Monday, January 29, 2007
USI is sponsor of Human Rights Film Festival
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USI, the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library, and the Committee to Promote Respect in Schools (CYPRESS) have partnered to bring a Human Rights Film Festival to the community. Heidi Gregori-Gahan, director of USI International Programs and Services, is the University representative for CYPRESS, an organization which strives to promote respect through diversity. “The Human Rights Film Series is a new program and we hope it can be an annual event,” she said. “It has been a nice collaborative effort among CYPRESS, Central Library, and USI.” Four films – all documentaries dealing with human rights issues - will be presented from February to May. Each title will be shown twice: at 2 p.m. on a Saturday in Central Library’s Browning Events Room, and at 7 p.m. the following Tuesday in USI’s Mitchell Auditorium in the Health Professions Center. All the films are subtitled. The first three titles are part of the Human Rights Watch Traveling Film Festival and sponsored by CYPRESS. Here is the schedule: • “Rain in a Dry Land,” directed by Anne Makepeace (USA/Kenya, 2006): Two Somali Bantu families leave behind a legacy of slavery in Africa and find new homes in urban America. This film will be shown February 3 at Central Library and February 6 at USI. • “S-21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine,” directed by Rithy Pahn (Cambodia/France, 2003): The Cambodian genocide in which approximately 1.7 million people lost their lives (21 percent of the country’s population), was one of the worst human tragedies of the last century. The Khmer Rouge, headed by Pol Pot, combined extremist ideology, ethnic animosity, and a disregard for human life to produce murder on a massive scale. The film will be shown March 3 at Central Library and March 6 at USI. • “KZ,” directed by Rex Bloomstein (United Kingdom, 2005): Even after 60 years, there is much to be explored and shared about the Holocaust. “KZ” is a groundbreaking, haunting film that looks at emotional repression and confrontation in relation to the Nazi atrocities. Bloomstein examines the shadow cast on visitors, tour guides, and local residents by Mauthausen, a concentration camp (“KZ” for short) on the banks of the Danube. The film will be shown April 7 at Central Library and April 10 at USI. • “Promises,” directed by Justine Shapiro, BZ Goldberg, and Carlos Bolado (USA/Israel, 2001): “Promises” follows the journey of Israeli-American B.Z. Goldberg as he travels to a Palestinian refugee camp and to an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, and to the more familiar neighborhoods of Jerusalem where he meets seven Palestinian and Israeli children. Though the children live only 20 minutes apart, they exist in completely separate worlds; the physical, historical, and emotional obstacles between them run deep. The film was shot from 1995-2000. The film will be shown May 5 at Central Library and May 8 at USI. A group discussion led by a facilitator will follow each film. The first month’s facilitators are Dr. Daniel Byrne of the University of Evansville (Central Library) and USI’s own Dr. Joseph Uduehi. For more information, contact USI International Programs and Services at 812/465-1248. |
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