Angles: Women Working in Film and Video (1996)

OC Ce Northern California Venues Women make strong showing Ba UA a I F ilms by and about women are making a strong showing in many Northern California festivals. In March, the Bay Area Women’s Film Festival hosted one of the most comprehensive and varied selection for women’s films. Sponsored by Landmark Theatres, this three-day showcase highlighted 30 features, documentaries and animated works from around the world with many regional premieres, including Meg Partridge’s film, Dorothea Lange: A Visual Portrait. Other festival favorites included works by area filmmakers — Frances Reid’s Oscar-nominated short Straight From the Heart, and Walls of Sand, a debut film by Erica Jordan. Once again, a portion of the box office receipts was donated to The Women’s Foundation, a nonprofit organization empowering low-income women and girls. Women created a strong presence at other festivals. The following is a sampling of work by women filmmakers screened at various Northern California festivals: San Francisco Asian American International Film Festival (March). Opening the festival was Kayo Hatta’s feature film Picture Bride (95 Sundance Film Festival Audience Award Winner), the story of a spirited young Japanese woman who ventures to the Hawaiian islands as a “picture bride” in 1918 and experiences times of hardship, struggle and unexpected joy. The closing night featured Mina Shum’s award-winning debut Double Happiness, a humorous romp through the cultural and generational gap, which follows a dutiful daughter who walks the thin line between her traditional Chinese family and the contemporary Canadian world. A program called “Chinese Stories: Looking for Family’ featured films from four Chinese American women seeking to reinterpret what “Chinese American” means as they search from an alleyway in San Francisco’s Chinatown to a faraway Chinese province for the meaning of family, food and place. Salutes to artists included the Academy-Award winning documentary Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision, directed by Frieda Lee Mock, and a retrospective of work by visionary video artist Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, 4 @ ANGLES “Double Happiness” TANNER AND BETS ¥ “HARDEN former Bay Area resident and pioneering artist who died in 1980. Among the short works at the Asian American Fest was a program called “Women’s Stories and Discoveries,” screening narrative, documentary, and experimental forms in which six accomplished women artists explore themes of self-discovery and challenge notions of family and identity. The San Francisco International Film Festival (April/May). Moufida Tlatli was awarded the prestegious Satyajit Ray Award for a filmmaker of exceptional promise. The Tunisian director of The Silences of the Palace is a prominent figure in Arabic cinema. Her film education began in childhood when under the pretext of visiting sick relatives, she accompanied aunts and cousins to the movies. In a tiny cinema on the outskirts of Tunis, she found herself enchanted by the Indian and Egyptian melodramas and the hypnotic voice of diva Oum Kathoum. She studied film in Paris and began her career as a Script supervisor and production manager. The Silences of the Palace is an evocative work of great beauty, which reveals the cloistered life of women in the ArabMuslim world. Other films included Art for Teachers of Children (U.S.) by Jennifer Montgomery, the re-creation of her affair as a 14-year-old girl with a 28year-old photographer. Fifteen years later, she was reinvolved when he stood accused of being a child pornographer in a case that generated much publicity and debate. A Litany for Survival: The Life and Work of Audre Lorde (U.S), a documenatery by Ada Gay Griffin and Michelle Parkerson, features a series of intimate interviews with Lorde, spanning several years of her life, and with noted colleagues. San Francisco International Lesbian & Gay Fest (June). Among the works featured was Fearless: The Hunterwali Story, a tribute to India’s legendary stuntwoman Fearless Nadia, by Riyad Vinci Wadia, Bombay’s first openly gay filmmaker. Awards presented