MARGARET MEAD TRAVELING FILM AND VIDEO FESTIVAL

The Margaret Mead Traveling Festival is now available for booking. This year, program themes include worker rights in China, Mexican-American migration, the evolution debate, and more.

As you may know, the annual Margaret Mead Film & Video Festival is the longest-running, premiere showcase for international non-fiction media in the United States. The Festival features a broad spectrum of cultural documentary, both in form and subject matter. Each year the Traveling Festival brings highlights from the Mead Festival to sites throughout the United States and abroad (museums, community and film centers, universities and colleges, festivals, public libraries, and more), providing access to innovative work from around the world.

The Traveling Festival is comprised of six thematic programs, each program

approximately between 1.5 and 2 hrs, depending on length of films. Venues have the option of renting a full package (six programs, $1800) or a half-package (three programs, $900); this includes background and promotional information on titles, still images, preview videos for publicity purposes, and a guide for conducting film festivals and screenings. The presentation format is in video, in either VHS or DVD. The Traveling Festival can be rented for a weekend marathon or for up to six weeks.

If you are interested in hosting the Traveling Festival, or have any questions, please contact Kathy Brew at travelfest@amnh.org ,Phone# 212-769-5078, or consult www.amnh.org/mead

Program 1: Worker Rights in China

China Blue

Micha X. Peled. 2005. 88 min. (U.S./China) NY Premiere

China Blue takes us inside a blue jeans factory in Southern China, where we follow the lives of Jasmine and her friends, young working girls struggling to fulfill the impossible obligations forced upon them by the factory’s owner. The complexities of globalization are brought to a human level through these moving portraits of the young workers who make our clothes.

Program 2: Mexican-American Migration

El Inmigrante

David Eckenrode, John Sheedy & John Eckenrode. 2005. 90 min. (U.S./Mexico)

El Inmigrante is a film about the American and Mexican border crisis, illuminated by the story of Eusebio de Haro, a young Mexican migrant who was shot and killed during one of his journeys north. This event becomes the point of departure for a far more multi-layered border tale, one that's especially relevant in the face of our nation's current immigration dispute. The cast of this film is diverse, including Eusebio's family in Mexico, the community of Brackettville, Texas, the horseback border patrol in El Paso, and other migrants en route to the United States. Their perspectives come together to create a moving political commentary on the current state of border issues.

Program 3: The Evolution Debate

Flock of Dodos

Randy Olson. 2006. 84 min. (U.S.)

Who are the dodos in the current debate over evolution versus intelligent design? With a Super Size Me-style good spirit, marine biologist turned filmmaker Randy Olson travels the country in search of an answer. He starts with his 82 year old mother who is neighbors with the top lawyer for intelligent design in Olson's home state of Kansas, which is the epicenter of the controversy. This film gets beyond the tedium of the “debate” of who’s right and who’s wrong. Instead, it explores how those who embrace each side are “communicating” their ideas to the public.

Program 4: Protecting Journalism

Shooting Under Fire

Sacha Mirzoeff. 2005. 72 min. (Germany/Israel/Palestine)

Modern warfare is carried out both on the battlefield and in the media. More and more, w e rely on journalists and photographers to provide us with unbiased access to events as they happen. Shooting Under Fire introduces Reinhard Krause, head of the Reuters photo bureau in the West Bank and Gaza and his team of local Israeli and Palestinian photographers, who cover both sides of the Israeli conflict. This riveting film highlights the individuals who risk their lives to bring us the pictures.

Program 5: A Few Strong Women

Sisters in Law

Kim Longinotto & Florence Ayisi. 2005. 104 min. (Cameroon)

"Men are going to get the message now." The lawyers and judges in one small

courthouse in Kumba, Cameroon are helping to transform women's and children's lives by protecting them from domestic violence. From the maker of Divorce Iranian Style and Gaea Girls comes this latest project celebrating dynamic women in non-traditional roles. A testament to how a few strong women can help to make an impact on individual lives as well as traditional world-views.

Program 6: Loving Portraits

A Map With Gaps

Alice Nelson. 2006. 26 min. (Scotland) NY Premiere

Using a combination of archive audio recordings, still photographs, drama reconstruction, and animation, this surreal and comic tale is an account of a journey made by the director’s father through Soviet Russia in the early 1970s in a van he built and named “Supervan.” Truth can indeed be stranger than fiction, and sometimes the gray area between the two is the most interesting place to explore.

Today’s Man

Lizzie Gottlieb. 2006. 55 min. (U.S.) NY Premiere

Nicky Gottlieb is a young man struggling to leave the comfort and safety of his parents’ home and find his place in the world. While he can calculate the square root of any number in the blink of an eye, he has trouble reading the simplest of facial expressions, making social interaction difficult. At the age of 21, he is diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism. This loving portrait by his filmmaker sister is both a personal exploration of one family’s journey and a broader effort to understand this mysterious disorder.

For a full description of this season's outstanding line-up please consult the Mead website at http://www.amnh.org/mead or contact Gisela Fosada Fosado@amnh.org for more information. To download a pdf of the program,