After more than 25 years of hosting free screenings of diversity-related documentaries in Piedmont and Oakland, the Appreciating Diversity Film Series is working with a consultant to update its approach to showing films.
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Take the survey HERE.
ADFS kicked-off the Piedmont Food Fest with five short documentary films
Viewers experienced the range of family diversity through themes such as adoption, homelessness, women’s issues, education, and gender identity. The films were appropriate for children ages 10 and up.
Absolutely No Spitting. A Jewish mother and her multiracial 4-year-old adopted daughter explore their DNA profiles and what it means to have many identities and cultures in your genetic heritage. From Peabody Award-winning filmmaker Judith Helfand.
A Concerto Is a Conversation. A virtuoso jazz pianist and film composer traces his family’s lineage through his 91-year-old grandfather from Jim Crow Florida to the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. Academy Award nominee for Best Documentary Short Film.
“In its compact 13 minutes, ‘A Concerto Is a Conversation’ manages to say more about race relations than a film that runs 10 times as long.”
Roger Ebert
Almost Famous: The Silent Pulse of the Universe. In 1967, a young astronomer, Jocelyn Bell, made a breakthrough discovery in astronomy, but as a woman in the sciences her role was overlooked and unfairly ignored.
What You’ll Remember. The story of young Bay Area parents determined to give their four children a good life despite moving in and out of homelessness over a period of fifteen years.
Texas Strong. Kai Shappley, a 6-year old trans child in Texas, fights to be recognized and accepted by her devout Christian family. Emmy Award winner for Outstanding Short Documentary.
Here’s a look at ADFS films from years past.
2000:
The Long Shadow
RBG
2019:
100 Years: One Woman’s Fight for Justice
The Pushouts
An Evening of Shorts (Mother’s Day, Bias, 4.1 Miles,
Dolores
Science Fair
Hillbilly
Knock Down the House
2018:
Code: Debugging the Gender Gap
Rape on the Night Shift
Soufra
Political Animals
The Chinese Exclusion Act
I Am Not Your Negro
2017:
13th
And Then They Came for Us
Arc of Justice
Growing Up Trans
Homestretch
Mind/Game
The House We Live In
The Hunting Ground
2016:
Audrie & Daisy
FREE
The Mask You Live In
3 ½ Minutes, Ten Bullets
2015:
At the River I Stand
Alive Inside
A New Color
The Raising of America: Are We Crazy about Our Kids?
Somewhere Between
Three to Infinity: Beyond Two Genders
2014:
American Promise
Inequality for All
Linsanity
Louder than a Bomb
Loving Lampposts
The Waiting Room
2013:
Lives Worth Living
The Loving Story
Out in America
Poor Kids
Room to Breathe
The Invisible War
2012:
Accidental Hero
Off and Running
Salaam Dunk
Stonewall Uprising
The Education of Shelby Knox
2011:
Brazil in Black and White
Cruz Reynoso: Sowing the Seeds of Justice
Paths of the Displaced
Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai
Writ Writer
Zora Neale Hurston: Jump at the Sun
2010:
Anyone and Everyone
Banished
Hip Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes
Speaking in Tongues
When Medicine got it Wrong
2009:
Ask Not
Blindsight
Companeras
Immigration Calculations
Race to Execution
Unnatural Causes
2008:
Aging Out
Boys of Baraka
Cats of Mirikitani
Islam vs Islamists
Made in LA
2007:
Autumn’s Eyes
Soul of Justice
2006:
39 Pounds of Love
Homeless in Paradise
Mad Hot Ballroom
Raising Teens
2005:
Beauty Before Age
Wet Dreams and False Images
Brother Outsider
Death of a Shaman
Girl Trouble
Lost Boys of Sudan
2004:
Death on a Friendly Border
Fear and Learning at Hoover Elementary
Unlikely Hero
You Don’t Know Dick
2003:
Brothers and Others
Kiss My Wheels
Mai’s America
Strange Fruit
2002:
Blink
Daddy & Papa
Dying to be Thin
Misunderstood Minds
Promises
What Do You Believe?
2001:
Boys will be Men
Breathing Lessons
Disability Culture Shock
First Person Plural
Girls Like Us
Long Night’s Journey into Day
Scout’s Honor
Sound and the Fury
2000:
Follow Me Home
The Personals
1999:
The Way Home
Raymond’s Portrait
Look What a Wonder
Rabbit in the Moon
AKA Don Bonus
Smoke Signals
1998:
Family Name
Twitch & Shout
1997:
Skin Deep
You can find a description of many of these films HERE.