Posted by Cathy and Len
We’re excited to announce that THREADS will have its Canadian premiere at the Mosaic International South Asian Film Festival! THREADS will screen with the film LISTEN TO ME at the Living Arts Centre in Mississauga on August 8 at 3PM. You can get festival passes through Sulekha or Eventbrite and single tickets here. #MISAFF15
Surayai Rahman took the future of Bangladeshi women into her own hands.
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Posted by: Cathy and Len
Happy New Year, everyone! Here is the latest Threads newsletter. You can get a copy as soon as it comes out by subscribing at our website: kanthathreads.com. Thanks to Anil Advani and Rita Meher for the photos.
May you find color and beauty in each day of the New Year
What an extraordinary year! As 2014 comes to a close, we send our thanks and good wishes to you and other supporters of Threads around the world. With your help and the dedication of our film team, we completed and launched Threads!
Threads recently screened for the first time at a film festival and won the Audience Choice Award for Best Short Documentary. We are very pleased with the positive response that this inspiring story is receiving and we look forward to bringing it to diverse audiences in many countries.
We anticipate an exciting year ahead for Threads. Our top priority is to find sponsors for a trip to Bangladesh to show the finished film to the resilient women who are in it and to screen the film as widely as possible in Bangladesh. We are also applying to film festivals worldwide. Getting into festivals is an exciting opportunity to have the film seen by more and more people, including critics and distributors, but it is also a lot of work: we will need to prepare exhibition copies of Threads, create press materials, and refresh the website.
As we continue work on this project, we speak with Surayia regularly and update her on our progress. She has seen an earlier cut of the film, and we hope that the day will soon come when she can see the finished version of Threadswith her family and friends.
We wish you a happy, healthy and peaceful 2015 and hope to see you at a screening of Threads soon. We will keep you updated on screenings through our newsletter and website. We are always happy to hear your ideas , so please keep in touch and tell your friends about Threads.
Threads has come this far with your support. Thank you! Just think what we can do together in 2015. Please help us to bring Threads story to audiences around the world.
Posted by: Cathy and Len
We wish all of our friends in Bangladesh and around the world a happy and peaceful Eid al-Fitr. Our Eid message is at this link.
Posted by: Cathy and Len
We recently had the chance to say “thank you” to our Seattle-area supporters and show them a “sneak preview” of some of the footage shot in Bangladesh over the past 12 months. The event on Mercer Island was a lot of fun for us and gave us an opportunity to talk with supporters, some of whom we had not met in person before.
In addition to a big thank you to those who have donated money, time and encouragement to the film project, we also want to say thanks to our friends who brought the delicious Bangladeshi food and tea, and to those who had so many good things to say about the film and about the importance of supporting independent film. As always, Rita Meher did an excellent job of editing the most recent footage into a beautiful seven-minute clip.
We could not have come this far without the help and support of a lot of people. Donations of money, time and services have gotten us to where we are today. The outpouring of enthusiasm and encouragement keeps us going. As we continue with our fundraising efforts we sincerely thank everyone who has helped and look forward to thanking those who will help in the future!
Posted by: Len
Congratulations to our friend Alex Rotaru for the New York City theatrical release and good reviews generated by his latest documentary, “Shakespeare High.” Cathy and I met Alex — who has also directed “Kids with Cameras” and “They Came to Play” — in late 2011 in Kazakhstan where I was helping to put on an American contemporary documentary film festival in Almaty and Shymkent. Alex’s enthusiasm, passion for his subjects, and general joie de vivre are refreshing and inspiring, and both Cathy and I really enjoyed the time we spent with him, and learned much from our discussions of film making.
Alex was in Kazakhstan because “Kids with Cameras” was selected by an independent panel of experts for the American Film Showcase which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, and was being shown, subtitled in Russian, along with five other American documentaries in various cities in Kazakhstan. Alex and film expert Diane Carson led discussions of his and the other films, had workshops with students, and helped introduce Kazakh audiences to a film genre that most were not familiar with. Continuing Alex’s tradition of success, in February “Shakespeare High” was selected for the 2012 American Film Showcase.
Congratulations to Alex and those who worked on the other films chosen for AFS! Your work goes around the world and helps audiences experience firsthand the amazing creativity and breadth of vision and experience of U.S. documentary filmmakers. We hope that Surayia’s story will one day join AFS as well.
