island for the screening of The Lark Farm; the Station Fire Fund for a screening of The Station, which was shot at a benefit concert at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center; the Gloria Gemma Breast Cancer Resource Foundation for a special closing night program of short films called “Hip Hot and Short.”
Shatner and Borgnine won’t be the only honorees this year. Composer Klaus Badelt, whose film scores include Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, The Time Machine and K-19: The Widowmaker as well as music for the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, will be given the RIIFF’s Crystal Image Award. Walt Misaka, the first Asian American pro basketball player to be drafted into what is now the NBA in 1947 and the subject of the film Transcending: The Walt Misaka Story, will be presented the first Roger Williams Independent Voice Award.
In addition, there are many special forums and sidebars throughout the festival, including the KidsEye International Film Festival of films made by children; the Local Filmmaker Spotlight which will showcase films by Jake Mahaffy; the Rhode Island Film Forum, which provides a networking platform for filmmakers, with Badelt as the keynote speaker; a two-day Scriptbiz workshop for aspiring screen writers which includes a special three-hour program on writing for Hollywood by film industry producer-writer Ron Tippe; the RIIFF Technology Forum, with a day-long series of workshops about new marketing and distribution trends in digital and Web-based technologies; the annual GLBT sidebar with 22 films geared to homosexuals and transgender people to be shown at the Bell Chapel.
In other words, there’s something in this year’s festival for everyone. For a complete schedule and description of the films and various programs, go to RIFilmFest.org.
mjanuson@projo.com

RI International Film Festival to screen “Home Across Lands”

Sat, 25 Jul 2009 06:01:02 -0400

By Victor Alvarez East Bay Newspapers
EAST PROVIDENCE - East Providence resident John Levall produced and directed a documentary that will be screened at the Rhode Island International Film Festival.
“Home Across Lands” follows a small group of refugee Kunama – a small ethnic group found mostly in Ethiopia and Eritrea – as they begin their new lives in Rhode Island. The International Institute of Rhode Island helps them make the difficult transition from the Shimelba Refugee Camp in Northern Ethipoia to their new home in the U.S.
“To illustrate their journey effectively we needed to show where it began, to give the audience a sense of what life is like inside a refugee camp, and to give a voice to people who are forced to live there,” said Mr. Lavall.
“Of the world’s nearly 14 million refugees, more than 7 million have languished in refugee camps for ten years or more, some for generations. It is a life of restricted mobility, enforced idleness and dependency – a human warehouse where lives are on indefinite hold – not unlike the punishment of a prison, though with the added injustice of never having committed a crime. Although the international community tried to find durable solutions to their plight, less than 1 percent are ever offered a chance of resettlement.”
Shot in one year, the film chronicles the extreme changes with an array of striking landscapes, from the arid Shimelba Refugee Camp in Ethiopia to the Spring House Hotel on Block Island.
“Home Across Lands” will be shown as part of “Rhode Island Stories,” a new feature of WSBE Rhode Island PBS airing on Saturday nights at 7 p.m. that celebrates independent documentaries by and about Rhode Islanders.
Visit www.homeacrosslands.org for more information.
WHEN TO SEE IT: “Home Across Lands”
Wednesday, August 5, 7 p.m.
Columbus Theatre – 270 Broadway, Providence
621-9660
www.columbustheatre.com

Poem Used in film

Mon, 25 May 2009 14:14:39 -0400

Just before we interviewed Baha for the film I happen to be listening to NPR and they were interviewing someone from Iran and the guest happen to mention how prevalent poetry is to their culture. So we decided to asked Baha if he wouldn’t mind reciting a favorite poem that he thought was relevant to the subject of resettlement. At the time we had no idea where his choice would fit into the final version of the film and that the verse by Saadi that he choose adorns the entrance to the UN building’s Hall of Nations in New York:
Of one Essence is the human race,
Thus has Creation put the base,
One Limb impacted is sufficient,
For all others to feel the Mace.

