Pan African Film Festival

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Pan African Film Festival (PAFF) is a non-profit corporation in Los Angeles, California, that states its goal to promote "cultural understanding among peoples of African descent" through exhibiting art and film. It hosts a film festival and an arts festival in Los Angeles in February of each year. [1] The Los Angeles Times in 2013 called the film festival "the largest black film festival" in the United States. [2]

Contents

Background

In its early years, it was held in West Africa, specifically in Burkina Faso (in February 1985, it was held in Ouagadougou and hosted by Thomas Sankara [3] ).

The first official festival was organized in 1992 by actors Danny Glover and Ja'net Dubois and executive director Ayuko Babu. [4] Glover and actress Whoopi Goldberg co-hosted the festival. [5] It featured over 40 films by black directors from four continents. The Los Angeles Times said the films had universal themes as well as African themes: "the overthrow of colonial governments, the clash between modern values and traditional values, and tales of gifted artists". Films at the first festival included Sarraounia , Heritage Africa, and Lord of the Street. [6] In 2013, the film festival attracted approximately 30,000 patrons, and the arts festival attracted around 75,000. [2] In 2014, the film festival featured 179 films from 46 countries. The films included feature-length documentaries, short documentaries, narrative feature films, narrative short films, and webseries. [7]

See also

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References

  1. ↑ "Pan African Film Festival | About Us". paff.org. Pan African Film Festival. Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  2. 1 2 King, Susan (February 6, 2013). "The world comes calling at the Pan African Film & Arts Festival". The Los Angeles Times . Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  3. ↑ Sankara, Thomas (1988). Thomas Sankara Speaks (2nd ed.). Pathfinder Press. pp.  151–152. ISBN   978-0-87348-986-7.
  4. ↑ King, Susan (February 16, 2011). "The 19th Pan African Film Festival features eclectic lineup". The Los Angeles Times . Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  5. ↑ Marx, Andy (October 15, 1992). "Pan African Film Fest kicks off tonight at Laemmle". Variety . Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  6. ↑ Staff (October 17, 1992). "A Kaleidoscope of Continents: Inaugural film festival highlights beauty of pan-African experience". The Los Angeles Times . Retrieved January 24, 2014.
  7. ↑ Bennett, Wyllisa (January 30, 2014). "22nd Annual Pan African Film Festival Night of Tribute this Friday, January 31". EURweb. Retrieved January 31, 2014.


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