The Alphabet Book

"The defense of cultural diversity is an ethical imperative, inseparable from respect for human dignity." —UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity

The Alphabet Book is a story of one man who has taken this imperative into his own hands, working to protect and preserve his own endangered culture while also helping his people transition into the modern world.

Along the notorious border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, the non-Muslim Kalash people are struggling to maintain their pagan beliefs and ancient way of life in a part of the world dominated by fundamentalist Islam and known in the West only as the likely hiding place of Osama bin Laden. In an effort to protect his heritage, our main character Taj Khan has helped create an alphabet for the Kalash people's oral-only language. While Taj uses this new script to compile the legends of his elders in the first Kalash book, our film shows how defending cultural diversity is more than just a noble idea for the United Nations. In The Alphabet Book, Taj turns the idea into action.

The Ambassador

In today's world, it's hard to imagine that a tribal society could still live in complete and total isolation. But deep in Ecuador's Amazon, a reclusive group of hunter-gatherers known as THE TAROMENANI continue to resist all contact with civilization, even as illegal loggers, oil companies and neighboring tribes push further into their ancestral homeland.

The Ambassador follows internationally-known indigenous leader MOI ENOMENGA as he struggles to protect the Taromenani from the forces of civilization rapidly closing in around them. Moi is the charismatic leader of a neighboring tribe called THE HUAORANI, who only a generation before were themselves feared as violent savages. The Ambassador tracks Moi over a period of five years as he navigates between the Amazon frontier and the civilized world with the survival of the Taromenani hanging in the balance. As he searches for a solution to the mounting crisis, Moi must overcome corruption, greed, and violence in one of the world's last truly wild places.

Birds of Passage

Birds of Passage (Aves de Paso) explores the emotional connections people have with the places they are from through the stories of three young, emerging songwriters in Montevideo, Uruguay.

Ernesto Díaz, who moved to the capital from the Brazilian border, finds the most complete expression of his hybrid cultural identity through music, but he is struggling to finance his first album and conquer his fear of the stage itself. After living for five years in the United States, Montevidean Victoria Gutierrez is reintegrating herself into her native city, but finds that this process leaves her feeling foreign. Yisela Sosa, originally from a town on the border of Argentina, has received a grant to make her first record; but when she falls in love with an Argentine man, she begins to consider emigrating to live with him and seek better economic opportunities.

This one-hour documentary combines original music with observational footage and interviews shot over the course of 16 months in Uruguay to show how the protagonists' experiences of migration affect both the creative process and the musical product. The three interwoven stories transcend place and time to resonate with the struggles common to many artists, while reflecting the particular challenges of dedicating oneself to music in a small country in the Global South in the 21st century.

For more information on this film, please visit our website.

Blacklist: Recovering the Life of Canada Lee

In an unprecedented collective effort, Blacklist: Recovering the Life of Canada Lee reveals the true story of one of America's first dignified black stars of Hollywood, Broadway, and radio, Canada Lee, who grew to become a spokesperson for equality in a time of racial oppression. Labeled by the US government as too controversial for his message of integration, Lee was strategically branded a traitor during the Red Scare. His career and life were subsequently destroyed. Through the insights of historians, cultural critics, co-stars, old friends and Lee's widow Frances Lee Pearson we relive Lee's triumphs and hardships -- both on and off the public stage. We uncover the steps taken by the FBI to halt Lee's work toward social change, and we come to know how this charismatic boxer-turned-actor found himself at the forefront of the movement for equality.

Book Club

The story of seven women who have participated in a book club together since 1941. They're spry, intelligent and "with it" as they like to say. Filmed in various locations in the United States, the story of Book Club will unfold over the course of six of their monthly meetings. Through the juxtaposition of member's individual stories, books they are currently reading, past books they've read and rich historical footage, we will see American history as well as their own as it unfolded from 1941 through the present. Individual interviews with book club members, family and friends, archival footage, home video and photos, will all be used to tell their fascinating story.

