Naomi and Her Mother
25 minutes, 2003 16mm, Netherlands By John Appel

Naomi and Her Mother is one episode of a nine part series for children between eight and twelve years old and is meant to deepen and broaden the knowledge of children of their own rights. This episode is based on article 18 of the 1989 'Convention for the Children's Rights,” which states that, “The state will ensure that both parents take responsibility for their child. The parents firstly are responsible for the upbringing of their child. Their duty is the protection of the their child’s interests.” Naomi is 12 years old and has a mother who is manic-depressive. In the film Naomi and her Mother director John Appel followed her during a week. During these days she tells her story on how is it is to live with a mother who, at the end of the day, can’t be a mother for her. The film is above all, a film about surviving.

Lemming Film
Kromme Mijdrechtstraat 110-3
1079 LD Amsterdam
31 (0) 20 661 04 24
info@lemmingfilm.com
www.lemmingfilm.com

67 minutes, 2004 HD24P, USA By Sandra Dickson & Churchill Roberts

The story of a forgotten civil rights figure who dared to advocate armed resistance to the violence of the Jim Crow South. Negroes With Guns combines modern-day interviews with rare archival news footage to tell the story of Rob Williams, the forefather of the Black Power movement and a complex man who played a pivotal role in the struggle for respect, dignity and equality for all Americans. Williams, dubbed the "violent crusader" by some, intended his philosophy of armed self-defense to work in concert with non-violent resistance; instead, he became the catalyst for what has been called a national showdown between these two opposing philosophies of the civil rights movement. Negroes With Guns is not only an incisive look at a truly fascinating man but also a thought-provoking examination of our notions of patriotism and the acceptable limits of dissent.

The Documentary Institute
University of Florida
P.O. Box 118400
Gainesville, FL 32611
(352) 392-4676
sdickson@jou.ufl.edu
www.negroeswithguns.com

53 minutes, 2004 Beta SP, Germany By Rainer Komers

The Indian National Highway No. 2 or "Grand Trunk Road" starts at Kolkata, cuts through the industrial areas of West Bengal and Bihar and meets the Ganges at Varanasi. The film documents three separate trips leaving the NH 2 to go north to Shantineketan (the international university established by Rabindranath Tagore and the ashram founded by his father), to Parasnath Hill, and to the sacred Buddhist pilgrimage centre Bodh Gaya. NH2 is a purely observational film made by acclaimed German filmmaker Rainer Komers, winner of a special jury prize at the 2005 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival for his film, "Nome Road System."  

Rainer Komers Film               
Moritzstrasse 102               
D-45476 Mülheim an der Ruhr
+49-208-77 94 38
r.komers@t-online.de

Nine Good Teeth
80 minutes, 2002 35mm, USA By Alex Halpern

Most families have secrets, mysteries and mythologies shared behind closed doors and passed down from generation to generation. Perhaps what is most remarkable about this documentary feature is director Alex Halpernís insistence on ferreting out the most painful aspects of his family mythology in an irreverent, uncompromising fashion. The film unfolds through the stories of Alex’s 104-year-old Brooklyn-born, Italian-American grandmother, Mary Mirabito (‘Nana’). In an intimate and often hilarious portrait, the fiercely independent and outspoken Mary dispenses homespun wisdom in a series of unflinching conversations with her persistent and equally outspoken grandson.

Pickled Punk Pictures
161 Ave. of the Americas, 11th floor
New York, NY 10013
212-627-1662
www.ninegoodteeth.com
ninegoodteeth@yahoo.com

Nome Road System
26 minutes, 2004 Super 16mm, Germany By Rainer Komers 2005 Artistic Vision Award

Nome Road System is a purely observational film shot entirely in Nome County, Alaska. The no-dialogue film stars gold-diggers, dog-sledders, hunters, and wildlife of the arctic tundra. The film is a beautiful composition of images and sounds without narration, interviews, dialogue or text.

“With Nome Road System Rainer Komers observes the life of the North in the arctic tundra, the daily tasks and little pleasures of the people when they harness the dogs to their sleighs. We feel the filmmakers sympathy and curious view and each take of the film shows his confidence in the expressive power of the image which today is lost in so many films.”
  - Rudolf Worschech, Epd-film

Golden German Short Film Prize 2004

Internationale Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen
Grillostr. 34
D-46045 Oberhausen
Germany
49-208-825 26 52
info@kurzfimtage.de
www.kurzfilmtage.de

No Room to Roam
24 minutes, 1990 16mm, USA By Stuart Perkin

No Room to Roam documents the clash between buffalo hunters and protesters near West Yellowstone, Montana. Bison have historically used land in Montana outside of Yellowstone Park as winter range and calving grounds. Montana doesn’t want bison roaming outside of the park and alleges that bison, which can carry the disease brucellosis, pose a threat to cattle herds in the state. Using the buffalo as a metaphor, No Room to Roam illustrates how land available for wildlife is rapidly disappearing. The buffalo were nearly wiped out during the turn-of-the-century wave of human expansion into their habitat. This human “progress” continues today as wildlife habitat is destroyed by developers carving up remaining wilderness areas

Stuart Perkin
2380 Birch Street
Denver CO 80207
303-355-3304
stuartperkin@hotmail.com

No Umbrella: Election Day in the City
26 minutes, 2006 miniDV, USA By Laura Paglin Northwest Premiere Documentary Short Competition

No Umbrella - Election Day in the City is an unblinking look at the 2004 U.S. Election Day failures in one of Ohio's poorest neighborhoods. In the most hotly contested state in the country, gridlock at inner city polls ignites tempers and sets off charges of conspiracy. No Umbrella drops us squarely into the chaos as we watch the irascible octogenarian councilwoman, Ms. Fannie Lewis, take on polling place breakdowns, an unresponsive bureaucracy and an increasingly agitated electorate.

www.bullfrogfilms.com

Now We Live on Clifton
26 minutes, 1974 16mm, USA By Jerry Blumenthal, Alphonse Blumenthal, Susan Delson, Sharon Karp, Peter Kuttner, Gordon Quinn & Richard Schmiechen

Now We live on Clifton follows 10 year old Pam Taylor and her 12 year old brother Scott around their multiracial West Lincoln Park neighborhood in Chicago. The kids worry that they'll be forced out of the neighborhood they grew up in by the gentrification following the expansion of DePaul University.

Kartemquin Films
1901 W Wellington Ave.
Chicago, IL 60657
773-472-4366
zak@kartemquin.com
www.kartemquin.com