The Sugar Babies

Last updated

The Sugar Babies is a 2007 feature-length documentary film about exploitation in the sugar plantations of the Dominican Republic. The film, narrated by Edwidge Danticat, explores how the descendants of African slaves, are trafficked from Haiti to live and work in inhumane conditions akin to modern day slavery.

Contents

Production

The Sugar Babies was shot on location in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, England, and the United States. The 99-minute film is originally in Spanish, French and Creole and sub-titled in English, and produced by the Hope, Courage and Justice Project of New Orleans, the Human Rights Foundation of New York, and the former Siren Studios of Miami.

The film was written, shot, produced, and directed by Amy Serrano. Its executive producer is Claudia Chiesi, its producer is Thor Halvorssen, Constance Haqq is co-producer and Salvador Longoria and Tico Pujals are associate producers. The film was edited by Jason Ocasio and scored by Bill Cruz.

Release

The film officially premiered at the Montreal International Haitian Film Festival, but preview screenings in Paris and Miami led to heated controversy. [1]

The Miami screening of the film, which included many members of the Hispanic media of South Florida and from the Dominican Republic, was the subject of a cease and desist order one hour before the time of screening, as well as a bribery scandal when several radio producers came forward to state that Dominican diplomats had offered them bribes to disrupt the screening and give the film a bad review. [2] The Paris screening of the film was also the subject of a sabotage attempt. [3]

The film was an "Official Selection" at Unifem's Through Women's Eyes Film Festival, the New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival, and the Buffalo Niagara Film Festival. It was also an "Official Selection" at both the Miami International Film Festival and the Women's International Film Festival, but was withdrawn from both South Florida festivals, ostensibly due to pressure from the sugar industry.

The Sugar Babies won the Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the Delray Beach Film Festival, was screened in film festivals and educational venues, and toured with Amnesty International in France.[ when? ]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Film festival</span> Dedicated event to screen films

A film festival is an organized, extended presentation of films in one or more cinemas or screening venues, usually in a single city or region. Increasingly, film festivals show some films outdoors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hurricane Cleo</span> Category 4 Atlantic hurricane in 1964

Hurricane Cleo was the strongest tropical cyclone of the 1964 Atlantic hurricane season. It was the third named storm, first hurricane, and first major hurricane of the season. Cleo was one of the longest-lived storms of the season. This compact yet powerful hurricane travelled through the Caribbean Sea and later hit Florida before moving offshore Georgia into the Carolinas, killing 156 people and causing roughly $187 million in damage. Major damage was seen as far north as east-central Florida, with the heaviest rains falling along the immediate coast of the Southeast United States into southeast Virginia.

<i>Mondovino</i> 2004 American film

Mondovino is a 2004 documentary film on the impact of globalization on the world's different wine regions written and directed by American film maker Jonathan Nossiter. It was nominated for the Palme d'Or at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival and a César Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Euzhan Palcy</span> French film director (born 1958)

Euzhan Palcy is a French film director, screenwriter, and producer. Her films are known to explore themes of race, gender, and politics, with an emphasis on the perpetuated effects of colonialism. Palcy's first feature film Sugar Cane Alley received numerous awards, including the César Award for Best First Feature Film. With A Dry White Season (1989), she became the first black female director to have a film produced by a major Hollywood studio, MGM.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haitian Americans</span> Americans of Haitian birth or descent

Haitian Americans are a group of Americans of full or partial Haitian origin or descent. The largest proportion of Haitians in the United States live in Little Haiti to the South Florida area. In addition, they have settled in major Northeast cities such as New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, D.C., and in Chicago and Detroit in the Midwest. Most are immigrants or their descendants from the mid-late 20th-century migrations to the United States. Haitian Americans represent the largest group within the Haitian diaspora.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Human Rights Foundation</span> Human rights non-government organisation

The Human Rights Foundation (HRF) is a non-profit organization that focuses on promoting and protecting human rights globally, with an emphasis on closed societies. HRF organizes the Oslo Freedom Forum. The Human Rights Foundation was founded in 2005 by Thor Halvorssen Mendoza, a Venezuelan film producer and human rights advocate. The current chairman is Russian opposition activist Yulia Navalnaya, and Javier El-Hage is the current chief legal officer. The foundation's head office is in the Empire State Building in New York City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amy Serrano</span> American author and film director

Amy Serrano is an American filmmaker, author and human rights activist. She is most well known for her documentary, The Sugar Babies: The Plight of the Children of Agricultural Workers on the Sugar Industry of the Dominican Republic.