Discovering our Organic Planet - USA

Most people know a product labeled Organic is good for them and the environment. Many, though, don't know why.

The central theme of Discovering our Organic Planet - USA is to promote an exchange of local and international ideas and experiences, to help build a global community consciousness of the nutritional benefits of organic and naturally grown food, and the positive environmental impact of ecological farming practices.

Each segment of this 13 x 30 minute documentary series will focus on a specific group of small organic farms and ranches and their products in different regions of the USA. Viewers will gain insight through the experiences of a variety of volunteers as they work with and learn from the farmers and ranchers about organic processes and products. Volunteers will share their stories and learning experiences, as they pull carrots in Minnesota, pick grapes in California, feed chickens in Washington, till soil in Iowa, cure cheese in Wisconsin, herd cattle in Texas and sort potatoes in Idaho. All these aspects (mini stories) will be intertwined creating a unique introduction and better understanding to organic and naturally grown products, regional and local organic farming techniques, and the many wonderful people involved.

For more information on this series, please go to our website and click Current Projects or . Your tax-deductable contributions are vital in bringing this project to life.

DOG

Every day Philadelphia Dogs set out to sniff, play, dominate and fight with one another, dragging their human companions at the ends of long leashes. DOG takes us to the Orianna Hill Dog Run in Northern Liberties where neighbors navigate the isolation of the city by forming social networks on a perceived border between the poverty of the past and the encroaching affluence of the future. Though the human and non-human characters in DOG are quirky and unique, they represent Americans searching for networks of their own. Based on over a year of anthropological research, DOG is a story of community, connection and urban gentrification, as people gently reach out to one another through the performance and love of their furry companions.

Driving the Magic in Augusta

It is a relationship built on loyalty, teamwork and trust for over 30 years at one of the most admired and exclusive sports events, The Masters golf tournament in Augusta, Georgia. Ben Crenshaw, the player and Carl Jackson, the caddy are two men from different worlds, who forged one of the most enduring relationships on or off the golf course. This story will show how they overcame adversity; competition and illness to become among the most respected men in their fields today.

Flying On One Engine

In India people refer to Dr. Dixit as God. He has performed over 100,000 free operations in the most economically depressed parts of India to treat its most disadvantaged citizens. Dr. Dixit is a documentary about the life of a doctor whose heart only functions at 18% capacity, has no larynx, and is bound to a wheel chair. In spite of these seemingly insurmountable obstacles Dr. Dixit manages to work 10 hour days performing reconstructive surgeries on patients who have prenatal congenital birth defects, burns, and other deformities. Poor villagers travel for days for a chance that the doctor will operate on their cleft lip son or crippled daughter. The life of Dr. Dixit is a study in contrasts as he divides his time between his own meager apartment in NYC where he is virtually unknown and unseen and India where thousands showed up to celebrate his 76th birthday.

God's Water

God's Water takes an intimate journey with Tom Logan — social radical, entrepreneur, and African missionary — across the east African country of Malawi to witness the challenges and rewards of a life committed to helping his fellow human beings. It is a story of hope and inspiration...the viewer will gain hope in the human spirit through inspiring, collaborative efforts of people of different countries and cultures working together in a way that empowers communities by creating their own safe water supply. It will show Americans accomplishing good deeds, working hand-in-hand with Africans who are willing and capable of improving their lives through hard work and the spirit of cooperation.

Tom Logan, through his organization Marion Medical Mission (MMM), is changing lives, saving lives, and building hope across Africa by bringing a sustainable supply of safe drinking water and important medical services to areas with no paved roads or electric power. Village residents supply the primary labor to build shallow wells that greatly improve the quality of their lives — as villagers dig wells, crush stone, and mold bricks, MMM provides the cement, pipe, and pump. Groups of villages select two or three individuals who are trained in the maintenance of each well, so villages are self-sufficient.

