This weekend marks the 16th annual Syracuse University Human Rights Film Festival. This year’s theme centers on storytelling.

The three-day event will feature five films including “The Sentence,” “On Her Shoulders,” “Call Her Ganda,” “I Dream In Another Language” and “White Sun.” The festival runs from Thursday to Saturday. The shows run at 7 p.m. on Thursday and Friday and 1 p.m., 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Saturday.

Professors Tula Goenka and Roger Hallas co-directed this year’s festival. Originally founded as a film festival focused on human rights violations in South Asia, the two worked to “broaden the focus” of the event to incorporate more communities and identities.

“(It) became truly global in scope,” Hallas said.

The purpose of this event, Goenka and Hallas said, is to expose students “to stories from around the world,” as well as in their own backyards. Both professors insisted that they want students to not think of human rights as an only foreign or global issue.

“Especially stories about human rights and social justice,” Goenka said. “We have a lot of injustices happening in our own country.”

The opening night’s film, “The Sentence,” by Rudy Valdez reiterates the festival’s storytelling theme, as well as its human rights violations roots. According to the documentary’s website, the film “explores the devastating consequences of mass incarceration” and mandatory sentencing. It does this through Valdez’s documentation of his own family and incarcerated sister over 10 years.

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Valdez, an award-winning filmmaker featured on HBO and in the Sundance Film Festival, will be making an appearance on campus at the premiere to host a Q&A session. This interactive component will allow students to engage and discuss the dialogues and themes shown through cinema. “The Sentence” will screen Thursday at 7 p.m. in the Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium.

Another festival highlight, PJ Raval’s documentary “Call Her Ganda,” tells the story of Jennifer Laude. A Filipina transgender woman, Laude was brutally murdered by a United States Marine. The film follows the women that invested themselves in her case to pursue justice. Raval’s film had its theatrical release this past weekend in New York City and will screen at the festival on Saturday at 1 p.m. in the Shemin Auditorium.

Goenka and Hallas said having a variety of films is important to co-founders, each noting the importance of diversity in geography, theme and genre.

Goenka said her intention is to make the event more accessible to students by holding it on Main Campus. While many similar film events are held across the city of Syracuse, the fact that this festival is on SU’s campus is a unique opportunity that, she said, students should take advantage of.

“Students come into this space and are open to an encounter with a different experience, an encounter with things they might not know about,” Hallas said. “They see this is something that is part of their world in which they have a responsibility to engage.”

Published on September 25, 2018 at 10:31 pm

Contact Kailee at knvick@syr.edu