Summer Screenings
The Sabira Cole Film Festival currently streaming all its films online. Below are our upcoming features. Be sure to check our social media for more immediate updates.
Yemanja: Wisdom for the African Heart of Brazil - Narrated by Alice Walker
More than 4 million Africans were brought to Brazil during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. More than anywhere else in the Americas.
This documentary film, narrated by Pulitzer-Prize winner author Alice Walker, centers the Afro-indigenous Candomblé spiritual culture in Bahia, Brazil. Grounded in strong community and Earth-based wisdom, Candomblé is a potent legacy of enslaved Africans in the Americas. The film explores contemporary and historical social challenges, resiliency, and triumphs of Candomblé and its devotees through the voices of extraordinary female leaders.
This award-winning documentary made its Pittsburgh premiere in 2016, including a panel discussion with Alice Walker, who participated in several workshops during her visit, and enjoyed a tour at City of Asylum before Alphabet City was open.
These Pittsburgh connections were made possible by Sabira Bushra (Cole) and the Sembene Film Festival.
Filmmakers Donna Roberts and Gerald (Chip) Hoffman will participate in a post-screening discussion and audience Q+A.
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The Untold Story of Emmett Till
On July 13, 2020, SCFF partnered with City of Asylum for a screening of "The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till" that featured a post-screening discussion and audience Q&A with Herb Boyd
and director Keith Beauchamp.
Click here to watch the discussion.
Keith Beauchamp (born 1972) is a filmmaker based in Brooklyn who investigated the murder of Emmett Till, fifty years after Till's death in 1955, Beauchamp's research eventually led him to create the documentary film The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till, and the reopening of the case by the United States Department of Justice in May 2004. Beauchamp first encountered the Emmett Till story at age ten while looking through an issue of Jet magazine. In 1996,
he started his own research, and found microfilm of articles which listed witness who had not been questioned by police, and references to uncharged participants in the murder, besides J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant, who were found not guilty of Till's murder, but later publicly confessed. Through the help of other researchers, Beauchamp contacted witnesses, but he says that it was some years before they trusted him enough to speak on camera. Researching and creating the film took nine years.
Struggle In Steel
On March 9, 2020, Sembène – The Film & Arts Festival partnered with City of Asylum to screen Struggles in Steel and a post-show talkback. Sabira Cole Film Festival with COA rebroadcasted the film and discussion. Filmmaker Tony Buba introduced the film, gave a live talkback, and lead the audience in a Q&A after the screening.