The one–hour program combines location video, interviews with Logan, his associates and his Malawian friends, with archival images and an original indigenous musical soundtrack. As our camera captures Logan while he works with African villagers committed to improving their lives, God's Water will inspire viewers with the story of a man motivated by a dedication to social justice strong enough to make a positive difference in the world.

Gone to Mali

This insightful and thoughtful documentary explores one man's journey from his birth hometown, well-to-do Princeton, New Jersey, to the dusty West African town that was his hometown during his years serving in the Peace Corps. He returns to find the woman who he called his mother in Mali, a year after the death of his birth mother. In the process he examines the lives of these two remarkable women from such different backgrounds, and yet who share so much, how his Peace Corps experience has changed his views of life, America and what's important, and what the concept of a motherland truly means.

watch trailer

In Search of Soil

A lyrical examination of the farming practices of campesinos in the rural highlands of Peru and follows the work of The Cusichaca Trust. The project hopes both to capture and validate the fragile balance currently in existence, and to support the use of sustainable agriculture worldwide by showing a balance between the two.

“I love Clint Eastwood; Jon Wayne!” Prisco says. He sports a leather jacket with fringes along the arms and shoulders. Prisco is an agronomist working for The Cusichaca Trust, an NGO that is working to rehabilitate ancient terraces and fortify a way of life which many in Peru see as backwards. “My cousin sent me this coat from the U.S.” He’s sitting in a general store in the middle of Pampachiri, Peru, drinking a beer, surrounded by canned milk, oranges and clothing for sale. Outside people ride by on horses and shopkeepers keep the dust down by splashing buckets of water on the dirt road. Sitting next to him is Andrea Dunlap, organic farmgirl turned documentary filmmaker, who is waiting to be joined by partner and filmmaker Hannah Heinrich. They are here In Search of Soil.

Indigenous knowledge has very little value in contemporary Peru, which like many developing nations faces extreme poverty as it tries to use technology as a quick fix. Though many of the older generation are illiterate and some speak only Quechua, they still follow the same sustainable agricultural processes that their ancestors and the Incas perfected before the time of the conquistadors. While malnutrition and poverty are rampant, thousands of hectares of terraces, called andenes lie abandoned and unused. What began as a mass exodus from the country to the cities in the age of Sendero Luminoso is now reversing itself, as people move back to the land of their birth. Without the andenes, which modify vast tracts of steep cactus-covered slopes into arable land and prevent erosion, the scarce resources that exist in the sierra would be even scarcer.

The Joy of Sox

Who would have thought that Western science, Eastern metaphysics, and prayer would converge in Fenway Park?

For most Red Sox fans, being crowned as World Champions, was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream. For two fans, however, it was the beginning of a quest to uncover the deeper truth behind that magical season and behind the player-fan interaction, in general.

The Joy of Sox documentary film explores the world of subtle energy science through the lens of baseball fandom. Do fans affect players through the power of their attention? Is it better to pray for your team or against the opposition? Is Fenway Park a sacred space?

Join Eric Leskowitz, MD, a board certified psychiatrist at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, as he journeys from ballpark to laboratory interviewing fans, players, baseball commentators, and pioneering scientists including: Larry Dossey, MD, author of "Reinventing Medicine" and "Prayer is Good Medicine;" Dr. William Tiller, Professor Emeritus, Stanford University, and featured scientist on "What the Bleep?;" Rollin McCraty, Ph.D the founder of the Institute of HeartMath; and Rupert Sheldrake, Ph.D., author of "The Sense of Being Stared At."

This provocative film will be the "What the Bleep?" for sports and spirituality, quirky and informative enough for everyone to enjoy and learn from. The Official The Joy of Sox web site.

A video about sovereignty in the Alaska Native community. While targeted for a television broadcast audience, we feel the program has broad implications for educational use in a classroom setting. Arlington Massachusetts filmmaker, Alice Bouvrie explores the issue of sovereignty in her second documentary situated in Alaska. Most of us are unaware of the internal politics and cultural life inside Native American communities. Very few of us know anything about the history of Alaskan Natives beyond cliches perhaps transposed from seeing Nanook of the North, or thinking that all northern Natives, Canadian and Alaskan, live in igloos and hunt for seals. This film will introduce us to strong individuals who represent diverse points of view on this important issue. The filmmaker learned digital editing at a DER workshop. Click here for the Land Sea Sky web site.

Live from Bethlehem

In January of 2007, the Ma'an Network based out of Bethlehem in the Palestinian territories launched the first daily TV news program for, about, and by Palestinians. Live from Bethlehem will be a documentary film that follows the evolution of the news program in its first few months as it faces the challenges of newsgathering and the pressures of putting together a daily news program. Our cameras will follow correspondents as they piece together the facts, travel to different news sites, and endure the relentless working hours of a television journalist. The adrenaline soaked daily grind that television journalists everywhere face will be further compounded by the special challenges that Palestinian journalists faceÑincluding deadline busting Israeli checkpoints, power and utility failures, and the constant specter of violence that can come at any time, from any direction. The correspondents who will be our central characters are smart, open-minded, English-speaking individuals who we expect to bring strong measures of unique thought and biting wit to this film. With proven PBS credentials, JCS Productions will seek to create an edgy film that gives viewers a unique perspective on one of the most chaotic conflict areas in the world.

Loving Lampposts

The public views autism as a terrible, epidemic disease that can destroy children's lives. Sometimes described as a disorder that steals children's souls, autism has been the subject of fear-inspiring stories on the front page of the New York Times, on Oprah and in People Magazine.

Loving Lampposts takes a different view of autism. Inspired by the filmmaker's own experience with a son on the autism spectrum, the film looks at the "neurodiversity" movement, a growing group of people who view autism not only as a disorder that must be treated, but as a different way of life that must be accepted and supported.

Told through the stories of autistic children and adults, the film examines the politics surrounding autism and the neurodiversity movement. Ultimately, it shows that it's possible to lead a happy, successful life and be autistic.

Film web site: www.lovinglamppostsmovie.com

Mathare Project, The

From award winning filmmakers Randy Bell and Pacho Velez comes a documentary series about intensely disenfranchised orphans making their way in the poverty-ridden slums of Kenya. Through the stories of the orphaned children, the documentary provides insight into the problems Kenya faces. Focusing on the filmmakers previous subjects, Boss and Chalo, the story will follow their struggles in coming of age and also tell the story of several other orphaned children.

New Woman, The

Until 1894 there were no female sports stars, no product endorsement deals, and no young mothers with the chutzpah to circle the globe on a bicycle. Annie Kopchovksy changed all of that. A spicy blend of adventure story, social history, and portrait of an athletic pioneer, The New Woman: Annie "Londonderry" Kopchovksy is a documentary film about an improbable journey by bicycle and the eccentric, fiery woman who dared to undertake it.

Described as "the most extraordinary journey ever undertaken by a woman," the odyssey was reportedly set in motion by a wager made by two wealthy clubmen in Boston. Annie's challenge was to circle the globe by bicycle in 15 months, earning $5,000 en route. This was not only a test of a woman's physical endurance and mental fortitude, but also of her ability to fend for herself in a man's world. Annie Kopchovksy embarked on her journey in June 1894 as a 23-year-old Jewish immigrant and working mother of three. She returned, 15 months later, as Annie "Londonderry," who fashioned herself as a bloomer-clad, PR-savvy, international celebrity and bachelorette. Traveling with only a change of clothes and a pearl-handled revolver, Miss Londonderry had earned her way, in part, by turning her bicycle and her body into a mobile billboard, carrying advertising banners around the world.

