Samuel D. Pollard and Rex Miller’s CITIZEN ASHE is the Opening Night film, and Julie Cohen and Betsy West’s JULIA to close out the festival
Centerpiece screenings include E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s THE RESCUE, and CJ Hunt’s THE NEUTRAL GROUND
The HSDFF Career Achievement Award will be presented to Samuel D. Pollard, Garrett Bradley will receive the festival’s Impact Award, and Dawn Hudson, Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences CEO will serve as the Honorary Chair
Hot Springs, AR (September 21, 2021) – The critically acclaimed Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival announced the lineup of films and honorees for its 30th edition, which will mark a return to in-person/in-theater screenings as part of this year’s expansive hybrid approach, and will take place October 8-16. Screenings will kick off with the Opening Night presentation of Samuel D. Pollard and Rex Miller’s Citizen Ashe, followed by the Centerpiece Selections of E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s The Rescue and CJ Hunt’s The Neutral Ground, with Julie Cohen and Betsy West’s Julia screening on Closing Night.
This year marks the inaugural HSDFF program for new Director of Programming, Greta Hagen-Richardson. Richardson said, “It was an incredible honor to be the Director of Programming at the festival this year. Our program represents the work of filmmakers who prioritize being a part of the community they document, not only in the director chair but in the makeup of their crews. With 55% of our directors identifying as female or non-binary and 40% identifying as a person of color, we strive to accurately reflect the world of nonfiction filmmaking.”
The 2021 HSDFF Career Achievement Award will honor the prolific and influential documentarian Samuel D. Pollard. The 2021 HSDFF Impact Award celebrates recent Academy Award nominee Garrett Bradley (Time), and this year’s Honorary Chair will be Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences CEO, Dawn Hudson.
“Our thirtieth anniversary program reflects the values we aspire to as a festival. We’re moving into the next thirty years with a renewed vision of documentary creation and the impact documentary filmmaking can have on our world,” said HSDFF Executive Director, Jennifer Gerber. “There is always a heightened energy and anticipation during anniversary years and this year’s films, our stellar trio of honorees, and the panels, events, activities, parties, and more that our staff has put together point to a truly exceptional film festival.”
THE GALA FILM SELECTIONS
Samuel D. Pollard and Rex Miller’s Citizen Ashe will screen Opening Night on Friday, October 8. The film details the evolution of Ashe from groundbreaking tennis legend to striking public figure. As the International Centerpiece, The Rescue, directed by the Academy Award winning filmmakers of Free Solo, E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, viscerally chronicles the unprecedented undertaking to rescue a boys soccer team trapped in a flooded cave. The U.S. Centerpiece Selection of CJ Hunt’s The Neutral Ground explores the social upheaval caused by the planned removal of Confederate statues in New Orleans. Julie Cohen and Betsy West’s Julia will close out the film festival on Saturday, October 16 with the legendary story of Julia Childs, the iconic chef, author, and television star, who introduced the concept of the “celebrity chef.”
HSDFF HONOREES
HSDFF Career Achievement Award honoree Samuel D. Pollard has spent his decorated career documenting the history of Black America. As a producer, editor, and director in both fiction and nonfiction, he is perhaps one of the most versatile and talented filmmakers of our time, having directed Sammy Davis, Jr.: I've Gotta Be Me, MLK/FBI and Mr. Soul! to name a few. Pollard’s work frequently concerns the uglier side of the political and racial divide in this country, while still finding joy and light in his subjects. Often faced with outrageous obstacles (bombings, government abandonment, cold-blooded murder), Pollard manages to save space for hope.
HSDFF Impact Award Winner Garrett Bradley is perhaps most well known for her Academy Award-nominated documentary, Time. Winner of the 2020 Sundance Award for U.S. Documentary Direction, the film and Bradley have made many critics “best of” year-end lists. However, she has been crafting captivating and deeply empathic stories her entire career. With a special ability to present her subjects as fully-formed individuals, simultaneously unique and relatable, Bradley has cemented her place in the future of the medium. Melding a visually dynamic approach to storytelling with a journalistic sensibility, Bradley is able to connect discrete narratives to a larger ideology about how individuals end up in certain situations. Beginning with her narrative feature debut, Below Dreams, Bradley centers characters who are regularly overlooked. Having spent much of her career creating in the American South, she understands and respects a region frequently maligned in the popular imagination.
A native of Hot Springs, the 2021 HSDFF Honorary Chair, Dawn Hudson, is the CEO of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Dawn oversees the Academy’s staff, operations and outreach, including awards, membership, marketing, communications, finance, technology and the Academy Foundation. Since joining the Academy in 2011, Hudson has driven significant diversity, inclusion, and representation initiatives across Academy membership and staff. As a result, the Academy has grown into a diverse global community of artists and filmmakers. Under Hudson, the Academy overreached its initial goals for doubling diversity and inclusion in membership by 2020.
ADDITIONAL HIGHLIGHTS
Presented by Mountain Valley Spring Water, this year’s schedule is packed with award-winners and festival favorites that span the globe, telling a wide array of stories — some shocking and daring, and all insightful and entertaining. Included among them are Matthew Heineman’s The First Wave, a heart-wrenching story documenting the first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic in New York City from the eyes of the medical professionals saving lives every day. Socks on Fire director, Bo McGuire, crafts a loving, playful ode to his recently passed grandmother as his wildly homophobic aunt and drag queen uncle battle over her estate; the in-person screening to feature a live drag performance pre-show. The 8th, directed by Aideen Kane, Lucy Kennedy, Maeve O’Boyle, follows the fight in Ireland to repeal the 8th amendment, which criminalized abortions, bolstering some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the world. With a spotlight on personal and community-driven stories set in Arkansas, the festival is thrilled to present the world premiere of Michael Schwarz’s Forever Majestic, a loving portrait of a treasured Arkansas tourist destination and all the controversy that it sparks. In addition, Jonathan Sutak’s Broken Wings will have its world premiere, a film featuring Adonis, the notoriously well known, one-winged vulture of Hot Springs.
Tickets and passes will be on-sale September 22. For more information on purchasing and additional details on the Hot Springs Documentary Film festival, please visit: hsdfi.org.
The 2021 Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival official selections:
