ADIFF 2023 Film Festival to Begin Next Month

The African Diaspora International Film Festival (ADIFF) will celebrate its 31st anniversary from Nov. 24 to Dec. 10 with 85 narratives and documentaries from 33 countries to be presented in five different venues in Manhattan.

ADIFF NYC 2023 will present to the audiences in the tri-state area a diverse array of comedies, compelling dramas, and thought-provoking documentaries hailing from major film festivals including Berlinale, Cannes, Toronto, Locarno, FESPACO, Trinidad Tobago and Durban. Alongside these offerings, the festival is featuring works by both independent American and international filmmakers. As a special addition to the main event, ADIFF NYC 2023 is set to introduce a Mini Virtual Festival, showcasing a curated selection of films accessible to audiences nationwide.

HIGHLIGHTS OF ADIFF NYC 2023

Hope of Escape by Amy Gerber (USA), ADIFF 2023 Opening Night Film. This historical docudrama tells the true story that follows the incredible journey of an enslaved mother and daughter who must escape before they are sold and separated forever. A star-studded "cast" of historic characters include abolitionist Julia Williams; famous orator Henry Highland Garnet, and renowned abolitionists William Lloyd Garrison and Lewis Tappan.

The Survival of Kindness by Rolf de Heer (Australia). Centerpiece of ADIFF 2023, this award-winning film will screen in presence of first-time actress Mwajemi Hussein described by Variety as "riveting." This film - which had its world premiere at Berlinale 2023 - is a wordless parable that follows BlackWoman's journey as she treks across a plague-ravaged wilderness in search of those who left her to die.

Shantaye's World by Guillaume Rico and Mathurine Emmanuel (St Lucia) is a historical drama chronicling the compelling journey of a young girl from St. Lucia, who, as a young woman, finds herself in war-torn England. Following a successful tour in the UK, Director Mathurine Emmanuel will be in attendance for the Gala screening.

Nome by Sana Na N'Hada (Guinea-Bissau) - an ACID Selection at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival - will have its US premiere screening as the Closing Night film of ADIFF NYC 2023. NOME, skillfully blending astute political commentary with breathtaking cinematography, immerses viewers in Guinea-Bissau's turbulent socio-political landscape, capturing the interplay between individual struggles and the weight of political decisions in a visually arresting and thought-provoking cinematic masterpiece.

OTHER ADIFF 2023 HIGHLIGHTS:

The South African film industry is one of the oldest and most significant on the African continent. The festival is showcasing a selection of 14 South African films that explore the evolution of South African cinema over time. The films are curated to take the audience on a journey through different eras, starting with films made during the Apartheid Era (pre-1994), then during the early to mid-90s, a transition period for South Africa right at the end of Apartheid, and contemporary cinema. The selection includes a newly restored copy of the 1988 classic crime drama Mapantsula directed by Oliver Schmitz, Marigolds in August by Ross Devenish, a drama based on the play "Marigolds in August" written by Athol Fugard, who in the early 1980s was South Africa's most celebrated playwright, and Nothing But the Truth written and directed by acclaimed South African actor-director John Kani.

ADIFF 2023 will present four Egyptian films that feature women both in front of and behind the camera. This carefully curated program highlights the depth and range of the productions, as well as the quality of the stories. The program will conclude with a Q&A session with Egyptian director Nadia Fares after the screening of her film Big Little Women presented at the 2023 Locarno Film Festival. The film is a tribute to the director's beloved Egyptian father and a chronicle of the condition of women in Egypt and Switzerland featuring Egyptian feminist intellectual Nawal El Saadawi who engages in a dialog with the filmmaker and a group of young women linking past and present feminist struggles.

Films by independent filmmakers not to be missed include Goodbye Julia by Mohamed Kordofani (Cannes 2023) about Mona - a northern Sudanese retired singer in a tense marriage - who tries to make amends for covering up a murder by taking in the deceased's southern Sudanese widow, Julia, and her son, Daniel, into her home; Move When the Spirit Says Move: The Legacy of Dorothy Foreman Cotton by Deborah C. Hoard and Ry Ferro, the portrait of Dorothy Foreman Cotton, a charismatic, courageous and consistently overlooked key player in the Civil Rights Movement who was the only woman on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s executive staff; In Search of Bangali Harlem by Aladdin Ullah and Vivek Renjen Bald which follows Ullah from the streets of New York City to the villages of Bangladesh to uncover the pasts of his parents. This film offers a transformative journey, not just for Alaudin Ullah, but for our understanding of the complex histories of South Asians and Muslims in the United States and Music Pictures: New Orleans by Ben Chace which presents legacy portraits and a rare backstage access into the lives and craft of four New Orleans music legends: Soul Queen of New Orleans Irma Thomas, Little Freddie King, Ellis Marsalis, and The Tremé Brass Band.

ADIFF 2023 presents additional programs that will cater to different interests including the Black Women of Excellence Program, a spotlight on the work of Curaçao filmmaker Felix de Rooy, the ADIFF School Program, a First Nation focused line-up and the African Youth: Films and Society Program offered in collaboration with the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

The African Diaspora International Film Festival is a 501(c)(3) not for profit organization.

The 31th Annual New York African Diaspora International Film Festival is made possible thanks to the support of the following institutions and individuals: ArtMattan Films, New York State Council on the Arts, The Harlem Community Development Corporation, The New York City Council in the Arts, West Harlem Development Corporation, The Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone Development Corporation administered by LMCC, The Office of the Vice President for Diversity and Community Affairs at Teachers College, Columbia University, Columbia University Department of Latin American and Iberian Cultures Columbia University African American and African, Diaspora Studies Department The International Organization of La Francophonie New York, The Martinique Bureau, The Saint Lucia Tourism Authority and The Schomburg Center for Research on Black Culture.

ABOUT THE AFRICAN DIASPORA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Established in 1993, the African Diaspora International Film Festival (ADIFF) is a Harlem based minority-led not-for profit international film festival that presents, interprets and educates about films that explore the human experience of people of color all over the world in order to inspire imaginations, disrupt stereotypes and help transform attitudes that perpetuate injustice.

The mission of The African Diaspora International Film Festival (ADIFF) is to expand the traditional views and perceptions of what the Black experience is by showcasing award-winning socially relevant documentary and fiction films about people of color, from Peru to Zimbabwe, from the USA to Belgium and from New Zealand to Jamaica

Commenting on the line up of ADIFF Chicago 2019, film critic Kathleen Sachs of the Chicago Readers wrote: "The films in the 17th Annual African Diaspora International Film Festival - Chicago do what much media and even the public school system fail to do: educate. Through robust programming that gives meaning to the word "diverse," the selections in this year's festival illuminate the experiences of those living in the African diaspora around the world. The New York-based husband-and-wife programmers, Reinaldo Barroso-Spech and Diarah N'Daw-Spech, have chosen more than a dozen films that, through a variety of modes and genres, further dimensionalize already complex issues specific to those living in these communities. Naturally, documentary lends itself to this mission, though several narrative features and a short fiction add to the plenitude of information."