A reflection of the powerful social forces of the 1890s — the bicycle craze, the women's rights movement, and yellow journalism — The New Woman will engage and educate public audiences. But it will also inspire. It is the story of a woman who transformed herself into the woman that she wanted to be and needed to be in order to achieve her version of the American dream.

Our Mockingbird

Our Mockingbird, a one hour documentary about the influence of Harper Lee's story, To Kill A Mockingbird examines how one work of art can continue to reach millions of people almost fifty years after its creation. Our Mockingbird will show how themes involving class, race, justice, tolerance, and coming of age as depicted in a story about a small southern town, resonate for people from Birmingham to Boston and beyond.

Postectli: Altar of the World

Postectli will profile the compelling characters and vibrant traditions of a remote - and at-risk - contemporary Aztec village as it embarks on a never before-filmed ancient pilgrimage to a "living altar" at the summit of an extinct volcano. Our cameras will capture, for the first time, this intense, music and art-filled ritual, that Nahua villagers hope will restore balance to the universe.

For centuries, the Nahua of northern Veracruz have carried on the often-misunderstood beliefs and language of their Aztec ancestors, but their culture is being rapidly overrun by commercial development, modern mores, and evangelical conversions. The Nahua believe that humans, the earth, and the wider universe are all one living entity...and that deep respect should be at the core of all relationships, from people to the land.

With their charismatic and insightful Ritual Healer leading the way, Postectli will utilize cinematic, character-driven storytelling and scrupulous anthropological standards to preserve and bring alive the full scope of a remarkable, but increasingly fragile, Nahua community. At each step of the way, we'll make lasting personal connections to art, music, the environment, family, history, language, religion, and bonds of understanding across cultures...and across time.

Returned: Child Soldiers of Nepal's Maoist Army

Imagine being forced to leave your family and fight in a war you don't understand - and you are only eleven years old. Sadly, for many of these child soldiers in Nepal this is a reality and the peace process has not solved their problems. These children quickly discovered that the return home is even more painful than the experience of war.

Returned is a feature length documentary that follows several Nepali child soldiers including Asha, a young Nepali girl, who was sent home from the Maoist's People's Liberation Army after the cease fire. Asha joined the Maoist army when she was 14-years-old. For this young low caste girl, joining the Maoist was a pathway to a future with education and employment. Despite two years of being on the frontlines, her biggest concern was what would await her when she returned home. Would she turn to commercial sex work, become a domestic slave, or would she be banished from her home and forced into marriage?

Returned weaves the voices of Nepal's child soldiers, organizations working to help them, and military leader's from Nepal's opposing forces, who answer the challenging questions about their use of child soldiers.

For more information on this film, please visit www.NepalDocumentary.com.

Romeo

A new film Project by Lorna Lowe Streeter. Romeo, a documentary, examines the complexities of battering through the eyes of Antonio, a 32 year-old, Haitian-American counselor for violent men. Most of us are unaware of the full extent of battering not only in American society but world-wide. The ramifications of these acts of violence across generations is devastating. Many people in the target audience for this program lead secret lives as a batterer or a victim who struggles to exist in conditions such as those that appear in the film.

Scenes from a Parish

Life in Lawrence, Massachusetts is hard. The former mill city north of Boston is the poorest in the state. Unemployment rates hover at twice the national average; three out of four children are at risk for hunger. After five decades of Latio, and more recently Asian immigration, Anglo citizens are now a minority in a city rife with language barriers and ethnic tension.

Four years ago, Paul O’Brien, a young Catholic priest, arrived at Saint Patrick’s Parish on the city’s south side. His new church had always been an Irish-American enclave, but that had begun to change. The Harvard-educated priest announced his intention to “embrace multiculturalism in all its forms” and pledged to build a safe place for all parishioners.

Father O’Brien had inherited a divided congregation. The church had added Spanish and Vietnamese Masses, which some parishioners viewed as an affront to the American ideal of assimilation. Feeling they had lost their city and now their church, they fled to parishes in other cities and towns.

