The Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers is a program of the Southern Arts Federation, a not-for-profit regional arts organization making a positive difference in the arts throughout the South since 1975. Southern Arts Federation is supported by funding and programming partnerships with the National Endowment for the Arts and the state arts agencies of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. For more information on the Southern Arts Federation and its programs visit www.southarts.org.
Southern Circuit Film Series is co- sponsored by Center for the Documentary
All films are FREE and do not require a ticket
Tru Loved
with Antonio Brown (Producer) and Stewart Wade (Director)
Film Trailer
Friday, Feb. 6, 8pm
Room 309 Simons Center for the Arts
The filmmakers will be available for Q&A after the screening.
About the Filmmakers: Writer/Director Stewart Wade was named one of "Five in Focus" at Outfest 2006 which recognized feature film directors who are "the next wave of hot new talent." Wade also wrote and directed Coffee Date, which screened at over 35 film festivals worldwide and received several awards., including Best Short Film at the Honolulu International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival and the Madrid Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, and the Jury Award for Comedy in the Bargain Basement Film Festival. In 2005, Wade wrote, directed and co-produced the feature-length version of Coffee Date, which screened at more than 30 venues on the international film festival circuit and won several festival Audience Awards for Best Feature Film. Coffee Date was released on DVD by TLA Releasing, and premiered on MTV's LOGO channel in December 2007.
Producer Antonio Brown is a former university professor and an honored recipient of numerous academic awards and fellowships. He currently holds the office for Vice President of the Board of Directors of the ACLU of Southern California and serves on the Board of Outfest, one of the nation's most prominent LGBT film festivals. In addition to producing Tru Loved, Brown served as the story consultant for the script. He and Stewart Wade co-founded BrownBag Productions, which focuses on programming with LGBTQ content.
About the Film: A teenage daughter of lesbian mothers, Tru struggles as an outsider at her new high school in a conservative Southern California town until high school quarterback Lodell takes an interest in her. The film traces their emerging friendship, her efforts to begin a gay-straight alliance at her school, and her eventual true romance. This film maturely explores the universal themes of social justice, acceptance and love. Tru Loved is a fresh, groundbreaking film that offers unique opportunities for discovery and light-hearted entertainment. The film was featured as the Opening Night Film at Newfest in New York and as the Closing Night Film at Outfest in Los Angeles. Tru Loved was also selected to screen at the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Philadelphia International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival, Santa Cruz Film Festival, Breckenridge Festival of Film and the Sedona International Film Festival. The film stars Najarra Townsend, Alec Mapa, Bruce Vilanch, Nichelle Nichols, Jasmine Guy, Alexandra Paul, Cynda Williams, Jake Abel, Matthew Thompson and Jane Lynch.
Full Battle Rattle
(*not part of the Southern Circuit Series)
Directed by Tony Gerber and Jesse Moss
Film Trailer
Friday, Feb. 27, 8pm
Room 309 Simons Center for the Arts
Full Battle Rattle is the story of a real war and a fake town. In California's Mojave Desert, the US Army has built a "virtual Iraq" and populated it with hundreds of Iraqi role-players. Army units spend three weeks inside the simulation before deploying to Iraq. The film follows an Army battalion through the simulation, as they attempt to quell an insurgency and prevent the mock village of Medina Wasl from slipping into civil war. Despite the movie-set contrivances, the stakes and the emotions are real. As reality and fantasy overlap, Full Battle Rattle moves from comic to surreal to poignant.
Random Lunacy:
Videos from the Road Less Traveled
with Victor Zimet (Producer/Director)
and Stephanie Silber (Producer/Director)
Trailer
Friday, Mar. 13, 8pm
Recital Hall, Simons Center for the Arts
The filmmakers will be available for Q&A after the screening.
About the Filmmakers: Emmy-award winning veteran of film and television, Victor Zimet, teamed up with Writer/Producer Stephanie Silber to form Home Team Productions in 1999. Zimet has more than thirty years of experience in the film and television business. He won an Emmy for producing and directing a magazine segment on the victorious 1986 Mets for WNYC-TV. Prior to launching Home Team, he edited many network specials and developed a stellar reputation at CBS, working on various series including Street Stories with the late Ed Bradley, Eye to Eye with Connie Chung, Public Eye with Bryant Gumbel, and Coast to Coast with Bernie Goldberg, for which he received another Emmy nomination.
Stephanie Silber has worked in entertainment and media for more than twenty years. Her theatrical experience includes work both on the boards and behind the scenes, and includes associations with Playwrights Horizons and The Ensemble Studio Theatre. After a stint as a print journalist, writing primarily about entertainment, Silber began producing, writing, and directing long-form documentaries which have aired on outlets such as Court Television, The History Channel and The Learning Channel. Her short film, Environmentalists Under Fire, produced for the Sierra Club and Amnesty International, was recognized in 2000 with a Telly Award and presented at the Amnesty International Film Festival in Vancouver in 2002.
About the Film: Random Lunacy is a documentary that chronicles the life and adventures of Poppa Neutrino and his talented vagabond family. From the streets of New York to a circus in Mexico, from the Arizona desert to an Atlantic Ocean crossing on a raft made of discarded materials, from Russia to Europe playing Dixieland jazz and eking out a living on the streets and points in between, Zimet and Silber weave a fascinating portrait of an incredibly resourceful, determined, inventive, and independent family led by Poppa Neutrino.
'Bama Girl
Rachel Goslins (Producer/Director)
website
Friday, Apr. 17, 8pm Room 309 Simons Center for the Arts
The filmmaker will be available for Q&A after the screening.
About the Filmmaker: Rachel Goslins is a documentary director and producer who has worked on productions for National Geographic, Discovery, PBS, A&E and the History Channel, among others. Her short film, Onderduiken, was acquired for incorporation into the standardized civil rights curriculum for Northern California high schools. A former international copyright attorney, she is currently directing a feature documentary on Muslims who saved Jews from the Holocaust and serves as the Programming Coordinator for the Impact Film Festival.
About the Film: The Crimson Tide's homecoming has a rich history, tied into centuries of privilege, old money and racial exclusivity. This powerful and enlightening documentary follows Jessica Thomas's quest to become Homecoming Queen at the University of Alabama. 'Bama Girl is the story of one black woman running against not only 15 other co-eds, but also a strictly segregated Greek system, internal black politics and, most ominously, a secret all-white association called "The Machine" that has been controlling politics at the University for most of the past century, including the Student Government and Homecoming Queen elections. Along the way the film divulges some surprising realizations about black vs. white, about Old South vs. New South, and about a surprising microcosm of electoral politics that mirrors much of what is happening across our country today. 'Bama Girl has screened at SXSW in Austin, Texas, and at the Atlanta Film Festival.