From: Iran’s Cultural Heritage News Agency (CHN)
Iranian cultural officials are holding a special ceremony today in Shiraz, the place where Saadi was born, in the southern province of Fars honoring the Persian poet. National television has also scheduled programs marking the day, presstv.com reported.
Born in Shiraz in 1194 CE, Abu Muslih Abdallah Shirazi, better known by his penname Saadi, is recognized as one of the most eminent poets in the history of Persian literature. His proficiency in Persian literature confers on him the title “Master of Prose and Poetry.”
He started studying literature and Islamic sciences in his early childhood. He continued his education in Baghdad+s Al-Nizamiyya School, the most prestigious institution of education at the time.
The unstable conditions in Persia following the Mongol invasion encouraged him to travel far and wide. He traveled to Ethiopia, Egypt, the Maghrib (North Africa), Syria, Palestine, Armenia and Turkey, becoming knowledgeable with the culture and conventional wisdom of various peoples.
Many people compare Saadi+s numerous travels and his adventures, which took him almost 30 years (between 1226 and 1256), to Marco Polo+s long journey in the region from 1271 to 1294.
Two of his famous works, Boustan and Golestan brilliantly reflect the experiences gathered during these extensive journeys.
Saadi Shirazi composed Boustan (The Orchard), an exquisite piece of didactic poetry, in 1257.
Within a year of the composition of Boustan, Saadi authored another volume which he entitled Golestan (The Rose Garden). The volume consists of a collection of eight rhymed-prose partitions interspersed with poetry.

Film details refugees' journey

Mon, 27 Apr 2009 10:23:19 -0400

By DANIELLE FURFARO, Staff writer Albany Times Union
Have you heard of the Kunama? Don't be embarrassed if you haven't. The Kunama are a tiny ethnic group from Eritrea, which is a country many people haven't heard of, either.
A war between their Eritrea and neighboring Ethiopia, about 60,000 of the Kunama ended up spending years in vast and oppressive refugee camps. The Kunama have traditionally farmed their fertile homeland in northeastern Africa.
The new film "Home Across Lands" follows the struggles and successes of one extended Kunama family that finally resettled in Rhode Island.
On Wednesday, the Albany office of the U.S. Committee for Refugees & Immigrants will screen the movie at the University at Albany's Page Hall on Western Avenue.
"We hope to raise awareness about refugees and their process of resettling," said Zoeann Murphy, director of the Albany office of USCRI. "Refugees bring to Albany incredible stories and experiences and an incredible work ethic."
A refugee is a person who leaves his or her home country to avoid danger or persecution based on religion, ethnicity or political affiliation. According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, more than 31 million people worldwide are classified as refugees and in need of services. Most of the recently resettled refugees in the Capital Region have come from Burma, Iraq or Bhutan, but many also come from the Congo, Afghanistan and Sudan.
Once the State Department approves a refugee's move to the United States, he or she is processed through one of the 35 USCRI field and satellite offices nationwide.
"We accept refugees based on our capacity, the languages we have on staff and the communities that already exist," said Murphy. "There is already a large and strong Burmese community in Albany, so it makes sense for them to come here."
In 2005, the Albany USCRI field office processed 50 refugees. In 2008, it handled 350 and is on track to do so again this year, Murphy said.
Once the refugees arrive, the government will help them for a limited time. Refugees are expected to pay back their plane tickets to the United States, so they look for work and a place to live immediately, as well as enroll their children in school, learn their way around the public transportation system and figure out where to get food. If you think you're stressed out running daily errands, try doing it in a strange land where you don't speak the language.
Zaw Min arrived in Albany from Burma in 2000, after spending years on the run from his government for political activism.
"It was democracy for a couple years and then back to a military dictatorship, so I got to run away, because they looked for whoever was in that movement," said Min, 35.
When Min arrived, there were few services for refugees. Now, he's a case manager at USCRI and specializes in helping Burmese families.
"If this agency no exist, the refugees don't know what they're going to do with themselves," he said.
USCRI is always in need of volunteers who can help guide refugee families through some of these struggles.
"Mentors help them practice English, use the bus, take care of their mail," said Jen Barkan, resource manager at USCRI. "They need to be shown simple things, like not to leave their thermostat at 85, or what mail is junk and what's important."
In addition to drawing mentors and volunteers, Barkan hopes that the film will make for a friendlier community.
"You might see them at the grocery store," said Barkan. "We want to let people know that they need friends and unstructured support."
In making "Home Across Lands," director John Lavall aimed to show the universality of issues that affect refugees.
"They were farmers who didn't have anything to do with the war other than they were originally from that area," said Lavall, who is based in Providence, R.I, where the family resettled. "People in refugee camps are just like you and me. They want to go home. But they can't, because they will be killed."
The screening of the film is meant as a promotion of World Refugee Day. The local celebration will be at 5 p.m. June 20 at Emma Willard in Troy. Tickets are $95 for an individual or $175 per couple.
"The U.N. encourages people from all over the world to celebrate this event, so we want a lot of people to come," said Murphy. "We're hoping to raise money for utilities and rent for refugees. The more direct support we can give them, the better."
Danielle Furfaro can be reached at 454-5097 or by e-mail at dfurfaro@timesunion.com.