Scenes from a Parish is a documentary film about those who stayed. Latino, Asian and Anglo-Americans all. They are the faithful who aspire to a communal “body of Christ”, but who have known the human conditions of loneliness and alienation. Scenes from a Parish, an independent film for PBS currently in production, will tell the stories of a committed priest and a fragmented group of believers – strangers in search of community.

The School Don Agustin Built

Born in 1933, in a small town along the Amazon River, Don Agustin Rivas spent his young adulthood as an accomplished sculptor exhibiting his works in his native country as well as Germany and Austria. After recovering from a severe injury to his hands that ended his career as an artist, he devoted himself to medicine and the shamanic path of the Ayahuasquero. In 1990, he returned to his birthplace in Tamshiyacu to find a town overwhelmed with problems: no jobs, rampant alcoholism and a community living well below the poverty line.

So in 2000, Don Agustin founded a school, with thirty or so students, built on the land of his grandfather's farm. A few years later, he established a co-op plantation for its graduates where they learn how to manage a company and practice sustainable agriculture. Today, over eight hundred students are enrolled. Although sanctioned by the Peruvian government, Don Agustin must provide for the building and maintenance of facilities and acquire textbooks and supplies for all the students. To do this, he relies almost entirely on donations.

The School Don Agustin Built will be an hour-long documentary film that explores the value that education and sustainable development has for impoverished children and their extended community in a rural Third World nation; raises awareness about the problem of a chronically undereducated rural class, which contributes to and maintains a cycle of poverty; and examine ways to create a sustainable agricultural system from the inside out that empowers future generations to thrive in rural environments.

Most importantly, this film will reveal the power of an individual to improve the lives of hundreds of children in his community, children whose only barrier to a more promising future is their ability to pay for it.

Son of Ghana

A documentary film intimately recording a young Ghanaian man’s return to his native land to travel on a bus with his father for eleven days before his thirtieth birthday. His father Reverend Blackson is head of over 300 churches in Africa. Their family fled from Ghana to London when Kute was three, when the Reverends good friend the President, Ignatius Kutu Acheampong (Kute’s namesake), was killed under a coup. Kute won a greencard and left home at seventeen to go to California. Now thirteen years later he is going back to Ghana.

The documentary captures their unfolding relationship while engaging with the rich culture, exposing beautiful imagery of Ghanaian dance, Shamans, ecstatic drumming, the shocking historic slave trade castles, and meetings with caretakers at AIDS hospitals, school children; the King and President John Kufuor.

The story is about the history of their relationship, their reconciliation, and who they are for each other and in the world now. At www.SonOfGhana.com you can be notified of upcoming events and releases.

The State of Integration: 50 Years after Little Rock

September 23, 2007 marked the 50th anniversary of the desegregation of Little Rock High Central School. Nine African American students, selected for their character and academic achievements, became pioneers for civil rights. Today those nine students are all accomplished citizens who continue to speak out about their experiences. The State of Integration reflects on both the achievements of that era and the current state of race relations in American schools.

The filmmaker's mother was a member of the class of 1958 at Central. The film takes viewers to Little Rock for the 50th reunion of the class of 1958, where those classmates share their reflections of that time and their thoughts on diversity in education today.

The United States is now at a juncture where it may move away from many desegregation programs and become resegregated, a trend that started in the 1970s and continues today. Through reflection on the events of 1957, the film reminds viewers that the battle to equalize education for all students is not over.

Studio7Arts

Founded by Robert Gardner in 2003 as a cooperative workshop in which member filmmakers, photographers, writers and designers could find space, facilities and encouragement for their work. Members in 2006 include: Kevin Bubriski, Robert Fenz, Robert Gardner, Sharon Lockhardt, Eric Masunaga, Susan Meiselas and Alex Webb. Donations to individual projects or to the larger collaborative effort are warmly welcomed.

