ITVS-funded filmmakers and staff rally for lunch at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, UT

Sundance 2012 was a record-breaking year year for ITVS and Independent Lens. Six ITVS funded films screened in the documentary competitions and all six were honored with Sundance awards. (ITVS had had seven films playing at Sundance in 2004; six films in 2002; and eight films in 1997 for those interested in banner years).

 Adding to that powerful showing, midway through Sundance two ITVS-supported films received Academy Award nominations for Best Documentary including Hell and Back Again by Danfung Dennis (coming to Independent Lens in May) and If a Tree Falls by Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman (broadcast on POV).  We were able to celebrate in person as Danfung and Sam (a producer on The House I Live In) were both in Park City.  Even the Utah snowstorms couldn’t slow our momentum because that’s one heck of a week.

From L to R: Danfung Dennis (Hell and Back Again), Lois Vossen, and Sam Cullman (If a Tree Falls)

Independent Lens and ITVS held an intimate lunch to honor our 2012 Sundance and Academy Award-nominated filmmakers. Stepping away from the noise and full-on energy that is Sundance, we wanted to take a moment to recognize and celebrate the extraordinary work of the filmmakers.

Four of the six ITVS films at Sundance are already slated for broadcast on Independent Lens following theatrical distribution, including Grand Jury Prize winner The House I Live In by Eugene Jarecki, Audience Award winner The Invisible War by Kirby Dick, Special Jury Prize winner Love Free or Die by Macky Alston, and Detropia by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, which was honored for best editing. In addition, the Independent Lens film The Island President by Jon Shenk, Richard Berge, and Bonni Cohen screened in a Sundance sidebar program. These five films will make for an exceptional new season of Independent Lens — and they will be joined by a stunning array of other documentaries coming to completion this year.

The two additional ITVS-funded films that premiered in the World Cinema Documentary Competition and took awards are Putin’s Kiss (Best Cinematography Award) and 5 Broken Cameras (Best Directing).

Sundance 2012 is a wrap, but the impact of these extraordinary films is just beginning. We have an exceptional year ahead, lead by the power of independent storytelling.

The film takes a look at a group of men and women — most of them former gang leaders and ex-cons — that are trying to “interrupt” shootings and protect their communities from the violence they once employed. Watch the trailer for the The Interrupters below:

Join the filmmakers and FRONTLINE for a live chat on the documentary on Wednesday, February 15.

The organization has supported a slate of documentaries that shine a unique light on the history of African American activism. Several of the films will air this month on Independent Lens. 

February is Black History Month.  It’s an important time for public media, because the heritage months — as artificial as they seem to some, including ITVS-funded filmmaker Shukree Hassan Tilghman, whose film More than A Month tracks his playful yet serious quest to end Black History Month — act as public reminders of our mission to bring underrepresented voices into the mainstream and ensure that the diversity of the nation is reflected on television.

One glance at public television’s offerings reminds us that American history is black history and black history is American history, so intertwined and inseparable are the African-American experience and the life of the United States.

What you’ll find on public television in February are nine new, original programs across PBS series like Frontline, Independent Lens, and Great Performances, alongside encore presentations of landmark programs like Freedom Riders. 

Among the premieres are four ITVS programs that together represent part of what’s special about public television: not just telling stories that should be told and heard, but looking for new and innovative ways to tell them.  And making sure communities can use these stories to engage, face-to-face and online, in ways that celebrate, debate, and most of all connect.

On the innovation front, the mobile app More than a Mapp brings the spirit of More than a Month to mobile devices, providing a fun and interactive (and year-round!) way to learn about Black History through landmarks and historical sites nationwide.  We’re also piloting a new online screening tool — sort of a virtual Community Cinema event, moderated by local public television stations, where people can watch a film together and discuss in real time — with selected Black History month programming through February.

Back in the brick-and-mortar world, Community Cinema is on track to host 200 screenings in January (the biopic Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock) and February (More Than a Month).  And that doesn’t include the selected outreach events to accompany the ITVS-funded The Interrupters,a groundbreaking look at the urban cycle of violence in Chicago and one of the most talked about films in recent history, which airs on Frontline on February 14^th.

We’re also excited about two international programs that shed surprising light on the African-American experience: February’s The Black Power Mix Tape, a retelling of the Black Power Movement through lost footage filmed by Swedish journalists, and the January broadcast of Have You Heard from Johannesburg, a five-part look at the global movement to end apartheid in South Africa.

All in all, it’s an emblematic way for ITVS to start a year filled with programming that goes straight to the heart of public media’s mission: sparking all-American, year-round, year-after-year conversations about who we are, where we’ve been, where we’re going, and who we want to be.

The Athena Film Festival  is a celebration of women and leadership, and the only film festival in the nation to focus its content on women’s leadership. With an impressive line-up of groundbreaking films — chronicling the lives of long serving Native American female firefighters to the weekend’s closing film, The Lady, on the life of Aung San Suu Kyi the Burmese opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

 Be inspired, join Women and Girls Lead at the Athena Film Festival in New York City on Saturday, February 11^th at 3pm for the special screening of Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock. And tune in for a live online panel discussion with Director Sharon La Cruise following the film, here.

Find more information about the Athena Film Festival.

Watch the Athena Film Festival trailer below:

WINNER OF THE GRAND JURY PRIZE IN U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
The House I Live In by Eugene Jarecki
The film weaves together director Eugene Director’s personal narrative with America’s war on drugs. Here, producers including Sam Cullman, Melinda Snopsis, Danny Glover, and director Eugene Jarecki — reflect on the film and its Sundance premiere.

WINNER OF THE AUDIENCE AWARD IN U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
The Invisible War by Kirby Dick
The film examines the epidemic of rape of soldiers within the U.S. military, the institutions that cover up its existence, and the profound personal and social consequences that arise from it. Here, director Kirby Dick and producer Amy Ziering reflect on the film’s Sundance premiere.

WINNER OF THE SPECIAL JURY PRIZE IN U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Love Free or Die by Macky Alston
The film  follows the historic and controversial rise of Gene Robinson, the first openly gay Bishop. Last week, ITVS caught up with filmmaker Macky Alston at a mass held at St. Luke’s Church in Park City, where LGBT leaders showed up to support and discuss the film.

WINNER FOR BEST EDITING IN U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Detropia by filmmakers Rachel Grady and Heiding Ewing; edited by Enat Sidi
The film artfully displays the rapid decline of a once thriving American city. On the brink of bankruptcy, the filmmakers and loyal citizens profiled in the feature, suggest the feeling that as goes Detroit, so goes the nation. Here, co-directors Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing reflect on the film and its Sundance premiere.

WINNER FOR BEST DIRECTING IN WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
5 Broken Cameras by  Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi
A Palestinian journalist chronicles his village’s resistance to a separation barrier being erected on their land and in the process captures his young son’s lens on the world.

WINNER FOR BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY IN WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Putin’s Kiss by  Lise Birk Pedersen
Nineteen-year-old Marsha is a model spokesperson in a strongly nationalistic Russian youth movement that aims to protect the country from its enemies. When she starts recognizing the organization’s flaws, she must take a stand for or against it.

On behalf of everyone from ITVS and Independent Len, congratulations to all the filmmakers on this extraordinary achievement!

The House I Live In premiered last weekend at the Sundance Film Festival. The film weaves together director Eugene Jarecki’s personal narrative with America’s war on drugs. Here, producers including Sam Cullman, Melinda Shopsin, Danny Glover, and director Eugene Jarecki — reflect on the film and its Sundance premiere.

This past weekend, filmmakers Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering premiered their documentary The Invisible War at the Sundance Film Festival. The film examines the epidemic of rape of soldiers within the U.S. military, the institutions that cover up its existence, and the profound personal and social consequences that arise from it. Watch the video below as both filmmakers recount the Sundance experience.

Sam Cullman, co-director and cinematographer of If a Tree Falls reacts to his Oscar Nomination, which he learned about on Tuesday at Sundance.

The movie takes a behind-the-scenes look at Earth Liberation Front, the radical environmental group that the FBI calls the “number one domestic terrorism threat” in America. If a Tree Falls aired on POV this past fall.

Premiering Monday night at Sundance is Macky Alston’s new film Love Free or Die, which  follows the historic and controversial rise of Gene Robinson, the first openly gay Bishop. BTB caught up with Alston at a mass held at St. Luke’s Church on Sunday in Park City, where LGBT leaders showed up to support and discuss the film.

Love Free or Die is an ITVS-funded film slated for broadcast on an upcoming season of  Independent Lens.