Kili Big world premiered at the Festival and was awarded Best Documentary, where director Ida Joglar and subjects were in attendance. Roshan Sethi’s 7 Days, took home the jury award for Best Narrative Feature. Americanized, by Erica Eng, was selected for Best Short Film and NOW with Fiona, by Fiona Dawson, won for Best Episodic.
“We are proud to offer audiences an inspirational line up celebrating diversity and inclusion on screen and behind the camera, to demonstrate the power of intersectional equity in entertainment media. Through our unique inclusion qualifiers, we are giving voice to directors who are 71% Female, 75% BIPOC or AAPI and 33% LGBTQIA+,” said Geena Davis, Bentonville Film Festival Chair. “We were excited last year to see our audience grow globally as a result of our virtual component. Come to our Festival this year, in person or virtually, and be transported into stories that can change the world,” said Davis.
To highlight the great work of filmmakers during a challenging year for the film industry, film fans, and everyone else, the Artistic Directors and programmers from the Bentonville Film Festival and the Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival have joined forces to announce their combined choices for the Top Ten Films of 2020 to call attention to some of their favorite films released in theaters, drive-ins, and online this year.
In the interview (which follows a few interviews I have done with Lanie for various outlets as the film has screened at the Bentonville Film Festival, the Harlem International Film Festival, and now NIFF, among others), we talk about how the script for the film found its way to Zipoy, and why the story stuck with her and infiltrated her dreams to the point she needed to make the film. We discuss the director/writer working relationship on an indie film – at least on this one, as well as Jason Biggs’ involvement in the film and participation beyond just playing a role to being a more supportive asset than just being a top lining star.
Fairchild, who most recently appeared in Waves, has the face of life experience and the aura of someone who’s been undeservedly passed by. For Devi, it may be too late, For the actress who plays her, Freeland should get more than a little recognition.
But in the midst of all this madness, the real goal was for lesbian women to have a place where they could just be themselves. And the magazine helped pioneer that space. Listening to the recounting of what came before and how things transformed is pretty much summed up in one sentence from an activist’s interview: “They’ve wanted us to be political for so long that any type of visibility is political.” Yes, just walking down the street holding hands with your partner used to be a radical act.
Where Breaking Fast goes deeper is in the roots of the character conflict being so culturally specific. Mo assumes his own liberal take on Islam is the only right one, and homophobia in the religion merely an aspect of colonialism. Kal has his own family issues that make trusting hard. When they and their comic-relief best friends fight, they’re pulling at resilient weeds that have bedeviled far more patient cultivators.
Isabel Sandoval’s LINGUA FRANCA took home the top prize winning the jury award for Best Narrative Feature. Alice Gu’s THE DONUT KING was awarded Best Documentary, Rachel Harrison Gordon’s BROKEN BIRD was selected for Best Short Film Narrative and Rachel Fleit’s AVA & BIANCA won for Short Film Documentary. Taylor Lee Nagel’s Lady Liberty and Miguel Angel Duran’s Immigrant Voices of America took the honors in Episodic.
So much of what makes this movie work is based around the genuine empathy on display and how this film gives voice to these people and whatever they have to say. It doesn’t need flashy kinetic typography or horribly gut-wrenching interviews of violence to make it’s point clear and it has a lot to say.
Wendy Guerrero , President of Programming of Bentonville Film Festival said: “ Our team has worked hard over the past few months to rethink and rebuild our Festival for 2020, always drawing on our mission to champion underrepresented voices, which has grown even more urgent as we continue these challenging circumstances. Our 2020 program is a celebration of art and diversity, perseverance, and talent. The films in this year’s lineup showcase what we’ve known all along: representation in media, means better content for all.