The Fanjul family —Cuban born brothers Alfonso "Alfy" Fanjul Jr., José "Pepe" Fanjul, Alexander Fanjul, and Andres Fanjul—are owners of Fanjul Corp., a vast sugar and real estate conglomerate. It comprises the subsidiaries Domino Sugar, Florida Crystals, C&H Sugar, Redpath Sugar, former Tate & Lyle sugar companies, and American Sugar Refining. Fanjul Corp. also owns a 35% stake in Central Romana Corporation of La Romana, Dominican Republic.

<i>The Price of Sugar</i> (2007 film) 2007 film

The Price of Sugar is a 2007 Uncommon Productions film directed by Bill Haney and produced by Haney and Eric Grunebaum about exploitation of Haitian immigrants in the Dominican Republic involved with production of sugar, and the efforts of Spanish priest Father Christopher Hartley to ameliorate their situation. It is narrated by actor Paul Newman. The documentary shows the poor working conditions in the sugar cane plantations, and political control exerted by the Vicini family to stifle efforts to change the situation.

Christopher Hartley is a British-Spanish Catholic missionary priest who worked from 1997 to 2006 to improve the working and living conditions of the Haitian sugar cane workers in San José de los Llanos in the province of San Pedro de Macorís, Dominican Republic. His work there was the subject of the documentary film The Price of Sugar (2007), produced and directed by Bill Haney.

The Vicini family is the wealthiest family in the Dominican Republic and is best known for their vast holdings in the sugar industry. The family business was started by Juan Bautista Vicini Canepa, who migrated to the Dominican Republic from Italy in 1860.

Malek Shafi’i is a film director, producer, festival organiser, and human rights activist from Afghanistan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Esther Anderson (Jamaican actress)</span> Jamaican filmmaker, photographer, and actress (born 1943)

Esther Anderson is a Jamaican filmmaker, photographer and actress, sometimes listed in credits as Ester Anderson.

Leticia Tonos Paniagua is a Dominican director, producer and screenwriter born in Santo Domingo. She graduated in Advertising in 1992 from APEC University. She obtained a master's degree in Audiovisual Communications at the International University of Andalucía, Spain (1997). She graduated from The London Film School in 2001, specializing in film directing. She is a pioneer in the area of film co-productions in her country, having made co-productions with Spain, France, Puerto Rico, Haiti, among others. She is co-founder of ADOCINE.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavery in Haiti</span>

Slavery in Haiti began after the arrival of Christopher Columbus on the island in 1492 with the European colonists that followed from Portugal, Spain and France. The practice was devastating to the native population. Following the indigenous Tainos' near decimation from forced labor, disease and war, the Spanish, under initial advisement of the Catholic priest Bartolomé de las Casas and with the blessing of the Catholic church, began engaging in earnest during the 17th century in the forced labor of enslaved Africans. During the French colonial period, beginning in 1625, the economy of Saint-Domingue, was based on slavery; conditions on Saint-Domingue became notoriously bad even compared to chattel slavery conditions elsewhere.

<i>Californias Forgotten Children</i> 2018 American film

California's Forgotten Children is an American feature documentary directed by Melody C. Miller. Winning Best Documentary at the 2018 Soho International Film Festival, the film follows a diverse group of resilient survivors who have overcome commercial sexual exploitation of children and are changing the world by ensuring no child is left behind. The film features stories from Time 100 Most Influential People Withelma "T" Ortiz Walker Pettigrew, attorney Carissa Phelps, academic scholar Minh Dang, activist Leah Albright-Byrd, therapist Nikolaos Al-Khadra, and educator Rachel Thomas, M. Ed.

Samuel Martinez is a Cuban-born American ethnologist, ethnographer, cultural anthropologist, and professor at the University of Connecticut. He has published extensively on the struggle for human rights for Haitian immigrants in the Dominican Republic and their Dominican-born offspring. He has also done research on north–south knowledge exchange in human rights and on the rhetoric and visual culture of activism against modern slavery.

The Third Horizon Film Festival(THFF) — first known as the Third Horizon Caribbean Film Festival – is a major international film and media arts festival held annually to celebrate Caribbean culture, its diaspora, and the Global South in Miami, Florida. The Third Horizon Film Festival was officially established in 2016 to present competitive and non-competitive screening sections including feature films, documentaries, short-length movies, and experimental narratives. In addition of its moving-image programming, the THFF also includes a series of performances, visual arts components, panel discussions, and lectures.

References

  1. Miller, Kimberly (June 29, 2007). "Fanjuls disturbed by film's portrayal of sugar 'slavery'". Palm Beach Post . Archived from the original on 2007-07-01.
  2. "La Verdad sin Compromiso – DominicanosHOY". Archived from the original on 2023-09-07. Retrieved 2007-07-23.
  3. IPS Inter Press Service Archived 2007-07-10 at the Wayback Machine