Tuesday, February 27
Bonni Curran Memorial Lecture for the Health and Dignity of Women
6:30 PM – St. Thomas Church, Ketchum
*Free to the public
Maria Cavalcanti, President and Chief Executive Officer of Pro Mujer will open the Festival with the presentation of the annual Bonni Curran Memorial Lecture for the Health and Dignity of Women at St. Thomas Episcopal Church on Tuesday, Feb. 27, at 6:30 p.m. The lecture is free to the public. >> more
Wednesday, February 28
Filmmaker Retrospective “Sun Come Up”
6 PM – The Community Library
*Free to the public
With filmmaker Jennifer Redfearn. In 2009, the people living in the Cateret Islands of New Guinea faced a crisis as rising seawaters began to shrink the atoll ring that was their home. The film follows Ursula Rakova, selected as relocation leader, picks a young man and a young woman to accompany her as she sets out by boat to find new shores to preserve their past and future. >>more
Thursday, March 1
“Mama Colonel”
7:30 PM – Sun Valley Opera House
With Ugochi Daniels, Chief of the Humanitarian Response Branch of UNFPA. This film focuses on a remarkable and unflappable woman, Colonel Honorine Munyole, head of a special national police unit charged with the protection of women and children in The Democratic Republic of Congo. Everyone is a survivor in Mama’s Colonel’s eyes, leading the resourceful policewoman to find a ray of hope— and a remarkably uplifting solution.
Friday, March 2
“Tocando la Luz” (Touch the Light)
7 PM – Sun Valley Opera House
With filmmaker Jennifer Redfearn. This film focuses on three blind women living in Havana, Cuba. It explores the heartbreak and the liberation of personal transformation, revealing both the pain and joy of what fighting for yourself means. As one of the women so aptly remarks, “If you want to die, you die. If you want to fight, you fight. If you want to live, you live.”
Saturday, March 3
“Poetry”
11 AM – Sun Valley Opera House
*Free to the public
This film follows Mija, who has just been told by her doctor that she is in the early stages of developing Alzheimer’s disease. When she sees a sign advertising poetry classes at her local community center, she enrolls on a whim, and eventually creates a poem of beauty in a world that seems to hold only sadness and pain.
“Sami Blood”
3 PM – Sun Valley Opera House
Based on the life of the director’s grandmother, this debut film explores the life of Elle-Marja, a 14 year-old indigenous Sami girl (also know as Lapps) who lives in Northern Scandinavia and herds reindeer with her family. When she and her younger sister are forced to attend a Swedish-speaking boarding school, for the first time Elle-Marja experiences the racism and prejudice directed at her heritage and culture that existed in 1930’s Sweden.
“In Syria” (Insyriated)
7 PM – Sun Valley Opera House
With filmmaker Philppe Van Leeuw. Locked inside an apartment with the door barricaded from the inside, a Syrian woman tries to protect her household from the raging war just outside her covered windows. In the span of 24 hours, we see danger come closer and the household is forced to make incomprehensible moral decisions to keep each other alive.
Sunday, March 4
“Girls’ War”
3 PM – Sun Valley Opera House
With filmmaker Mylene Sauloy. As terror and war tear through the Kurdish villages of Syria and Northern Iraq, the brave women of the Patriotic Women’s Association have even created an army, comprised of women from all over the world including Paris, Turkish Kurdistan, and Germany. They have taken up arms against the Islamic state, and winning inspiring victories.