Dear Friends,
African Human Rights Coalition (African HRC) is proud to announce its partnership with California Film Institute (CFI) for the upcoming free community impact and educational screening of the award-winning feature documentary Unsettled: Seeking Refuge in America, in Marin County, California. You are invited to the screening!
Bay Area filmmaker Tom Shepard’s powerful new documentary tells the untold stories of LGBTQ refugees and asylum seekers who have fled intense persecution in their home countries and are attempting to resettle in the United States. The film follows four new arrivals, each of whom have escaped potential peril in their native countries for being different. They’ve landed in the purported “gay mecca” of San Francisco yet, even here, building a new life in an adopted nation is a precarious undertaking. As the current Administration continues to restrict immigrants and drastically cut the flow of refugees and asylum seekers, Unsettled is a timely look at the challenges and perseverance of four refugees on a quest for a better tomorrow.
Discussion and Q&A immediately following screening with director Tom Shepard, Melanie Nathan, Executive Director, African Human Rights Coalition and others also featured in the film, TBA.
SCREENING: Monday, September 16, 2019 at 12 Noon (90 minutes) – at the Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center, 4thStreet, San Rafael.Free Tickets HERE.
On a personal note, I am so excited that the film, UNSETTLED, partly birthed here in Marin, is now being screened at Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center, in Marin, California – as part of the CFI Educational programming. CFI has invited several Marin High Schools, including that of my own freshman daughter, and you are invited to come along to this free community screening! Tom Shepard’s cameras followed us for the 4 years filming the Bay Area portion of a very long arduous journey of courageous asylum seekers and refugees, capturing over 400 hours of footage to yield this acclaimed 88-minute film.If in Marin/Bay Area, go online and get your tickets right away as they are limited:
AND if you are in any other part of the world please stay tuned for when the film is coming to you. This film is getting a lot of the attention it deserves and the opportunity for awareness in this difficult realm is much appreciated.
Looking so forward to seeing you there.
The Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Feature at OUTFEST was awarded to Unsettled, directed by Tom Shepard. It tells the story of four “LGBTQ refugees who flee their home countries for the safety of the United States,” Outfest programmers write. “While Syrian émigré Subhi becomes a public face for the queer refugee movement, Angolan lesbians Cheyenne and Mari, along with Junior, a gender-nonconforming person from the Congo, have a more difficult time navigating the labyrinth of bureaucracy.”
SCREENING: Monday, September 16, 2019 at 12 Noon (90 minutes) – at the Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center, 4thStreet, San Rafael.
Aluta Continua,
Mel.
Melanie Nathan.
African Human Rights Coalition
Executive Director
http://www.AfricanHRC.org
California Film Institute: CFI celebrates and promotes film by presenting the annual Mill Valley Film Festival, exhibiting film year-round at the Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center; and building the next generation of filmmakers and audiences through CFI Education. With thanks to CFI’s educational programming several local high schools will be in attendance and tickets for the screening are free to our community.
Screening Community Partners:
The Spahr Center: is Marin County’s only non-profit community agency devoted to serving, supporting and empowering the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community and everyone in the county living with and affected by HIV. “Guided by our mission, our Board of Directors, staff, volunteers, supporters and donors work together to achieve our vision of Marin as a healthy, inclusive community where every person lives with freedom and equality.”
African Human Rights Coalition: The African Human Rights Coalition (AHRC) works with LGBTI communities and individuals in and from African countries seeking to claim and defend their human rights, with advocacy, resources and direct services: “ We provide ad hoc advocacy and humanitarian services to LGBTQI people who have been criminalized in several African countries and are compelled by persecutory threat and violence to seek safe shelter and/or exile. Our ultimate goal is to partner for change, in the hope Africa can return to its pre-Colonial time of acceptance of sexuality, so Africa’s environment for LGBTI people advances the pursuit of freedom and happiness” Contact Melanie Nathan: nathan@AfricanHRC.org Website: www.africanHRC.org
#UnsettledDoc #UnsettledDocumentary
MORE SCREENINGS AT FESTIVALS
Unsettled is playing in over 15 festivals and venues in the coming weeks.
Here are some ways to see it in the Bay Area, Chicago, Boston, Atlanta, Sonoma, Dayton, Stockholm.
Stay tuned for more screening details soon: Seattle, NM, Ottawa, Pittsburgh, Sacramento, Scottsdale, Ft. Lauderdale, London and more.
MELANIE NATHAN
Commissionermnathan@gmail.com
Advocacy: African Human Rights Coalition
Speaker: Melnathan
Mediation: Private Courts
Follow me on Twitter – @MelanieNathan1
Instagram: @commissionermelnathan
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