Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival Announces Film Lineup for its 31st Edition
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- Category: Entertainment News
- Published on Saturday, 17 September 2022 18:59
- Written by A&E Contributing Editor
The critically acclaimed Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival announced the lineup of films and honorees for its 31st edition, which returns to the Arlington Hotel & Spa as part of this year's screenings and presentations, taking place October 7-15.
Screenings will kick off with the Opening Night presentation of Mark Fletcher's Patrick and the Whale, followed by the Centerpiece Selections of Ben Klein and Violet Columbus' The Exiles and Shaunak Sen's All That Breathes, with Kathlyn Horan's The Return of Tanya Tucker – Featuring Brandi Carlile screening on Closing Night. World premieres include Carlos Montalva and Alex Meza's Pasta Bueno, Nick Collier's Scout Master, and Alexander Jeffery and Paul Petersen's You Have No Idea.
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As previously announced Christine Choy (Who Killed Vincent Chin?) will receive the film festival's Impact Award, and Brent Renaud will posthumously be honored with the Career Achievement Award.
"This year's edition of the film festival will kick off our fourth decade celebrating the impact that documentary filmmaking has on us as we view our world through the lenses of these incredible filmmakers' work," said HSDFF Festival Director, Sheryl Santacruz. "Each year fills us with a renewal of enthusiasm and appreciation for the stories we get to experience in each screening, complimented by the participation of the artists and subjects themselves. The conversations, events, activities, parties, and more are going to make for a fantastic film festival and cultural event next month."
THE GALA FILM SELECTIONS
Mark Fletcher's Patrick and the Whale will make its U.S. Premiere when it screens Opening Night on Friday, October 7. The film gives audiences a rare view – with amazing cinematography of the whale's world under the sea. As the U.S. Centerpiece, Ben Klein and Violet Columbus' The Exiles, reconnects noted documentarian Christine Choy with an unfinished project of hers from the late 80s via a group of Chinese dissidents who sought asylum in the states following the Tiananmen Square massacre at that time. Could reviving and releasing that film force Choy into an exile of her own? The International Centerpiece Selection of Shaunak Sen's All That Breathes explores the connection between man and nature via two brothers raised with a tradition of the community feeding birds of prey known as kites. Now threatened by pollution, the brothers have made it their mission to care for and rehabilitate the birds. Kathlyn Horan'sThe Return of Tanya Tucker - Featuring Brandi Carlile will close out the film festival on Saturday, October 15 with the exhilarating story of country music legend Tanya Tucker's return to the big stage spurred and encouraged by rising star Brandi Carlile.
WORLD PREMIERES
Three films will make their world premieres at HSDFF. Those films include Carlos Montalva and Alex Meza's Pasto Bueno, about a group of Peruvian and American miners who bond in a tragic search for one of the country's most prized gemstones, rhodochrosite. Neil Collier's Scout Master investigates the 1987 investigation of murders that shook a small town in Arkansas and led to the arrest of a former Boy Scout unraveling secrets and lies at the heart of one of the largest sex abuse scandals in American history. Alexander Jeffery and Paul Petersen's You Have No Idea looks at a mother whose son was diagnosed with Autism in the early 90s when treatment options were limited. Rejecting doctors' advice to limit his personal interaction, she instead worked to provide her son with a life filled with purpose and friendship.
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HSDFF HONOREES
A pioneer Asian American filmmaker, HSDFF Impact Award honoree Christine Choy has made more than 85 films and received over sixty international awards, including her Oscar nominated film, Who Killed Vincent Chin? (1987).She has been a recipient of numerous fellowships, among them: John Simon Guggenheim, Rockefeller, Asian Cultural Council, Fulbright Senior Research, and an award for best cinematography from the Sundance International Film Festival. Choy's latest collaborative documentary film, The Exiles, won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2022.
Before being killed in Ukraine in March of 2022, HSDFF Career Achievement Award honoree Brent Renaud had spent over two decades traveling the world making character driven verité documentaries. Along with his brother Craig, Renaud won almost every major award in television journalism. He won a Peabody for the Vice series Last Chance High, a Columbia Dupont Award for a New York Times story that followed the lives of children injured by the earthquake in Haiti, and another Columbia DuPont Award the following year for a documentary about the drug war in Mexico. The Renaud Brothers' ten-part series Off to War was the first time a group of soldiers had been filmed for an entire deployment at war and won an Overseas Press Club Award, and an International Documentary Association Award. Brent Renaud also co-founded the Little Rock Film Festival, was a visiting distinguished professor of journalism ethics at the University of Arkansas, and a Harvard Nieman Fellow. An award presentation will be made with special guests and going forward the award will be known as the "Brent Renaud Career Achievement Award."
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ADDITIONAL HIGHLIGHTS
Among the additional highlights within a schedule packed with them, are Julia Bacha's Boycott, which profiles individuals and organizations caught in the crosshairs of new laws restricting political boycotts of Israel on its human rights record including Alan Leveritt of the Arkansas Times, Bahia Amawi in Texas, and Mik Jordahl in Arizona. Quinn Grovey and Tracy Anderson's Growing Up Grovey looks at the life journey of the only Arkansas quarterback to ever guide the Razorbacks to back-to-back conference championships who faced his toughest opponent off the field as the full-time caregiver for his mother, Bobby Jean, who was diagnosed with dementia and the onset of Alzheimer's. Dawn Mikkelson and Keri Pickett's Finding Her Beat focuses on a dynamic group of women who smash gender roles in the world of Taiko drumming.
On the international front, Fazila Amiri's And Still I Sing will make its U.S. Premiere at HSDFF. The film focuses on Sadiqa Madadgar and Zahra Elham as they compete to make history as the first female winner of the popular reality TV show Afghan Star and face increasing public scrutiny and danger as the season hurtles toward its final episodes. Victoria Linares' It Runs in the Family shines a light on Oscar Torres, the filmmaker's unknown and once world-famous queer filmmaker cousin, sending us on a journey through reconstructions of his intimate memories living in the 1950's authoritarian Caribbean. Mantas Kvedaravicius' Mariupolis 2 is a ragged, on-the-ground look at the present-day war in Ukraine, as seen by those who are living it. It is the final film by the late Mantas Kvedaravičius, who was captured and killed by Russian Forces while making it.
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Passes are on sale now. For more information on purchasing and additional details on the Hot Springs Documentary Film festival, please visit: hsdfi.org.
