Sometimes we give ourselves room to experience "reality"--non-media driven reality. We vacate one location and relocate to another, different landscape--perhaps even "culture"--so that we can re-mind ourselves; reshape, recharge, refashion our consciousness by "getting away." But the reality of other people's experiences are not far from our minds. Its in the (e)books we take along, the music that plays in the background.... We escape only to allow ourselves to be recaptured by a 'new experience of reality'--or perhaps, just another's experience of reality...
Non-fiction (documentary) film and video has a way of giving us escape from our own (and nearby) selves so that we can observe how other people are dealing with 'reality'.
Like all other media its portable in many formats. By accepted conventions, non-fiction stories engage us in "serious" examination of events. They can be joyful, they can be overbearingly sad--but as with other media--we choose which type of experience (and how long to endure it) as both a means to recapture some notion of our selves and of our collective experience as human being whatever sub-category is applicable.
I've been many years making and studying non-fiction films that explore the human experience and recently, one of my works was added to a list of 30 films (including two Academy Award Nominees) that are being shared with 55+ countries at festivals, schools, embassy functions and the like. This year another collection of films is being gathered and films and filmmakers are traveling to nations around the world. I will have the privilege of serving as "expert" for several films and will accompany filmmaker Patti Bonnett to Rwanda during July 17-24.
I'm going to use this Blog both to report and to serve as a diary of my experience. (I will also post updates on my Facebook page as time permits.)
The adventure begins with a trip to Washington, DC for a State Department briefing this coming Wednesday!
rj
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