“Women’s Stories” Film Series

A Note from GIFF’s Chair of Film Selection, Laura Kutnick

THE GREENWICH INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, a female founded film festival, takes pride in telling women’s stories and not just to women. This virtual film series gives voice to the unsung stories of forgotten women from different walks of life.

Our female focused stories delve into the emerging identities of young women as well as into the wearisome sacrifices of the women who came before them. These independent films offer rare insight into the harried life of the jobless destitute who struggles to make ends meet as well as the working woman who struggles to break through the glass ceiling of a male dominated profession. The overwhelming complexity of modern life is caught on camera whether it be the homeless high school student who wins a college wrestling scholarship or the inexplicable suicide of the privileged sixteen year old from a caring family. On the other end of the spectrum, we come to better understand how a law-abiding elderly widow can be driven to a life of crime or how the power of female friendship can win out over career failure.

Selfless or selfish, understood or misunderstood, loved or lonely, this female film series brings viewers a broader appreciation of women in our world.

LOSING GRACE FINDING HOPE

Documentary Feature
World Premiere
1 hr 23 min/US/English
Director & Producer: Marcia Carroll
Executive Producer: Sue Loncar
Editor: Michael Ray Lewis

Grace Caroline Loncar was striking, brilliant, sarcastically funny, insanely talented, and popular. She came from a prominent family in Dallas. To anyone looking from the outside, she was the girl who had it all. The one you hoped to know. The one you dreamt to be. Grace was sixteen when she took her own life on November 26, 2016. Suicide does not discriminate, and the after-effects are just as earth-shattering as the tragedy itself. This documentary seeks to spread awareness by shining a light on the loved ones left behind. It is our heartfelt hope that anyone who has lost a loved one to suicide will be inspired by this family’s remarkable journey and realize that there is purpose in theirpain, & the very real possibility of healing & happiness after suffering such devastating loss–surviving and thriving after the death of a loved one to suicide is possible.

A virtual Q&A will take place on April 1st at 6 p.m. EST with Director Marcia Carroll, Executive Producer Sue Loncar, Grace Loncar Foundation Executive Director Jennifer Eckert, and Grace Loncar Foundation Board Member Abby Loncar. Kimberly Wolfson-Lisack, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, will moderate the discussion.

LUCHA: A WRESTLING TALE

Documentary Feature
1 hr 36 min/US/English

Director: Marco Ricci
Producers: Marco Ricci, Jonathan Judge-Russo, Mauricio Vasquez
Editor: Leah Goudsmit

A fresh spin on the story of high school sports as the path to transformation and redemption, Lucha takes us inside the Taft High School women’s wrestling team on their journey to a championship. Personal challenges abound, from unsupportive families to homelessness, but these four young women from the Bronx—Shirley, Nyasia, Mariam, and Alba—find solace and hope in each other and on the mat. Their empowering story is a testament to the human spirit and true grit.

BLAGA’S LESSONS

Narrative Feature
1 hr 54 min/Bulgaria, Germany/Bulgarian

Director: Stephan Komandarev
Producers: Stephan Komandarev, Katya Trichkova, Co-producers: Eike Goreczka, Christoph Kukula
Editor: Nina Altaparmakova
Key Cast: Eli Skorcheva, Gerasim Georgiev

When a retired, recently widowed teacher falls prey to a phone scam, she’s left robbed of her life savings and without any money for her late husband’s grave. Her life turns upside down when she realises that there’s no way of gaining her money back, up until she receives an alluring, yet suspicious offer for work.The tables turn as she takes matters into her own hands and cash begins rolling in, this time claiming her most prized attribute: Her values, as she slowly and surely transforms into the scammer herself.In this eerie suspense drama, Stephan Komandarev(“Directions” Un Certain Regard 2017)chronicles step by step the journey of a woman swirling into the vicious cycle of the dog-eat-dog reality outside her window.

Susan Feniger.FORKED

Documentary Feature
1 hr 30 min/US/English

Director: Liz Lachman
Producers: Lisa Donmall-Reeve, Liz Lachman
Editor: Joan Gill Amorim

Susan Feniger. FORKED is a verité documentary film following award-winning celebrity chef Susan Feniger (Food Network/Master Chef) on her first solo restaurant, and her passionate struggle tobring global street food under one roof in the form of a new LA restaurant: STREET. Featuring appearances by Wolfgang puck, Bobby Flay, Mary Sue Milliken, and shotby Susan’s longtime filmmaker partnerin Vietnam, Shanghai and Los Angeles, it’s a personal story of starting over and about not IF onefails… but HOW.

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