Sunlight Man: The Life & Times of John Gardner

Novelist John Gardner – bestselling author of Grendel, The Sunlight Dialogues, Nickel Mountain and other works – died in a motorcycle accident in 1982. Sunlight Man is the story of Gardner’s complex life and turbulent times, as seen from the point of view of his filmmaker son, Joel.

Through interviews, archival film, still photographs and present day location shots, Joel Gardner’s odyssey weaves together several parallel stories in Sunlight Man. Joel examines the myths surrounding his father’s early years, including the death of a younger brother in a farm accident. He traces his father’s swift rise to fame with the publication of Grendel, his subsequent fall from critical favor, and tells of his father’s personal struggles – in art and in life – which led to his death at 49.

Alongside his exploration of John Gardner’s life and work, Joel Gardner tells his own story in intimate terms. Joel compares and contrasts the choices he’s made against those of his father. By the end of the film, Sunlight Man, Joel Gardner is able to come to terms with his father, with himself, and with the tangled legacy John Gardner left in his wake.

Take a Bow

Take a Bow is about a school in Bartlett, Illinois for mentally disabled children between the ages of 5 and 21. Every spring, the school puts on a musical play, and students with disabilities ranging from Autism and Down Syndrome to Cerebral Palsy and Tourette's Syndrome perform memorized dances and dialogue in front of standing-room-only audiences. One of the unique elements of Take a Bow is that the filmmakers encouraged the students to speak for themselves. The film is mostly told from the students' point of view, and their worries about the future, experiences in public schools, and downtime on the playground is all captured here. Interviews with parents and teachers round out the film, touching on the lack of affordable resources available for special needs people in the United States, as well as the bleak futures that many of the children will face once they leave the school system. These negative aspects are pushed aside when the students are onstage in the spotlight, able to be perfect performers and receive the applause they so rightly deserve.

Official website: www.takeabowfilm.com

Tea in the Waiting Room

Currently entitled, Tea in the Waiting Room (to the Axis of Evil), this feature documentary film lyrically spins a tale of contemporary Syrian life, weaving a series of stories and lessons from a wide range of Syrian citizens, as experienced by an American woman living in Damascus and traveling throughout Syria. Surprisingly intimate encounters are recorded with Syrians, ranging from government ministers and college students to Bedouin herders and taxi drivers, who openly discuss history - some cities have been continuously inhabited for 5000 years; hijab - women's head covering worn by a minority of Syrian women; smoking - Syria is the only country in the Middle East with laws designed to create greater awareness of the health hazards of cigarettes; education - Syria's education system is truly a meritocracy; and dating and marriage - from virginity issues to interfaith unions. In order to dispel the myths surrounding a culture, we need to connect with other individuals in that culture to see that they are people not so different from us.

For more information about the project, including letters from Syria , photos, and video clips, please go to www.reorientfilms.com.

Tiapapata Art Centre

The Tiapapata Art Centre was established in 1989 with various art courses offered informally to children and adults. Since then the Art Centre has grown to be a dynamic and innovative contributor to the art scene in Samoa and, in June 2006, was registered as a Charitable Trust with the Government of Samoa. Printmaking, ceramics, fabric printing, wood and bone carving, and paper recycling are some of the more popular courses taught. Filmmaking is also a growing field for the Art Centre with particular emphasis on human rights education documentaries (three produced to date with work on a fourth about to start) and ethnographic recordings, mainly of oral traditions associated with archaeological sites in Samoa.

At the end of March 2007, the Tiapapata Art Centre burned to the ground in fire caused by a Raku firing attended by students and teachers from a local high school and university. Luckily no-one was injured but there is now an urgent need for financial support to rebuild the Art Centre.

