Friday, October 3rd-Saturday, Oct 4th
The Sixth Annual Black Panther Party Film Festival
(Remembering our political prisoners over 800 years in captivity)
Produced by the Black Panther Commemoration Committee, NY in conjunction with Maysles Cinema
Friday, October 3rd, 7:00pm
Voice of Liberation: Jalil Abdul Muntaqim
Eve Goldberg and Claude Marks, 2002, 20 min.
Jalil Abdul Muntaqim (formerly Anthony Bottom) was 19 years old when he was arrested. He is a former member of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army, and is one of the longest held political prisoners in the world. This documentary is a unique opportunity to hear Jalil's story. While in San Quentin prison in California in 1976, Jalil launched the National Prisoners Campaign to Petition the United Nations to recognize the existence of political prisoners in the United States and in 1997 Jalil initiated the Jericho Movement. Over 6,000 supporters gathered in the Jericho '98 march in Washington DC and the Bay Area to demand amnesty for US political prisoners on the basis of international law. The Jericho Amnesty Movement aims to gain the recognition by the U.S. government and the United Nations that political prisoners exist in this country and that on the basis of international law, they should be granted amnesty because of the political nature of their cases.
In the Land of the Free
Vadim Jean, 2010, 84 min.
This 2010 documentary (narrated by Samuel L. Jackson) is about the Angola 3, three prisoners who while serving their time in Angola State Prison (the United States' most notorious penal colony) joined the BPP and participated in non-violent resistance campaigns protesting the terrible conditions, prisoner abuse and sexual slavery rampant inside the prison. As a result they were falsely accused of murder while in prison and have all been, with the exception of Robert King who was released in 2001, serving the last 38 years in solitary confinement.
Tribute to the late Herman Wallace, one of the Angola 3, with Herman's House filmmaker Angad Bhalla.
trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhpS3hjhPrQ
BPT: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/868699
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/705014159577246/
Saturday, October 4th, 4:00pm
Passion for Justice
Pat Saunders and Rea Taijiri, 1994, 57 min.
Yuri Kochiyama is a Japanese American woman who has lived in Harlem for more than 40 years with a long history of activism on a wide range of issues. Through extensive interviews with family and friends, archival footage, music and photographs, Passion for Justice chronicles this remarkable woman’s contribution to social change through some of the most significant events of the 20th century, including the Black Liberation movement, the struggle for Puerto Rican independence, and the Japanese American Redress movement. In an era of divided communities and racial conflict, Kochiyama offers an outstanding example of an equitable and compassionate multiculturalist vision.
Mountains That Take Wing: Angela Davis & Yuri Kochiyama
C.A. Griffith & H.L.T. Quan, 2009, 97 min.
Mountains That Take Wing features conversations that span 13 years between two formidable women whose lives and political work remain at the epicenter of the most important civil rights struggles in the US. Through the intimacy and depth of conversations, we learn about Davis, an internationally renowned scholar-activist and 88-year-old Kochiyama, a revered grassroots community activist and 2005 Nobel Peace Prize nominee's shared experiences as political prisoners and their profound passion for justice. On subjects ranging from the vital but largely erased role of women in social movements of the 20th century, community empowerment, to the prison industrial complex, war and the cultural arts, Davis' and Kochiyama's comments offer critical lessons for understanding our nation's most important social movements and tremendous hope for its youth and the future.
Post-screening Q&A TBA.
BPT: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/868715
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/705014159577246/
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJik3l2vb1g&list=PLHWcXOdPg3tJ9GSMtZ6iBaUnyMI3_En-S&index=5
7:00pm
Voices of Three Political Prisoners: Nuh Washington-Last Statement
The Freedom Archives, 2000, 20 min.
Albert “Nuh” Washington... a freedom loving, freedom fighter, Nuh joined the ancestors in prison on April 28, 2000, from cancer. Nuh fought a courageous battle with this disease. He was determined that the effects of the disease on his system would not compromise his integrity, self-respect or humanity. His life and death leaves a rich legacy to be learned from and cherished. In 1969, he joined the Denver, Colorado Chapter of the Black Panther Party (BPP), working with the Free Breakfast Program. By 1971, Nuh was working out of the San Francisco Branch of the Party. Nuh (the Arabic form of Noah) was a committed member of the Black Panther Party and later, after the notorious FBI-engineered East coast-West Coast split, worked with the Black Liberation Army (BLA), in defending the lives and dignity of black folk. Back in the 1970s, Nuh was shot and captured with another Panther, Jalil Muntaqim, and was later charged and convicted of murder along with Jalil and Herman Bell. Evidence has since surfaced strongly suggesting the three men were unjustly convicted in this case. For over 28 years Nuh (was) held in California and New York gulags, and repeatedly punished for his political ideas. When Nuh was diagnosed with terminal cancer, he was devastated. He never envisioned dying behind the walls. He always believed he could win his freedom. While accepting the diagnosis, he still fought until the end, but he sought to put his house in order, so to speak. His final days were spent doing this to the best of his ability.
Free Angela and All Political Prisoners
Shola Lynch, 2013, 102 min.
A documentary that chronicles the life of young college professor Angela Davis, and how her social activism implicates her in a botched kidnapping attempt that ends with a shootout, four dead, and her name on the FBI's 10 most wanted list.
Closing Reception and Party.
BPT: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/868744
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/705014159577246/
