ITVS OPEN CALL

ITVS Open Call for funding is now accepting applications. Open Call gives independent producers up to $350,000 to complete production for a standalone broadcast length documentary to air on public television. The documentary can be on any subject, viewpoint or style as long as it is in active production already, as evidenced via a ten to fifteen minute work in progress sample. Open Call is not a grant. You will receive funding in the form of a co-production agreement that assigns ITVS certain broadcast and streaming rights to your project during the term of the contract.

Deadline for applications is December 16th. Learn more and apply here.

CATAPULT RESEARCH GRANT

The Catapult Research Grant seeks to develop the voices of diverse filmmakers by providing five $10,000 grants plus six months of mentorship and professional development. The grant is open to US-based filmmakers only.

The grant can be used for a variety of needs for developing new nonfiction film ideas including: research, writing, travel, crew, identifying and gaining access to protagonists, and any preliminary production costs associated with shaping the artistic vision or capturing early footage.

Deadline for applications is November 14th. Learn more and apply here.

DOC NYC'S 2022 DOCUMENTARY NEW LEADERS

DOC NYC’s Documentary New Leaders initiative honors individuals whose innovative approaches to distribution, sales, festivals, and marketing work toward a more inclusive and equitable documentary industry. The list of 11 recipients draws from 9 cities—including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Denver, Oakland, San Francisco, and others—and reflects the honorees’ broad range of experience, including roles in distribution, community engagement, exhibition, social impact, organizing, festival programming, and journalism.

The New Leaders include CID sponsored Ann Bennett (Prana Productions) and Amanda Upson (FWD-Doc). Find the full list of honorees here.

JERRY BROWN: THE DISRUPTER AT DOC NYC

JERRY BROWN: THE DISRUPTER, directed by Marina Zenovich, will have its New York premiere at DOC NYC on Sunday, November 13th at 7:15pm. Purchase tickets here.

The film, which looks at the life and career of two-time, four term Governor of California Jerry Brown, had its world premiere at the San Francisco International Film Festival's Doc Stories showcase.

THE SECRET SONG WORLD PREMIERE

THE SECRET SONG, directed by Samantha Campbell, had an exuberant premiere at the Orlando Film Festival, where the filmmaking team was able to kick off its first phase of outreach, including offering free festival passes to local music teachers. Watch the new film trailer here and take a look at the recently-launched website.

The Secret Song is about a piece of recent history that we will never forget, the 2019-2020 school year, when the world was thrust into the pandemic and schools struggled to adapt. Legendary San Francisco music educator Doug Goodkin was retiring after 45 years of teaching and the film originally set out to chronicle his final year. Covid’s abrupt entrance into our lives greatly shifted the filmmaking and amplified a core theme -- the role of improvisation in navigating real-world challenges. The film shows, through a remarkable educator, how a sense of belonging helps us surmount hardships and adversity. The urgency and disarray that the pandemic thrust upon the subjects of this film elicited a kind of dynamism that all teachers must find and bring forth in any challenging situation.

Please follow the film’s updates here:

Facebook: @thesecretsongfilm

Instagram:@thesecretsongfilm

Twitter: @SecretSongFilm

Website

LIFT FEATURED IN THE NY TIMES

Filmed over ten years, LIFT shines a spotlight on the invisible story of homelessness through the eyes of a group of young homeless and home-insecure ballet dancers in New York City. 

After a successful world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival where the film took home an Audience Award, LIFT screened at the Hamptons International Film Festival, and just won the first annual Shine Global “Children’s Resilience in Film Award” at a ceremony in Los Angeles. Last week, The New York Times published a feature story about Steven Melendez, Diana Byer, and the LIFT documentary: "A New Leader at New York Theater Ballet and a Call for New Audiences."

The LIFT team includes: Academy Award-nominated director David Petersen; producer Mary Recine (Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold); executive producers Sam Pollard (When the Levee Breaks) and Jannat Gargi (Summer of Soul). Misty Copeland is the film’s principal advisor.

Check out www.liftdocumentary.com or follow LIFT on Instagram @liftdocumentary.

CLARISSA'S BATTLE AND REBOUND SCREENINGS

CLARISSA'S BATTLE was selected for the Virginia Film Festival and will be screened on Friday, November 4 with the filmmakers and featured participant Clarissa Doutherd in attendance. The film is also screening at Centre Film Festival in Philipsburg, PA.

Clarissa's Battle kicked off its Impact Campaign with a screening at the Grassroots Assembly for Child Care and Early Education in Albuquerque New Mexico on September 23, with over 150 organizers and activists including the film's heroine Clarissa Doutherd and filmmaker Tamara Perkins. Partnerships with local and national Early Childhood Education organizers, funders, and networks such as The Child Care for Every Family Network, Early Childhood Funders Collaborative, Raising Child Care Fund, and Community Change Action are fueling the screenings and actions happening across the country.

REBOUND will be included in the Oakland Museum of California's (OMCA) Hella Feminist Exhibit with a screening and talk with filmmakers and film participants scheduled for Sunday, December 11 at 2pm. The film will also be featured in San Francisco Public Library's 2022 One City One Book Program on Tuesday, Nov 15 at 7pm. 

Both Clarissa's Battle and Rebound are available for Education and Impact via GOOD DOCS. Follow the films @ClarissasBattleFilm and @ReboundWomen.

MAMA HAS A MUSTACHE SCREENINGS

MAMA HAS A MUSTACHE, a short, animated documentary about kids and gender identity, recently screened at the Hamptons International Film Festival, the Mill Valley Film Festival, and will screen at the San Francisco Transgender Film Festival later this month. Director Sally Rubin also presented the film as a keynote/plenary session at the EDGY: Dimensions of Gender conference at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles. The film will be screening in classrooms around LA as part of LGBTQ history month. Visit the website for further updates.