To Timbuktu with Vieux Farka Toure

Journey on a musical pilgrimage following the extraordinary life and work of Vieux Farka Toure. Born in Mali, West Africa, on the banks of the Niger River just outside of Timbuktu, in a country rich in cultural and ancestral wealth yet bound by economic poverty, Vieux is son to the late guitarist and multi Grammy Award winner Ali Farka Toure. Ali is legend in Mali and one of the most celebrated musicians out of Africa. Rooted in the traditional music from his father, and moved by popular sounds from around the world, Vieux has just made his musical debut and is now at the cutting edge of the world music scene.

We begin the journey in Bamako, the capital of Mali, where Vieux now lives (when he's not on tour), and we'll travel with him throughout the country by 4x4, camel and boat, into the Sahara desert just outside of Timbuktu, where Vieux will perform at the Festival in the Desert. After experiencing the music, variety of cities, people and landscapes in Mali, we'll move to the United States. Here we'll see Mali's connection to American history - a story that goes back the origin of the American blues in West Africa, and the later influence of American soul music in Mali.

Today the musical connections live on through Vieux. As he travels around the world, moving audiences and critics virtually everywhere he steps foot, his universal spirit is connecting him to popular musicians from all walks of life; from NY based DJ's that created his remix album, to American country folk musicians. Beyond a successful debut album, largely due to his ability to make music that is palatable to any ear, his increasing musical collaborations and inspiration throughout the world suggest that his music is bound for an even larger audience and world sound.

With the most frequent media images of Africa focusing on disease, poverty, violence, or an attention to culture that's so specific that we lose any sense of humanity, Vieux's story will show another side. To follow Vieux, we'll experience how music is lived, we'll see the complexities of Africa's fight for survival in the 21st century, and we'll learn how we as an international community are inextricably linked and celebrated through the music of Vieux Farka Toure.

to further explore visit www.totimbuktu.com

A Tree of Life

A Tree of Life will track the progress of the DNA Shoah Project, an effort to use DNA to link relatives separated during the Holocaust, as well as introduce relatives that might not even know the other existed. DNA will also be used, eventually, to identify remains that are accidentally being unearthed in Germany and Poland. This identification could facilitate a proper burial, possibly by a surviving relative. The DNA Shoah Project could drastically change the lives of many. A Tree of Life will reveal this incredible story of survival, renewal and hope.

view the trailer at Kurtis Productions

The Way We Get By

The Way We Get By is a story about three elderly people battling their greatest fears and finding a reason to live. The film examines the lives of three Maine Troop Greeters as they put their politics aside to keep a promise to support the American troops. The story's three characters must overcome tremendous obstacles - health issues, emotional losses and financial difficulties - to live a life on-call, 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, traveling to the airport to greet complete strangers. To date, the Maine Troop Greeters have greeted over 600,000 troops, as 75% of all soldiers and marines heading to and returning home from Iraq, fly through Bangor's tiny airport. For more information, visit www.thewaywegetbymovie.com.

Who We Are in the Classroom: A Matter of Identity

Karen Schwartz of the Harvard Graduate School of Education is using film in a quest to replace existing cliches and stereotypes of teacher identity with authentic portraits of teachers as human beings. It will explore how teachers personal histories, values and imaginations shape their motivations in the classroom.

The Work of 1000

The Work of 1000 is a story about a small town Massachusetts housewife in the 1960s who led the charge to clean up one of the nation's most polluted rivers.

After World War II, industry in America boomed. Economic growth seemed limitless and environmental regulation was virtually nonexistent. In the 1950s and 1960s, rivers across the country became more polluted than they ever had in the course of human history. One of those rivers was the Nashua.

Cleaning up the Nashua seemed hopeless-which is why it appealed to a restless housewife named Marion Stoddart. Against all odds, Marion persevered. Eventually, her efforts helped get the Massachusetts Clean Rivers Act passed. In the process, she won a United Nations award, was profiled in National Geographic, and had a widely-read children's book written about her. Marion's story looks at the timeless question of what impact one person can have in the world, and at what private cost.