Documentary follows refugees from Eritrea to R.I.

Mon, 30 Mar 2009 06:50:25 -0400

By Anita Mathews The Brown Daily Herald
PROVIDENCE — "Home Across Lands," a documentary that follows the journey of Eritrean refugees from Ethiopia to Rhode Island, will screen this Thursday, followed by a talk with the film's director, John Lavall. The event is sponsored by the Brown Refugee Youth Tutoring and Enrichment program.
With the aid of the International Institute of Rhode Island, the refugees, part of a distinct Eritrean community known as the Kunama, become acclimated to life in the United States. The Kunama are considered to be some of Eritrea's original inhabitants. Though they are demographically one of the smallest groups in the region, they have sustained a language and culture distinct from the rest of the surrounding country's. The Kunama inhabit some of Eritrea's most fertile land and have therefore long been persecuted by the Eritrean government, leading them to flee across the border to live in Ethiopian refugees camps.
According to the press release, the documentary "illustrates the ways the International Institute bridges the vast divide from life in a refugee camp to life in Rhode Island as they help the Kunama in making sense of apartment living, public transportation, employment and health care, while nurturing their own community as they adapt to a larger and very foreign one."
The International Institute's mission to assist in refugees' acclimation process aligns with that of the BRYTE program. BRYTE matches Brown students with refugee families throughout Providence, allowing the students to serve as tutors and mentors. Through its tutoring program, BRYTE, like the IIRI, aims to alleviate the difficulties of assimilation experienced by refugees.
Lavall, who also produced the film, has won Emmy Awards for his previous work. He and a production team spent a year filming the Kunaman refugees as they bridged the nearly 7,000-mile gap between the Shimelba refugee camp in Northern Ethiopia and their new homes in Providence. Lavall and his production team filmed in both Ethiopia and Providence - a risky venture given that the camp lies within the 50 kilometer zone between Ethiopia and Eritrea deemed unsafe for travelers by the U.S. State Department.
Filming in Ethiopia presented other challenges to Lavall and his crew, he wrote in an email to the Herald. His production team had to avoid potential land mines on the roads, and to grapple with very limited time during which to conduct interviews with families.
Back in Providence, the production team also encountered several obstacles. Lavall wrote that the crew wanted to ensure the most accurate retelling of the refugees story as possible. Such in-depth study, however, presented the crew with additional challenges.
"To tell this story effectively we needed to immerse ourselves into the day-to-day workings of the resettlement office and into the lives of these newly (resettled) families," Lavall wrote. "Our goal was capture as much as we could on film; their arrival at the airport, in the doctors office, the first day of school, a job interview."
But Lavall explained that IIRI's support was critical in allowing the crew to overcome these challenges.
"We were very fortunate to gain access and permission at every turn," he wrote, "it's a testament to the strength of IIRI within the community. Whenever we explained what we were doing and who's story we were telling the mere mention of IIRI was enough for most people to agree wholeheartedly."
Despite the challenges involved, the final product is an inspiring and informative documentary that highlights the success of refugee outreach programs in Providence.
"For many refugees, this is it," says one IIRI staff worker in the film. "We are the only hope they have."
"Home Across Lands" will screen at 7 p.m. on April 2 in the Hunter Carmichael Auditorium in the Hunter Laboratory on Waterman Street.

