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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (2/05)
Contact: Dr. Lisa Nicoletti, 318-869-5261, or Lynn Stewart or Jennifer Hayes, Centenary News Service, 318-869-5120

Emmy Award-winning Filmmaker Jonathan Stack to Host Series of Films, Events at Centenary College March 7-9


Scene from Jonathan Stack's film Liberia: An Uncivil War, which will be shown March 9 at Centenary College

SHREVEPORT, LA — Jonathan Stack, two-time Oscar nominee and Emmy winner, will present a series of lectures and films at Centenary College March 7-9. He will be on campus as an Attaway Fellow in Civic Culture.

"Centenary is proud to be the first location to host the complete series of his award-winning films about Louisiana prisons, along with his newest internationally acclaimed film, Liberia: An Uncivil War," said Dr. Lisa Nicoletti, associate professor of art at Centenary.


Filmmaker Jonathan Stack

Stack received the Thurgood Marshall Journalism Award for his documentaries on Angola Prison and recently received the “Courage Under Fire” award for his newest film about Liberia’s Civil War.

Stack will be screening the documentaries he directed and produced about Louisiana prisons and the unrest in Liberia. Each screening will be followed by a discussion of the film and a question-and-answer session.

The film screenings are free and open to the public.

The schedule and film descriptions follow:

Thursday, March 3
Pre-visit Screening - Final Judgment: The Execution of Antonio James
7 p.m. in Carlile Auditorium (Mickle Hall 114)

First aired on the Discovery Channel, this film details the last days of executed inmate Antonio James. It reveals the complex legal process, his relationship with the warden and his final reunion with family. It features commentary by recently released Angola inmate and journalist Wilbert Rideau.

Monday, March 7
Screening - The Farm: Life Inside Angola Prison
7 p.m. in Kilpatrick Auditorium (Smith Building)
Followed by Q&A with the filmmaker

Angola was a thriving slave plantation before being converted to a prison. Nicknamed "The Farm," its labor force has hardly changed -- a mostly black convict population now works its fields. The movie follows six inmates at America's largest and most notorious maximum security prison. Two of the men fight for their innocence. Two transform their lives -- one as an inmate advocate, the other as a preacher. Two prepare for their death (Eighty-five percent of those who enter the gates as young men will die in Angola.)

Tuesday, March 8
Screening – Wildest Show in the South: The Angola Prison Rodeo
8:20 a.m. in Jackson Hall, Room 304
For five weekends of the year, the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola is transformed into the stage for an extraordinary, money-making event--the Angola Prison Rodeo, where inmates risk their lives to entertain the public, win prizes, and earn respect.

Screening – 900 Women
2 p.m. in Jackson Hall, Room 304
This film gives a face and voice to the grandmothers, mothers, lifers and death row inmates who live at the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women in St. Gabriel, as well as to the women who work there. Six women--including a young high school student, a pregnant woman, a recovering heroine addict, a prison guard and a woman on death row--share their stories about life on the streets, abuse, incarceration, childbirth and motherhood.

Screening - Shadows of Doubt: The State vs 85188 Vincent Simmons
7 p.m. in Carlile Auditorium (Mickle Hall, Room 114)
Followed by Q&A with the filmmaker
Vincent Simmons, featured in The Farm: Life Inside Angola Prison, was sentenced to 100 years for the rape of teenage twins. He has never wavered from his original claim of innocence. The rape victims insist that the right man was convicted. This film reveals a tale about rape and race in Louisiana, as well as restorative justice, and the healing process by which victims recover from a crime.

Wednesday, March 9
Screening - Liberia: An Uncivil War
7 p.m. in Kilpatrick Auditorium, Smith Building
Followed by Q&A with the filmmaker
In Liberia, the summer of 2003 was pure insanity. After a decade-long civil war, a largely teenage rebel army attempts to overthrow a government run by indicted war criminal Charles Taylor. Innocent civilians suffer and die. Stack captured the last months of President Taylor's regime in Monrovia, while colleague James Brabazon traveled with the LURD rebel army as they marched on the capital city. The filmmakers expose life in a war zone like never before, earning them the prestigious "Courage Under Fire" Award.

For more information about Jonathan Stack or his films, visit http://www.gabrielfilms.com/.

This lecture series is supported by a grant from the Louisiana State Arts Council, the Louisiana Division of the Arts, Office of Cultural Development, Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism, and the Shreveport Regional Arts Council.


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