The Sedona International Film Festival is proud to present the Northern Arizona premieres of the 2022 Oscar Nominated Documentary Shorts March 11-17 at the Mary D. Fisher Theatre.
Now an annual film festival tradition, Sedona audiences will be able to see all of the short films nominated for Academy Awards before the Oscar telecast on March 27. A perennial hit with audiences around the country (and now the world), don’t miss this year’s selection of shorts.
The Oscar-Nominated Documentary Shorts Program will include:
• The Queen of Basketball (USA): She is one of the greatest living women’s basketball players. 3 national trophies. Scored the first basket in women’s Olympic basketball at the ‘76 Olympics. Drafted to the NBA. But have you ever heard of Lusia Harris?
• When We Were Bullies (Germany/USA): A mind-boggling coincidence leads the filmmaker to track down his fifth grade class and fifth grade teacher to examine their memory of and complicity in a bullying incident 50 years ago.
• Audible (USA): “Audible” is a cinematic and immersive coming-of-age documentary following Maryland School for the Deaf high school athlete Amaree McKenstry and his close friends, as they face the pressures of senior year and grappling with the realities of venturing off into the hearing world. Amaree and his teammates take out their frustrations on the football field as they battle to protect an unprecedented winning streak, while coming to terms with the tragic loss of a close friend. This is a story about kids who stand up to adversity. They face conflict, but approach the future with hope – shouting to the world that they exist and they matter.
• Lead Me Home (USA): 500,000 Americans experience homelessness every night. “Lead Me Home” is a documentary short by Jon Shenk and Pedro Kos that captures the experience from multiple perspectives. This immersive, cinematic film personalizes the overwhelming issue by telling the real-life stories of those going through it as a first step toward challenging uninformed attitudes and outmoded policies and gives the audience a rare, in-depth look at the scale, scope and diversity of unsheltered America today.
• Three Songs for Benazir (Afghanistan): The story of Shaista, a young man who — newly married to Benazir and living in a displacement camp in Kabul — struggles to balance his dreams of being the first from his tribe to join the Afghan National Army with the responsibilities of starting a family. Gulistan and Elizabeth Mirzaei’s remarkable access sheds light on the experience of modern-day Afghans who live, love, and seek space for themselves amid constant instability.
The Oscar Documentary Shorts Program will show: Friday, Sunday and Monday, March 11, 13 and 14 at 7 p.m.; and Wednesday and Thursday, March 16 and 17 at 4 p.m.
Tickets are $12, or $9 for Film Festival members. For tickets and more information, please call 928-282-1177. Both the theatre and film festival office are located at 2030 W. Hwy. 89A, in West Sedona. For more information, visit: www.SedonaFilmFestival.org.