Recent News
Pride of Lions screens at Waterfront Film Festival June 13 and 14 in Saugatuck Michigan!
Louise and John Woehrle sat on a panel "Docs That Rock" along with Academy Award Winner Sue Marx.
Screen Actors Guild magazine SAGIndie named Waterfront one of its "Top Five Favorite Film Festivals" worldwide, ranking it third behind the Cannes and Sundance festivals.
Well-known Sierra Leonean journalist/filmmaker Sorious Samura (Cry Freetown) learned about Sierra Leonean Dr. Barrie and the work he is doing in Sierra Leone through our film project and trailer. This led to Dr. Barrie's inclusion in Addicted to Aid, an investigative report that aired on BBC Panorama and BBC World News in November and December of 2009.
Addicted to Aid highlights Dr. Barrie and his story about his work through Global Action Foundation at the Kono Medical Clinic and community outreach as examples of an NGO in Sierra Leone using funds effectively, helping thousands of people. You can view an excerpt from Addicted to Aid by going to the Global Action Foundation website www.goact.org.
Pride of Lions in the News
Review from Quad City Times ( 'Pride of Lions' hinges on hope amid brutal civil war )
Review from Waterfront Film Festival ( read )
MPR News, Movie Natters with Euan Kerr ( read )
City Pages ( read )
Holland Sentinel ( read )
Lowdown, State News ( read review )
Lowdown, State News ( read article )
Blogs
http://filmreporter.wordpress.com/2009/06/
http://www.nextcat.com/discussion/viewtopic.php?p=5323
http://mnartists.org/article.do?rid=229830
Previous Screenings
April 26th
27th Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival
"Best of Fest" 2nd Place
April 20th
Boston International Film Festival
noncompetitive
April 9th
The Heights Theater
Minneapolis. MN
"Special Screening"
Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
Princeton, NJ
Malvern Preparatory School
Philadelphia, PA
Freetown, Bumpe & Bo
Sierra Leone
Scholar Gives Review of Pride of Lions
"In this important film, we meet with West African individuals who speak about crucial topics of mutual concern to them. This "grassroots" and close-up perspective is rarely projected in the information we receive from West Africa, but it appears with clarity and abundance in this important film. This is a welcome piece of work of interest to a wide spectrum of viewers.
In the "Pride of Lions," a group of Sierra Leone people speak in their own voices and manner about issues arising out of war in their country. We learn too, why these issues are important. This approach of the filmmakers is at least as valuable as the specific history of the devastation caused by Sierra Leone's recent decade of war and these citizens' courageous work of recovery and forgiveness. The devastation caused by loss of human life, the loss of peoples' knowledge, skills and talents, and of their material accomplishments, is tautly demonstrated.
From different parts of a community, of different ages and positions, the persons in the film identify what has been done and what remains to be done at the local level in their part of Sierra Leone. The film allows us, who cannot visit them, to learn of their experiences and actions, without "interpreters" to cloud the conversation.
Most powerful is their courage to forgive, to tell of their hope, and of the responsibilities they have towards each other. We note the welcome accorded to visitors and strangers, with their power to help or cause varying degrees of problems, even havoc. As one of our narrators tells us, the Sierra Leone people of the film are like lions now, protecting and defending each other. They stand in hard-won genuine hope, and allow us to share in how that came to be, and lead us to reflect.
Victoria Bomba Coifman, PhD
University of Minnesota
African American & African Studies.
