The ninth annual Citizen Jane Film Festival (CJFF) comes to Columbia this Thursday through Sunday for a celebration of female filmmakers and their films.
Patrons can choose from 90 films - shorts, documentaries and features - at venues on the Stephens College campus and in downtown Columbia.
Since its inception, the CJFF has continued to grow and evolve into a complete experience. In addition to the film screenings, this year's event includes a "For the Record: Female Comedy Review" event from 10-11:30 p.m. Saturday at Hitt Street Records, along with parties, filmmaker Q&As and other events.
This year's opening night film is "Raising Bertie," a documentary that follows the lives of three young black men in Bertie County, North Carolina. It will be shown at the Tiger Hotel, 23 S. Eighth St., followed by a Q&A with the filmmaker.
"Columbia is a very documentary-friendly town, and we thought a film about rural African-American males would bring a different point of view to our audiences," CJFF Director Barbie Banks said.
This year, the festival hired Greta Hagen-Richardson as features programmer and Amy Sharland, a filmmaking student at Stephens College, as programmer for the shorts programming strand. The festival includes three or four different shorts programs, including "Ms.Ouri Made," which features films from filmmakers in the state, and "The Secret Lives of Girls," from filmmakers 18 years old or younger. Filmmaker Kim Sherman returns to her hometown as the producer of two short films, one in the "Mix Tape" shorts program and the other in "CJ Under the Moon" at Logboat Brewery.
"Our shorts program continues to be stronger and stronger, and we're really excited with the variety of films included," Banks said.
As abortion is always a hotbed issue, this year's festival includes the documentary "Abortion: Stories Women Tell," which had a limited theatrical release before airing on HBO.
The film lets women on both sides of the issue do most of the talking, including many from Missouri, one of the hardest states in the country to obtain the procedure. Directed and produced by Tracy Droz Tragos, several of the film's subjects will be on hand after the screening at the Macklanburg Playhouse, along with cinematographer Kamau Bilal.
Tragos and her first cousin Andrew Droz Palermo produced and directed "Rich Hill," a documentary about three boys coming of age in her Missouri hometown named in the title. It won the prestigious Grand Jury Prize at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and was screened that year at the True/False Film Festival.
Feature films showcased this year include "To Keep the Light," written, directed and starring Erica Fae, who will attend the screening for a Q&A, and "A Woman, A Part," written and directed by Elisabeth Subrin and starring Maggie Siff ("Billions," "Son of Anarchy" and "Mad Men"). The CJFF also will feature screenings of a remastered "Daughters of the Dust," which came out 25 years ago and is the first film ever made by an African-American woman.
Last year, MovieMaker Magazine included the CJFF and the True/False Film Festival in its list of "The 25 Coolest Film Festivals in the World." Much smaller than True/False, the CJFF has continued to grow since its inception and has evolved to include a lecture and film series and a filmmaking camp for young women at Stephens College.
A Citizen Jane Film School runs in conjunction with the festival on Nov. 3 at Columbia Access Television's Studio on the Stephens College campus. Female filmmakers and industry professionals discuss the state of women in the film industry, and panels include Melissa Silverstein, founder and publisher of "Women and Hollywood," and Marina Shifrin, who graduated from the University of Missouri and currently works as a writer on "@midnight with Chris Hardwick" on Comedy Central.
The Citizen Jane box office, located in the Columbia Foyer on the Stephens College campus, opens today, and online ticket sales begin today as well. For more information on passes, tickets and films, visit CitizenJaneFilmFestival.org.