Rhode Islanders who left a special mark

Mon, 29 Dec 2008 06:57:14 -0500

By KAREN LEE ZINER Providence Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE - Eight years ago, Frewoine Kassahun arrived in the United States as a refugee from Ethiopia. As a refugee resettlement caseworker for the International Institute of Rhode Island, Kassahun relies on personal experience to help others navigate life in a new country.
This past spring, Kassahun traveled to the Shimelba Refugee Camp in northern Ethiopia, a trip recorded in the documentary film, Home Across Lands, that premiered in Providence last month.
The film chronicles the work of the institute’s staff and volunteers as they guide Kunama refugees from the makeshift camp to their new home in Providence. Kassahun played a critical role as the only speaker of Tigrinya — a language spoken by the Kunama, an Eritrean ethnic minority.
“I was really touched by these people. It was emotional,” says Kassahun of the trip. “We were trying to establish connections” between Kunama in Providence and their family members at the camp — some of whom have either relocated here or will in the near future.
Kassahun currently works primarily with the Kunama, who fled Eritrea in 1998 when war broke out with Ethiopia. Because she speaks Arabic, she also assists Iraqi refugees here.
As part of a team, Kassahun handles at least 100 cases a year. The job entails everything from airport arrivals to housing orientation, how to shop and how the bus system works. Kassahun interprets during benefit applications, school registrations, medical and other emergencies.
“Some are lonely and fragile. Their only family is the International Institute,” says Kassahun. “They have to come and see you every day; you have to check on them.” She is always on call for emergencies.

Film details a new life for refugees in R.I.

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 07:33:47 -0500

By KAREN LEE ZINER Providence Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — “I was born in war, I grew up in the war, all over, there is war. I would like a new life without machine gun,” says a refugee interviewed for Home Across Lands, a documentary film about refugee resettlement that premieres tomorrow night.
The film chronicles the work of the International Institute of Rhode Island staff and volunteers as they guide Kunaman refugees from a life of despair in the Shimelba Refugee Camp in northern Ethiopia, to their new home in Providence: from thatched-roof mud huts to a path to self-sufficiency in a new country.
The Kunama featured in the film fled their native Eritrea after war broke out between Eritrea and Ethiopia in 1998. They then spent years in the Shimelba camp until they were granted refugee status by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees that allowed them to come to the United States.
At the outset, the camera sweeps across the Shimelba camp’s dusty roads and trains on aspects of life in the camp: women and children carting water, a food drop-off point, makeshift tents and children playing in the dirt. Refugees describe day-to-day survival, without hope.
“Life in the camp is difficult. There is nothing we can do. We completely rely on supply given to us. There is a lack of clothing, jobs and water,” says one woman. “A refugee camp is more like a prison … you just cannot do anything,” says another refugee.
But for some of those refugees, there is hope. The documentary follows several families who were granted refugee status and allowed to come to Rhode Island.
The video is the collaborative effort by executive producer Mary Copp; cinematographer/producer Jessica Jennings; director/producer John Lavall; and editor/producer Julie Lewis.
The International Institute’s executive director, William Shuey, who was among the group that traveled to Ethiopia, said the documentary “is an attempt to talk about the challenge of adjusting to new life for these new families.”
The film documents the institute’s role in helping the Kunama navigate their new world, from their arrival at T.F. Green Airport, to getting settled in apartments, learning the bus system, visiting health centers, studying English at the institute, and at their first jobs, including picking apples and radishes at Rhode Island farms.
It weaves interviews with International Institute staff and many of their community partners, with interviews and footage of refugees in the Shimelba camp.
The half-dozen Kunama families in Rhode Island are among the roughly 150 to 200 refugees the nonprofit agency resettles each year, providing such services as cultural orientation; a first apartment; food, school enrollment, health screening, job training and employment resources, as well as ongoing advocacy, support and referrals.
The agency, founded in 1921, also assists immigrants and native-born individuals and families. Its clients are from more than 100 countries.
According to the institute, the characteristics of the newly arriving refugees in the past five years “have been skewed towards individuals and families in great distress and need.” Many have spent years in refugee camps and have experienced “severe trauma and disruption.” They arrive “with little else besides the clothes on their backs and their documents, and are expected to achieve self-sufficiency within 180 days after arrival.” They receive only $425 per person from the federal government for basic needs.
kziner@projo.com