April 10-17, 2016

This Year's Program Celebrates the Power of Art and Culture in Affecting Positive Change

Tenth Annual event takes place April 12-19th in collaboration with Roger Williams University. Highlights include major international shorts and features, and documentaries and a celebration of the arts.

2016 ROVING EYE INTERNATIONAL

FILM FESTIVAL AWARDS

11th Annual Event welcomed world premieres & attending filmmakers

BRISTOL, RI • Awards for the top films screened at the 11th Annual Roving Eye International Film Festival have been announced.

The Festival created by the Flickers’ Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIF) in partnership with Roger Williams University kicked off April 10th and ran through the 17th. This year’s programming featured over 80 films from across the world, numerous World and US Premieres; panel discussions/symposia; visiting filmmakers; workshops; student film and arts showcases on the RWU campus.

The Roving Eye International Film Festival is a portal of discovery for film, arts and culture lovers across the region. The Festival’s annual Soforenko Foundation Film/Speaker Series On The Jewish Experience showcased documentaries and short films never before shown in the U.S. Guest speakers included Brian Mayer, Cantor at Temple Beth Emmanu-El; and Andrew Lund, director/producer/educator.

Throughout the Festival, a series of panel discussions and presentations took place. This year’s guest panelists included such industry leaders as Eric Latek: writer, director, motion graphics artist; Duncan Putney, actor, and award winning screenwriter; Chris Sparling, award-winning writer/director; Tom DeNucci, writer/director/actor; Fr. Kenneth Gumbert, O.P., filmmaker/educator/painter/sculptor; Alice Cross, writer/lecturer; Rev. Nancy Soukup, RWU Multifaith Chaplain; and Shawn Quirk, RIIFF Program Director.

Students at the University, with the guidance of Flickers’ Rhode Island International Film Festival, created the Roving Eye International Film Festival through the Film Minor senior-level course, Curation and Film Festival Production. Flickers’ Executive Director and RWU Professor, George T. Marshall teaches the class. This year, 22 students spent the first part of the spring semester reviewing more than 500 films provided by Flickers and from there went on to create the entire Roving Eye Festival. The students developed active marketing and PR strategies, including the planning for events plus staffing throughout the week. Roberta E. Adams, Ph.D., Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, is the Festival Chair, linking faculty adjudicators with students, RIIFF and the RWU administration in a unique collaboration.

THE 2016 AWARD WINNERS:

BEST DIRECTOR:

Eve Symington, Director, TETHER 18 min. Guatemala, 2015 In a remote Mayan village, a tenacious young girl's dream of education is in peril when an unwanted pregnancy endangers her sister's life.

BEST SHORT DOCUMENTARY:

THE MANY SAD FATES OF MR. TOLEDANO | Joshua Seftel, Director | 25 min. USA, 2015 Photographer Phil Toledano has become obsessed with his future. Using DNA tests, fortune tellers, and a prosthetic makeup artist, he begins photographing the many dark possibilities that might await him -- despite his wife's pleas to abandon the project. Over three years, Toledano's obsession alters him and his family forever.

A CHANCE TO DRESS | Alice Bouvrie, Director | 39 min. 2015, USA, 2015 Dr. John Southard, a world renown and respected geologist and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, is an open cross dresser. The film explores the various dimensions of identity and the diversity of gender expression.

BEST DOCUMENTARY:

MIRIAM BEERMAN: EXPRESSING THE CHAOS | Jonathan Gruber, Director | 53 min. USA, 2015 Miriam Beerman was born in Providence, Rhode Island in 1923 with a visual gift for the world around her. She quickly knew that painting would be her life. A recipient of two Fulbright fellowships, among numerous other honors, she had the first-ever solo female show at the Brooklyn Museum in 1971. Yet even in the art world she was challenged as a woman in another male-dominated profession.

Tied With:

GOODBYE THERESIENSTADT | Carl Otto Dethlefsen and Jonatan Jerichow, Directors | 58 min. Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Israel, 2015

Over 7,000 Jews escaped from Denmark to Sweden when the occupying Germans tried to round up Danish Jews in October 1943. Yet regrettably, 470 Jewish men, women and children were captured and put into cattle cars bound for the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

Seventy years after they were miraculously rescued from Theresienstadt, six Danish Jews who were children at the time return to the concentration camp where they suffered for a year and a half, consumed by hunger, anxiety and fear of what tomorrow might bring.

BEST FOREIGN SHORT FILM:

FRENCH TOUCH | Cheng Xiao-Xing, Director | 22 min. France, 2015 The Chinese dream Florent, a young French graduate turn into nightmare. He is desperate to survive in the Far East. He crosses paths with Tang, a beautiful Chinese woman returned from France, which will make him an offer.

BEST U.S. SHORT FILM:

DAY ONE | Henry Hughes, Director | 25 min. USA, 2015 On her first day in Afghanistan, an interpreter for the US Army is forced to deliver the child of an enemy bomb-maker.

BEST NARRATIVE SHORT FILM:

BEFORE THE BOMB | Tannaz Hazemi, Director | 23 min. USA, 2015 10 year-old Elsa takes matters into her own hands when Child Services plans a visit that could separate her from her 5 year old brother.

BEST JEWISH SHORT FILM:

SUPERMAN ISN'T JEWISH (...AND I AM, A BIT) | Jimmy Bemon, Director | 30 min. France, 2014 When he finds out that it's because he's Jewish that his willy is different, young Benjamin decides to do everything he can to hide his religion and keep his secret...

BEST FEATURE FILM:

THE VALLEY BELOW | Kyle Thomas, Director | 87 min. Canada, 2014 UNITED STATES PREMIERE The Valley Below is a multi-narrative drama that chronicles the life of a small town in the badlands of Alberta over the course of one year.

Tied with:

FRIENDS AND ROMANS | Christopher Kublan, Director | 88 min. USA, 2015 Screenplay: Michael Rispoli, Christopher Kublan, Gregg Greenberg Cast: Michael Rispoli, Annabella Sciorra, Paul Ben-Victor and Tony Sirico A group of lifelong mob movie extras mount a production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in their local Staten Island theater in order to finally get some speaking roles. But the theater is the secret hideout of a real-life gangster who fancies himself an actor, and whom the FBI are hunting for the recent murder of a Broadway producer.

To see a listing of this year's programming and to learn more about the Roving Eye Festival, go to: http://www.film-festival.org/RovingEye.php

ABOUT FLICKERS' RHODE ISLAND INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL:

The Flickers' Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIFF) has secured its place in the global community as the portal for the best in international independent cinema, earning the respect of domestic and foreign filmmakers, filmgoers and trend watchers. This confluence of art and commerce brought together world-class celebrities, award-winning filmmakers, new talent and audience members in record numbers last year. Ranked as one of the top-10 festivals in the United States, RIIFF is one of 19 festivals worldwide that is a qualifying festival for the Academy Awards® in both short film and documentary short film through its partnership with the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences®.

Our Collaborative Partners: