By The Global Film Initiative, on March 27th, 2013%
Screening of TANTA AGUA
NINAH’S DOWRY (Cameroon), SO MUCH WATER (Uruguay) and WHEN I SAW YOU (Palestine/Jordan) are just a few titles among a host of Global Lens films and grant recipients keeping our news feed a-buzzing…
The buzz just won’t stop. From nominations, to awards, to screenings in festivals across the globe, GFI grant recipients and Global Lens films are continuing to impress in a big way. Check out the most recent news:
Continue reading FESTIVALS & AWARDS: Africa Movie Academy Awards, Miami IFF, ReelWorld FF and festivals, festivals, FESTIVALS!
By The Global Film Initiative, on January 28th, 2013%
Thirty-nine nations in the Winter 2013 grant-cycle comprise what could very well be our most diverse group of applicants (and undiscovered cinematic pearls), to date…
We’re at it again, folks; the Global Film Initiative is diving through our first batch of Granting Program applications for the Winter 2013 Granting Cycle for feature film productions, and what an array of projects to behold during this, our tenth year of granting…
This cycle could very well be our most diverse applicant pools, as Asia is now the leader of the pack, taking Latin America’s long-time lead. At the same time, Africa and the Middle East have increased their representation in our Granting Cycle, proving that our applicant pool is becoming more and more regionally diverse!
While we can’t share too many details until grant awards are announced in April, here are a few highlights to wet your appetite:
Continue reading GRANTING: The World is Our Oyster
By The Global Film Initiative, on May 8th, 2012%
On the eve of its world premiere, Pardon My Hindi gives Un Certain Regard star MISS LOVELY a seductive new look for the red carpet at Cannes….
 <- You saw it here—first! Designer Chiraag Bhakta’s cheeky-cum-risque rendering of Ashim Ahluwalia’s much-anticipated second feature, MISS LOVELY, just before it hits the fabled French Riviera at Cannes.
We can’t tell you where to get the poster, because it’s only a few hours old. But, we can show you a trailer for MISS LOVELY-because who doesn’t love a film about the Bollywood underground (certainly, we do—see credits).
As for Chiraag, some of you may remember him as the graphic hand behind GFI’s education experiment site, Bluescreen. And the rest of you might know him as iconic eye behind Pardon My Hindi (which words can’t describe—so visit the site).
And as for Cannes… You know who’s got our vote.
Continue reading Lovely MISS LOVELY!
By Santhosh Daniel, on March 24th, 2012%
How a chance encounter turned into an uncommon opportunity to support Sierra Leone’s first-ever international film festival
 We’ve always invested in Africa. Grants. Film exhibitions. Time. It’s been one of the many beating hearts, since our founding, that has kept the Global Lens film series, and the Initiative, alive.
A few months ago, outside a very crowded bar in San Francisco, Kieran Ridge, advisory board member of the Palo Alto Film Festival—one of our newest partners—had the insight to introduce us to someone with a very similar commitment to Africa: Banker White, of WeOwnTV. You may recognize the name, as a few years ago, Banker directed a documentary about a music innovation in Freetown called the Sierra Leone Refugee All Stars.
Continue reading GFI @ the Sierra Leone International Film Festival
By The Global Film Initiative, on March 19th, 2012%
BEAUTY shines at the South African Film and Television Awards, THE BODA BODA THIEVES nabs the top pitching prize in Berlin, and more great news about Global Lens films and GFI grant recipients!
Producers James Tayler and Sarah Muhoho (THE BODA BODA THIEVES, dir. Donald Mugisha, Uganda) at the Berlin International Film Festival! Photo: bizcommunity.com.
The past few weeks have been nothing short of spectacular for Global Lens films and GFI grantees, and we’re very proud to announce the latest scoop!
First, news about GFI grantees:
BEAUTY (dir. Oliver Hermanus, South Africa, 2010 grant recipient) was awarded Best Director and Best Actor at the South African Film and Television Awards!
Continue reading FESTIVALS & AWARDS: Sofia IFF, Festivalissimo, SAFTAs, Berlin IFF and more!
By Susan Weeks Coulter, on February 9th, 2012%
GFI Founder and Board Chair Susan Weeks Coulter recounts the sights, sounds (and tastes) of the 41st International Film Festival Rotterdam
Susan with the famous GFI bag-and frites!-in hand at IFFR 2012
 The 9-hours-ahead time change left me with the very worst jet-lag—I found myself laying wide awake in my hotel room at 3am, humming “We Shall Overcome” in hopes that perhaps by the third verse, I might doze off.
But the quiet time did allow for a period of reflection about Holland, the Rotterdam International Film Festival, Hubert Bals Fund, and of course, the Dutch people. For those of you new to The Global Film Initiative, it was actually the Hubert Bals people who jump-started our organization back in 2003.
Noah Cowan and I had been wrestling with not only the idea of what we wanted to do in showcasing film from emerging countries/film industries, but we were perplexed at how to structure such an organization. Noah met up with Simon Field who was, at the time, heading up the Hubert Bals efforts, and explained what we wanted to do in the U.S. With Simon’s encouragement, open-mindedness, and welcome, the Global Film Initiative had found an organization “structure” that we felt
Continue reading Meet & Frite
By The Global Film Initiative, on January 23rd, 2012%
Rob Avila and Iraqi director Oday Rasheed discuss the genesis of inspiration against a backdrop of war, politics and filmmaking
Iraqi director Oday Rasheed talks to Rob Avila during the premiere of Global Lens 2012 at MoMA
Oday Rasheed is one of only a small handful of filmmakers working and producing in Iraq today. His first feature, Underexposure (2005), captured the immediate aftermath of the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in a fictional documentary-style story about a Baghdad filmmaker trying to make sense of the tumult of this period. Soon after its debut, Rasheed left the growing sectarian violence in Baghdad for Berlin, where he immersed himself in film studies, gravitating to the works of Andrei Tarkovsky, among others, and eventually developed the script for his second feature, Qarantina. He returned to Baghdad in 2008 to make the film, which was completed in 2010.
Qarantina is one of ten awarding-winning films featured in the Global Lens 2012 series, premiering this January at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Oday was able to attend his Global Lens screening in New York as part of a short U.S. tour that includes multiple screenings at MoMA, and a presentation of the film at the Council on Foreign Relations on January 25th, and also at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service on January 30th.
Recently, during the premiere of Global Lens
Continue reading Oday Rasheed on the Making of QARANTINA and Remaking Baghdad in Today’s Iraq
By The Global Film Initiative, on January 15th, 2012%
This year’s launch in New York set our universe in motion thanks to a host of filmmakers, friends and more than a little help from MoMA and a one-man army…
Angelica Dongallo, Acquisitions & Granting Dynamo, kicks-off Global Lens 2012 amongst the stars
What can we say-it was spectacular. And for as much as we’d really like to tell you about the launch of Global Lens 2012 in New York, pictures do the job so much better. The stars were out and in alignment, and the year began with a big bang, cosmic kismet and maybe even a few good parties-see for yourself!
Next stop: everywhere. Global Lens 2012 will be playing all across the U.S. and Canada, from Palm Springs to Boston, Latin Wave in Houston and Vue d’Afrique in Montreal-check our calendar!
A special thanks to Jytte Jensen, Curator, and Clay Farland, at the MoMA Department of Film; Consul General M. Levent Bilgen, Consul Ismet Erikan and the Turkish Consulate General of New York; Robert Avila; Gary Ponzo; Gianfranco Sorrentino and our friends at Gattopardo; Carlos Gutierrez; Tom Vick at the Smithsonian Institution; Engin “One-Man Army” Yeniduniya; and Global Lens 2012 directors Bujar Alimani, Tolga Karacelik, Carlos Osuna, Gustavo Pizzi, and Oday Rasheed-none of this would’ve been possible without you.
Continue reading Global Lens 2012 @ MoMA and Beyond!
By Santhosh Daniel, on December 21st, 2011%
Bucking convention and breaking new ground with our filmmakers…
An indelible image from AMNESTY provides the backdrop for Global Lens 2012
Years ago, one of my grade school teachers said ‘if you do nothing at all in life, at least be original.’ Of course, nowadays, that sentiment is something of a cliché. But back in the days of psychedelia and Sesame Street, it had gravitas. And, truth be told, it has guided some of my ambitions, and is what eventually drew me to the Global Film Initiative…
There are only a few days left in this year, and as we look forward to 2012 and the Initiative’s tenth anniversary, we also look back at the preceding 3500+ days and some of the more original things we’ve done. Community programs, educational initiatives, and a very unique form of business and social enterprise-to name a few. And then, Global Lens, our sterling accomplishment.
But nothing occurs in a vacuum, and we can hardly take credit for all that has happened. And thus, rather than talking about our accomplishments, in the spirit of holiday we’d instead like to thank each of our directors, and friends in the industry, for their very original gifts that comprise the soon-to-be-launched new season of Global Lens:
- To Bujar Alimani, director of AMNESTY, and M-Appeal:
A beautiful
Continue reading SUPPORT: ‘Tis the Season of Change
By The Global Film Initiative, on December 8th, 2011%
Our ninth season opens January 12th in New York with the director, cast and crew of TOLL BOOTH
The new year is just a few weeks away, and with it comes launch of Global Lens 2012 at the Museum of Modern Art, January 12th-28th! The presentation, as many of you know, is part of our annual and ongoing collaboration with the Museum, and is organized by Jytte Jensen, Senior Curator in MoMA’s Department of Film. And what can we say except…
It’s one of our best series yet. Global Lens 2012 includes GREY MATTER, the first narrative feature film produced in Rwanda by a native Rwandan filmmaker; the oh-so-lovable Farfan, star of FAT, BALD SHORT MAN (the first-ever rotoscope feature for Global Lens); and top picks from Pusan, FESPACO, Morelia and Guadalajara international film festivals (and, not to mention, Albania’s official submission to the Oscars: AMNESTY).
Continue reading Global Lens 2012 @ MoMA!
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