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What makes anyone want to blow themselves up for a cause? Dharsika and Puhalchudar belong to the suicide brigade of the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam), fighting for recognition by the Sri Lankan government. The girls are close friends. They have been eating, sleeping, training and fighting side by side for seven years. They can survive for weeks in the jungle without supplies and they don’t know exactly how many enemies they’ve killed in ordinary battle. They now strap themselves to an American-made Claymore mine. My Daughter the Terrorist looks at what life is like inside a guerrilla organization, and the way the world appears in the eyes of the alleged terrorist. It’s about unthinkable terrorist acts, and about beginning to understand people who are firmly committed to doing the unthinkable. Beate Arnestad, 2006 • 52 min • Color • Mini DV • Norway and India

For a completee MadCat program go to www.madcatfilmfestival.org

Program:

* Tales From the Margins Kavita Joshi
2006 • 24 min • Color • Mini DV • India • US Premiere

Twelve women strip themselves naked on the streets of Manipur in protest. A young woman has been on a fast demanding justice, and is forcibly nose-fed and kept under arrest by the government for more than six years. Why are the women of Manipur, a state in northeastern India, using their bodies both as their last weapon and a battlefield?

* Between Girls Kaja Leijon                                                                                                                                                   2007 • 10 min • Color • Mini DV • Norway • World Premiere

A group of girls are sitting in the dark, their faces lit by the light of the movie screen. What are their hopes and dreams?

* El Otro Lado Anne Wallace
2006 • 13 min • Color • Mini DV • US/Mexico • West Coast Premiere

The eye follows the hypnotic rhythm of a seemingly endless steel wall along the US/Mexico border from the Rio Grande to the deserts of Arizona and California. The voices describe border residents’ creative responses to the problems it poses.

* Niko Lesya Kalynska
2006 • 10 min • Color • Beta SP • Ukraine • West Coast Premiere

A former freedom fighter with the Georgian National Liberation Movement now struggles for daily survival as an illegal immigrant in New York City. Through sculpting and painting, he finds another kind of freedom in the creative process.

* The Days and the Hours Kristine Samuelson and John Haptas
2006 • 8:15 pm • Color • Beta SP • US • Filmmakers in Person

At a church in the middle of San Francisco, homeless people are allowed to sleep in the pews during daily services. Filling row after row, more than a hundred exhausted men and women find relief from filthy sidewalks and dangerous city shelters. Their voices describe their lives before they slipped off the tracks.

For a completee MadCat program go to www.madcatfilmfestival.org

A vibrant and award-winning one-hour documentary about inspiring well-spent lives, offers a totally fresh look at successful aging. Narrated by Beau Bridges, it profiles ten legendary surfers who model healthy aging by staying active and engaged into their 7th, 8th and 9th decades. Through interviews, contemporary day-in-the-life footage, and a wealth of rare archival material, the film provides an eloquent and powerful antidote to the negative images of aging presented in America’s youth-obsessed culture.