ALLY Highlighted in The Insider (Sarasota Film Festival)

(You can read the original article here)

Can you believe the festival is now only days away? Unreal! So everyone is coming to me saying, “I know the big headline films, what about some other really personal movies I may not have heard about yet?” Well, you can’t go wrong with Eliaichi Kimaro’s A Lot Like You (which recently won Best Documentary at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival)!

Activist turned filmmaker Eliaichi Kimaro goes in search of her identity and discovers long held family secrets. Kimaro is the daughter of a Tanzanian father and Korean mother. Wanting to develop a stronger bond between herself and her African roots, Kimaro journeys to Tanzania. There she discovers that the cycle of violence she has been working hard to break in her US home is part of her family history and culture on another continent. This is a story of sweeping themes about violence against women, exile and return, multicultural identity-and intimate family details. It reveals how simply bearing witness to another person’s suffering can break silences that have lasted for generations.

A Lot Like You screens THIS SATURDAY at 3:00 PM and encores Wednesday, April 18 at 1:00 PM. Eliaichi Kimaro will be here for filmmaker Q&As after each showing!

THE INSIDER: What inspired you to seek out your father’s tribe on Mt. Kilimanjaro and to document your experiences there?

ELIAICHI KIMARO: … 

Portland Premiere!

Check out this Beautiful poster made up by the McMenamins marketing team
for our upcoming Portland screening…
See our McMenamins event listing here.
Then buy your $5 Tickets Here!

Feature in today’s CIFF daily blog

March 28th, 2012 @ 6:51am
Filmmaker Eli Kimaro explores her roots

Eli Kimaro is a first-generation American, with a Chagga father, from Tanzania, and Korean mother. In 2003, shortly after she was married, she panicked. When she thought about the children she and her husband might have and realized that “their understanding about what it means for them to be Korean or Chagga would have to come from me,” she says. She was terrified. “Because what the hell did I know?!,” she says.

Burned out from her job as a trauma counselor, the time seemed right to do something. The next month, she was sitting in an intro to filmmaking class. Several months later, she and her husband quit their jobs and bought two one-way tickets to Tanzania.

“Even though we had zero skills or equipment or know-how…I felt like I had finally figured out a way to preserve and pass down our cultural heritage and family stories,” she says.

Kimaro had a happy childhood with “loving, supportive brilliant parents,” she says. But the film reveals that there were also some painful and confusing moments, which “altered the course of my life,” she continues.

Thoughts from Juror Momo Chang

Momo Chang is an award-winning writer/freelance journalist based in Oakland, California. She is a features editor for Hyphen, a national Asian American magazine focusing on arts, politics and culture.  And she was one of this year’s SFIAAFF Doc Competition Jurors.  Momo shares her reflections on her jury experience on her blog.

Her words about A Lot Like You really resonated with me, because she articulates beautifully some challenges we’ve faced with the marketing of our film:

This film really surprised me because I thought I knew where it was going in the beginning, and it turns out quite differently. The film takes you on a journey, and I found Eliaichi to be a very compelling and trustworthy narrator and guide. Funny thing is, if I were to try to describe this film to someone, I wouldn’t really be able to. It’s about so many things, including culture, insider/outsider status, suffering, family secrets, and human dignity.  I hope this film reaches an even wider audience in the future, like on public television.

Official Selection of Sarasota Film Festival/Through Women’s Eyes Film Festival

We’re excited to announce that A Lot Like You is an Official Selection of
Sarasota Film Festival and Through Women’s Eyes Film Festival!

The 13th annual presentation of Through Women’s Eyes will feature independent documentaries, narratives, and short films by directors that increase awareness of the lives of women throughout the world. Directors who attend the film festival will lead post-film discussions following the first screenings on April 14 and 15, and celebrate with filmgoers at the Filmmakers’ Reception fundraiser on April 14.

Encore screenings of the films will be integrated into the Sarasota Film Festival schedule, which will host ten days of films plus education programs, special events, talkbacks and panels with some of the leading voices in film today.

A Lot Like You screenings will be held at Regal Hollywood Theaters on:
~ Sat., April 14 @ 3pm (followed by Q&A w/Director)
~ Wed., April 18 @ 1pm

Hope to see you and/or your FL friends & family there!!

While in Cleveland…

Cleveland International Film Festival (CIFF) is doing their part to keep me busy while I’m in town.  And for these many opportunties to engage directly our audience, fellow filmmakers, and community members, I am so grateful!!

So…here is a quick rundown of events:

A Lot Like You‘s CIFF screenings will be sponsored by Cleveland Rape Crisis Center, and will be held at Tower City Cinemas on:

 - 3/28 @7:10pm with Film Forum*
- 3/29 @12:10pm followed by Q&A with Director
- 3/30 @1:00pm followed by Q&A with Director

*Film Forum= moderated, interactive panel discussions that feature filmmakers, community leaders, and scholars who are knowledgeable about the issues raised in the film.

On March 31 & April 1, Cleveland State University’s School of Communication, in conjunction with the Cleveland International Film Festival, will be hosting Interactive Panel Discussions – featuring visiting filmmakers whose works are being shown at the Festival and members of the Cleveland State University faculty discussing the art, craft, and business of moving image production.

I have  been invited to participate on the Panel on Filmmakers of the African Diaspora, which will be on 3/31 @1pm.  Not sure who my fellow panelists will be, but as previously mentioned, CIFF this year is showcasing works by filmmakers from the African Diaspora thanks to their grant from the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences.  Please be sure to check out the phenomenal lineup of artists who are being featured in CIFF’s Focus of Filmmakers program.

FYI, these panel discussions will be videotaped by CSU students.  I will be sure to share the link to our discussion once it’s posted.

We hope to see you at one of these in Cleveland!!

Confessions of a SFIAAFF Juror

SFIAAFF Doc Competition Juror, Brian Hu, offers a behind-the-scenes look at what it means to serve on a festival jury.   As someone who’s hoping to be summoned for Jury Duty one day, I appreciate this glimpse into the inner-workings of their decision making process, and his reflections on some of their deliberations.

He considers the impact previewing films on DVD vs in the theater with the Director and a live audience–something I’ve often wondered about.   And I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall as they “began to draw lines between different films, mapping out common themes, and in doing so, mapping out the terrain of Asian American cinema circa 2012.”

Thanks to you, Brian Hu, for this wonderful write-up.  And to your co-Jurors, Momo Chang and Vincent Pan, for their thoughtful consideration and reflection on all of our films!