Docuday in L.A.

Saturday was the annual Docuday in L.A. where all the nominated documentary films that are nominated for an Academy Award are shown at the Writers' Guild on Doheney.  The five long films (about 90 minutes each) and the five short films (40 minutes each) are shown from 9:00 AM to near midnight with interviews with the film makers and Q & A after the shows.  Most of the documentaries share something about life that we are not aware and are very moving.  The nominated short films are:

"Redemption" is about New Your City's gleaners...living on the redemption of bottles and cans at 5 cents a piece.  Thousands of New Yorkers are living this way and the competition is fierce especially since the Great Recession.

"Mondays at Racine" is about two women who provide salon services to women  diagnosed with cancer for free on one Monday a month.  The women are cared for physically and emotionally as they deal with this life crisis.

"Open Heart" is about 8 Rwandon children whose hearts have been ravaged by preventable strep throat turned deadly due to heart valve damage.  These children were selected from dozens who need this surgury to save their lives.  After seeing this movie, the government of Rwanda is now taking steps to prevent this heart disease and to open a heart surgery center in their own country.

"Inocente" is a 15 year old girl who is homeless, undocumented, and clings to her hope to be an artist in the face of a bleak future. This documentary won for the best short.  Inocente was on the stage at the academy awards as well as at Saturday's viewing.  She is now living independently and supporting herself through her art.

"Kings Point" is about former New Yorkers who moved to this retirement community in Florida and live their life there away from family with new transitional friends.  This "waiting for God" environment is filled with daily drama that includes dating, sickness, death, and isolation in this "paradise."

The nominated feature length films are:

A Palestinian farm worker buys a camera in 2005 to document his new born youngest son but instead documents the creeping Israeli settlements on the West Bank near his home.  The community's non violent protests grow as barriers are cut through their land and their olive trees are destroyed.  Each of his 5 broken cameras documents a an act of violence that he experiences. 

"The Invisible War" is about the nearly 20,000 women and men who are sexually assaulted in the military each year and the cover up and lack of justice victims experience.  After viewing this video last summer, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta ordered the restructuring of investigations to take the process outside the direct command in order to bring justice to the victims.  Also, commanders from all over the globe were flown in to see the movie and were directed to respond to this crisis where only about 10 percent of the assault cases end in prosecution of perpetrators.

"How to Survive a Plague" is about the activism that was necessary to respond to the H.I.V crisis in the 1980's to get adequate response from the government and the medical community.

This feature length documentary won the Academy Award.  "Searching For Sugar Man" is about the search for Rodriquez who was bigger than Elvis in South Africa in the early 1970's.  However, his two albums did not do so well in the U.S. and he "disappeared."  Actually he lived a quiet life as a demolition carpenter in Detroit.  He is still there but once "found" he has traveled to South Africa where he was given a King's Welcome and gave a concert.  He has also given concerts in the U.S. and is C.D.'s are now at the record stores.

I went to bed early, but Colleen watched the final documentary that began at 10 PM called "The Gatekeepers." It is about Israeli secret service former leaders talking about their actions and insights about the Occupation after the Six Day War in 1967.  At least one said that they were doing to the Palestinians on the West Bank and Gaza what the Nazis did to the Jews in Europe.