GROUNDWORKS BROADCAST ON PBS

Toasterlab's documentary GROUNDWORKS is being broadcast nationally on Public Television stations and online through November 29. Check local listings throughout the month for airings. If you're in the Oakland area, there will also be a special screening of the film at the Oakland Museum of California as part of Friday Nights at OMCA on Friday, November 18, 2022. At 6 pm, join the filmmakers in the James Moore Theater for a screening and a short musical offering and panel discussion about the film. DJ Teao Sense will be playing in the Amphitheater from 6 to 8 pm. Make sure to stop by Oakland Public Library’s Bike Library to grab a free book, sign up for a library card, and join for Storytime in the OMCA Garden starting at 5:30 pm. This event is free. More here.

Groundworks introduces viewers to four diverse Native performers who come together in a collaborative performance on Alcatraz Island, on San Francisco’s first official Indigenous People’s Day. The collaborators bring to life the history of Indigenous people’s connection to the land, as well as the contemporary outcry for restoration of Native people’s rights and relationship to land. Through moving oral history and stunning traditional dance, the film documents how Native groups and traditions relate to each other geographically and culturally as they collaborate on land reclamation advocacy.

HUMAN SHIELD CROWDFUNDING CAMPAIGN

HUMAN SHIELD, a feature documentary on abortion clinic escorts - volunteers that walk patients from their cars to the clinic front doors - just launched a crowdfunding campaign on Seed&Spark. The film team is raising money to continue production and finish filming. Learn more about the film and its crowdfunding campaign here. Join the growing community of supporters!

SALLY IN THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

On 10/31 (Halloween!) The San Francisco Chronicle published a front page article about Sally Gearhart and the CID-sponsored documentary-in-progress, SALLY, about her life. The author, Ryan Kost, interviewed over a dozen people from Sally’s life, as well as director Deborah Craig and some folks from the film crew too. The article took a deep dive into Sally’s many accomplishments and also explore her “erasure” from the Oscar-winning film Milk (2008) and her later decades on women’s land in Northern California. Read the the article here. If you can’t get past the paywall, please feel free to reach out to Deborah at dcraig@lmi.net for a PDF. 

JULIA VINOGRAD WORK SAMPLE SCREENING

Director Ken Paul Rosenthal presented a work sample of his in-progress feature documentary, JULIA VINOGRAD: BETWEEN SPIRIT AND STONE to a full house at the annual San Francisco Lit Crawl. Watch his recent interview about the film and reading of three Julia Vinograd poems on Berkeley Community Media TV, here.

PREMIERE OF RECIPROCITY PROJECT SEASON ONE

Join the free online premiere of RECIPROCITY PROJECT SEASON ONE on 11/17 at 7:00pm ET! Watch all seven episodes and hear from Reciprocity Project filmmakers and community partners Brianna Smith (Passamaquoddy), Jeremy Dennis (Shinnecock), Malia Akutagawa (Kanaka Maoli), Alisha Carlson (Gwich’in), Lauren Stevens (Passamaquoddy), and Reciprocity Project series producer Adam Mazo. Reciprocity Project embraces Indigenous value systems that have bolstered communities since the beginning of time and invites learning from time-honored and current Indigenous ways of being. Register here.

ENDURING DEMOCRACY AT THE UNITED NATIONS FILM FESTIVAL

ENDURING DEMOCRACY: THE MONTEREY PETITION, produced and directed by David C. Schendel screened at The United Nations Film Festival at Stanford in October.

In a dusty filing cabinet in Monterey, CA, a 1938 film is discovered that depicted a joyous Japanese-American community just before their lives are destroyed. Along with this remarkable never-before-seen film was a trove of signed petitions demanding the restoration of civil rights to those same Americans. Enduring Democracy explores the motivations of individuals who financed hate campaigns as well as the daring women who spearheaded the carefully thought-out response.

TONY FOSTER UPDATE

After an eight day, 100 mile canoe trip on the Canyonlands section of the Green River, principal photography has wrapped for TONY FOSTER: PAINTING AT THE EDGE, a film produced and directed by David C. Schendel.

Tony has now painted the entire Green River from Headwaters in Wyoming to the confluence with the Colorado in Utah. He will be exhibiting the paintings in May at The Whitney Western Museum in Cody, WY. The show with then travel to NYC and around the United States. The filmmakers hope to have the documentary finished by late 2023.

JONATHAN SKURNIK AT THE EDGY DIMENSIONS OF GENDER CONFERENCE

Jonathan Skurnik of the YOUTH AND GENDER MEDIA PROJECT was overjoyed to be back for the third time at the EDGY Dimensions of Gender conference, hosted by Penny Lane, one of the largest foster care agencies in California. Penny Land was the agency that placed Johanna, from Jonathan’s film BECOMING JOHANNA, with a loving and accepting family. This time, Jonathan screened his film CREATING GENDER INCLUSIVE SCHOOLS to a packed room, followed by engaging discussions and personal reflection activities around youth and gender.

THE ESSENCE OF ESSAOUIRA AT FESTIVALS

THE ESSENCE OF ESSAOUIRA, a short film by David H. Wells, screened in October at the SENE Film Festival and at the New Haven Documentary Film Festival.

Walk the spice-scented lanes, tour the markets in the medina (old town) and watch fishermen at work in the busy commercial fishing port of Essaouira, (essa-weera, or es-sweera in Arabic) a city on Morocco’s Atlantic coast protected by 18th-century seafront ramparts. The film was captured, edited and output on an Apple iPhone 11Pro.