The Bentonville Film Festival, whose mission is to champion diversity and inclusiveness in film and media, will show a documentary that looks at the history and systematic forces behind gender inequality in the entertainment industry on the first day of film screenings.
"This Changes Everything" will screen at 4:30 p.m. May 8 at Record North. Geena Davis, festival co-founder and Academy Award-winning actress, is the executive producer of the film. Tom Donahue is the director.
It will be one of several films shown that day, beginning at 10 a.m. The festival will be held May 7-11.
The discrimination in the entertainment industry reinforces disparities in culture, Davis says of the documentary. The motto of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender Media is "If they can see it, they can be it."
"When people see somebody that looks like them doing something on screen, they will realize they can do it, too," she says. "We really want to see systematic change across the industry, in the biggest movies."
"This Changes Everything" features Davis, as well as Meryl Streep, Sandra Oh, Natalie Portman, Taraji P. Henson and others who share their insight into sexism in Hollywood. There will be a panel discussion after the screening with Donahue and actors Jackie Cruz and Gabrielle Cateris.
"This Changes Everything" is one of 13 spotlight films this year -- noncompetition films that are free to the public, although a ticket may be required.
This year's competition categories include 15 narrative films, 14 documentaries and nine episodic films. Eighty-one percent of the competition films are female directed, and 68 percent have a person of color either directing or acting as the protagonist, according to Davis.
Harloula Rose's "Once Upon a River" will make its world premiere in the narrative competition category. It's based on Bonnie Jo Campbell's best-selling novel, and it's a coming-of-age story in which a 15-year-old part-Native American girl sets out on an odyssey down the Stark River to find her estranged mother after her father is killed.
"She is in a tough situation, consistently in dire straights, but she never really loses a sense of hope or herself," Rose says of the main character, Margo Crane.
It was central for Rose to have a female protagonist in her feature debut, she says.
"I felt like I could really empathize with this girl and what she's going through, even though it's not about me per se," she says. "I felt like I could tell the story in an authentic way."
It'll screen at 4 p.m. May 10 and 10 a.m. May 11 at the Skylight Cinema.
The Bentonville Film Festival is doing a great job elevating voices in minority communities, says Flavio Alves, director of "The Garden Left Behind."
The film tells the journey of a 30-year-old Mexican transwoman and her grandmother as they navigate the protagonist's transition and life as undocumented immigrants in New York.
Alves, a gay Latinx filmmaker, says he feels a responsibility to tell the stories of people who have been underrepresented on the screen because he knows what if feels like to be an outsider.
"The more stories that we have, the more people will be educated about what it means to be Latino or a gay man or even trans," he says.
Alves made sure trans characters in the film are trans in real life and spoke to more than 200 transpeople while writing the script to help ensure an authentic story was portrayed in the final product, which took six years to complete, he says.
Although the film tells a story from the LGBTQ community, it was made for a wider audience, he says. Alves hopes it sparks conversation and that those who see it can relate to certain themes, such as everyone's need to feel financially secure or to find love.
"The Garden Left Behind" premiered at South By Southwest in Austin, Texas, in March, where it received the Audience Award. It will screen at 6 p.m. May 9 and 8 p.m. May 10 at Skylight Cinema.
There will also be four films with Arkansas ties shown this year.
"To the Stars" was previously screened at the Sundance Film Festival and was created by Fayetteville-based Rockhill Studios. It takes place in a small town in Oklahoma in the 1960s and follows a reclusive teen as she navigates her alcoholic mother and bullying from classmates to find a friend with a charismatic new girl at school.
"Saint Frances" features Arkansas native Kelly O'Sullivan in the lead role playing a woman, Bridget, who works as a nanny for 6-year-old Frances after having an abortion.
"Well Groomed" follows dog groomers from their homes to competitions across the country. Arkansas-based champion groomer Angela Kumpe is featured in the film and will be in attendance at the festival, according to the festival's website.
"Sweet Inspirations" was filmed last summer in various locations around Northwest Arkansas, including the building that is now home to Big Box Karaoke on Block Avenue in Fayetteville, where the cupcake shop in the film was created.
Festival leaders will also honor Jamie Brewer, the "American Horror Story" actor and Drama Desk Award winner, with the See It, Be It Award this year. The award highlights an influential voice in the arena of diversity and inclusion in media.
"She's an incredible trailblazer," Davis says. "We want to highlight her career and highlight our interest in giving representation to underrepresented people."
New to the festival this year is a day-and-a half filmmaker retreat in Eureka Springs as well as a partnership with The Unexpected -- an organization that brings urban and contemporary art to Arkansas -- in Forth Smith.
The Bentonville-based festival will bring the documentary program and a feature film as well as cast members and filmmakers to downtown Fort Smith May 9-10.
"This year we're trying to broaden our reach a little bit in terms of providing programming for all of Northwest Arkansas," says Trevor Drinkwater, Bentonville Film Festival co-founder and president and CEO of Inclusion Companies.
NAN What's Up on 05/05/2019