American Documentary Showcase in Kano

The U.S. embassy cultural affairs

Still from One Bridge to the Next by Kim Snyder, from the American Documentary Showcase

section in conjunction with MOPPAN (The Motion Pictures Practitioners Association of Nigeria) is bringing the American Documentary Showcase to Kano, today, Monday, 2 August 2010, and tomorrow, Tuesday, 3 August 2010.

The events open to the public include a documentary screening at Mambayya House from 2-4pm 2 August 2010, and a simultaneous screening at Bayero University, New Site, Department of Mass Communication from 2-4pm. There will be an additional screening in the 1000 seater auditoriam at BUK, New Site, at 7pm.

On Tuesday there is a reception for invited guests at Mambayya House.

As the Kano State Censorship Board is still reviewing the documentaries, the event planners have not been able to reveal which films they will be showing. However, the films will come from the following selection of 30 films: A Man Named Pearl produced by Scott Galloway; Note by Note produced by Ben Niles; A Village Called Versailles made by S. Leo Chiang; The Hobart Shakespearians produced by Mel Stuart; One Bridge to the Next produced by Kim A. Snyder; Soundtrack for a Revolution made by Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman; Welcome to Shelbyville by Kim Snyder; Which Way Home by Rebecca Cammisa; King Corn (by Aaron Wolf, Ian Cheney, and Curt Ellis) & Big River by Curt Ellis; Flow: For Love of Water by Irena Salina; America’s Lost Landscape: The Tallgrass Prairie by David O’Shields.  

Two documentary filmmakers have also come from the U.S. to teach the masterclasses and show their films:

KIM A. SNYDER is an award-winning documentary filmmaker. She most recently co-founded the BeCause Foundation to produce a series of documentaries designed to raise awareness about socially conscious global issues and inspire philanthropy through the power of film. Following her short documentary One Bridge to the Next, about the burgeoning field of “street medicine,” Her most recent short, Crossing Midnight, focuses on the healthcare crisis in Eastern Burma and an extraordinary community of refugees battling the odds to help their own. Her next work is set in America’s rural South, where on the eve of the recent election, a town deals with issues of immigrant integration and reckons with its segregated past.

Snyder directed and produced the award-winning documentary I Remember Me, which won numerous festival awards including Best Documentary at the Denver International Film Festival, the Audience Award at the Sarasota Film Festival and an Honorable Mention at the Hamptons International Film Festival. I Remember Me was distributed theatrically in the US by Zeitgeist Films and has been distributed on DVD in over 22 countries. She has also directed and produced numerous short documentaries for cable network Plum TV.

Snyder has also published numerous articles for Variety and worked as media producer for the Hamptons International Film Festival, producing commercials, trailers and promotional media.

In 1994, Snyder associate produced the Academy Award-winning short film Trevor, directed and produced by Peggy Rajski, which became the cornerstone of The Trevor Project, a national nonprofit organization dedicated to suicide prevention among gay youth. Snyder also served on the admissions review committee for New York University’s Graduate Film Program, and has been a producer’s rep for several critically acclaimed foreign films including Crows (New Yorker Films), directed by Dorota Kedzierzawska. Snyder graduated with a masters in international affairs from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. (Bio from documentary.org)

Bart Weiss is listed in the American Documentary Showcase programme printed by the U.S. embassy in Nigeria, as

an award-winning independent film and video producer, director, editor, and educator who has lived in Dallas since 1981.

He is mostly known as the director and founder of the Dallas Video Festival. He produces the TV show “Frame of Mind” on KERA TV in Dallas and is the artistic director of 3 Stars Cinema.

He has taught film and video at Texas A&M’s Visualization Lab, Souther Methodist University, the University of Texas at Austin, and West Virginia State College and is currently an associate professor at UT Arlington.

He is a former president of the Association of Independent Video and Filmmakers (AIVF), fomer (and founding) board member of Dallas Artists REsearch and Exhibition (DARE), and founder of the Video Association of Dallas. He has been a video columnist for The Dallas Morning News, Dallas Times Herald, and United Features Syndicate.

Mr. Weiss recieved an MFA in film directing from Columbia University in 1978 and a BA in radio, TV, and film from Temple University in 1975.

His films and videos have been shown at the SF Jewish Film Fest; SXSW; the Other Cinema; Kennedy Centre; AFI’s National Video Festival, Berlin; Media Operative Festival; Sidney and Melbourne Film Festivals, and many more.