Blog

» More images

After the Sept.11 terrorist attacks, more than 5,000 people, mainly non-U.S. nationals of South Asian or Middle Eastern origin, were taken into custody by the U.S. Justice Department and held indefinitely on grounds of national security. Following an unconventional format, Persons of Interest presents a series of encounters between former detainees and directors Alison Maclean and Tobias Perse in an empty room which serves both visually and symbolically as an interrogation room, home, and prison cell. Through interviews, family photographs, and letters from prison, the directors have fashioned a compelling and poignant film, allowing those affected a chance to tell their own stories. Alison McLean & Tobias Perse 2003, 63 min

A Staff Member from NLSCA will be leading an interactive discussion with the audience after the screening.

The National Legal Sanctuary for Community Advancement (NLSCA) is the first
and  currently  the only organization in the United States solely dedicated to  providing accessible and affordable legal advocacy to protect the civil and  human  rights  of  Middle  Easterners, Muslims and South Asians facing systemic  discrimination. Through grassroots legal defense, policy advocacy and  public  education, the promotion of media accountability and community building,  we  bridge  the  gaps  between these diverse communities and our society at large to boldly advance social justice.

In the mid-’70s, a growing number of Brazilian farm workers found themselves forced off of the land they had worked for years, with few career options available to them. Many found themselves stranded in urban shantytowns after they were unable to find work and out of this came Brazil’s “Landless Movement.”
     The idea behind the movement was to stake legal claim to unused land and allow settlers to move in; those who stayed on and worked the land would in time divide up legal claim to it, which would give the economically deprived a place to live and a means of supporting themselves. However, in Brazil—a nation where one percent of the population owns half of the available land—this notion proved unpopular with wealthy landowners, who not only offered political resistance to the Landless Movement, but in some cases raised private armies to drive the newcomers off the land by force.
     Los Sin Tierra: Por los Caminos de America is a documentary that charts the difficult history and eventual successes of the Landless Movement.
2004, 72 min. Spanish w/ English subtitles