Bringing the best films and artwork from all over the globe, the annual Human Rights Arts and Film Festival (HRAFF) will challenge, touch and inspire audiences from all walks of life.
Here in Canberra the festival will be held at the Arc Cinema at the National Film and Sound Archives from May 27-29.
On Opening Night the National Film and Sound Archives will be transformed into a human rights action hub. This will include action hubs from various organisations that work in the human rights field and give you practical ways to contribute to human rights.
The festival will be launched by Father Frank Brennan, Jesuit Priest and Human Rights Advocate, whilst the film will be ‘William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe’
WILLIAM KUNSTLER: DISTURBING THE UNIVERSE
Dirs: Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler, USA, 2009, 85 mins, video, (unclassified 18+)
Civil rights attorney William Kunstler was once called the ‘most hated and loved lawyer in America’. His clients ranged from the liberal to the violently radical edge of American politics, including Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Jack Ruby, Lenny Bruce, the Chicago Eight and the Attica prison rioters. Kunstler’s daughters Emily and Sarah explore their father’s public legacy as a ‘media hound and hit-and-run’ lawyer, and also the private heartache of a man who risked all for just, but often difficult causes. HRAFF’s Canberra Opening Night will transform the NFSA into a human rights action hub, with food, drinks and music by From the South. Special Ticket prices apply.
Tickets for Opening Night are $15 which includes some food and drinks, and of course the film!!
The second night of the festival will welcome The Hon. Bob McMullan MP, Parliamentary Secretary for International Development, and Julia Newton-Howes, CEO of CARE Australia. The film, sponsored by CARE Australia, is ‘A Powerful Noise’.
A POWERFUL NOISE
Dir: Tom Cappello, USA, 2008, 80 mins, video, (unclassified 18+)
Bui My Hanh is an HIV-positive widow in Vietnam, who starts an HIV/AIDs awareness and self-help group. A refugee of the Bosnian war, Nada Markovic leads an agricultural co-operative that supports both Serb and Bosnian war widows. Jacqueline Dembele, better known as ‘Madame Urbain’, fights for labour rights for young women working under near-slave conditions in the slums of Bamako, Mali. A Powerful Noise takes you inside the lives of these women, witnessing their daily challenges and their significant victories over oppression.
The final night of the festival will see former AYAD, CEO of the Big Bang Ballers NGO and 2010 ACT Young Australian of the Year Pierre Johannessen introducing the film ‘Garbage Dreams’.
GARBAGE DREAMS
Dir: Mai Iskander, USA, 2009, 79 mins, video, (unclassified 18+)
For generations, Cairo’s 18 million residents have relied on the 60,000 Zaballeen, the entrepreneurial ‘garbage people,’ from the labyrinth streets of the Coptic enclave of Mokattam, to collect and recycle their garbage. Even though the Zaballeen recycle over 3,000 tons a day (almost 80% of all the waste they collect), in 2005 the Cairo government privatized garbage collecting, threatening their livelihood. Mai Iskander prize-winner documentary followed the lives of three teenage Zaballeen boys over a four-year period, as each confronted the threat to their livelihood, and to their fringe-dwelling culture.
Tickets for the films on 28 and 29 May nights are $10 each. Tickets an be purchased through the links above or through the National Film and Sound Archive.
Further information on the festival and the films being shown can be found here: http://www.hraff.org.au/Films/Canberra.aspx
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