Feat. Dir. Barbara Kopple and Whitney Bell

The Town Hall
Sunday 22nd, September
11.00 – 1.00 PM

Barbara Kopple is the two-time Oscar winning documentary filmmaker, and legend in her field. In her career spanning over 40 year she has covered a dizzying array of subjects, always with a keen sense of social justice and astonishing access. We are honored to host Barbara to talk about her remarkable career and host a special screening her new brand feature aptly set at a Summer camp. 

NEW HOMELAND

offers a unique and intimate perspective into the experience of building a new home after fleeing the traumas of war.

Every summer since 1914, Camp Pathfinder, a summer camp located on a small island in the Canadian wilderness, invites a community of boys and young men from all across Canada and the USA to the backcountry learning how to camp, hike, canoe and fish. Two years ago Camp Director Mike Sladden, enraged by the tragic images from the global refugee crisis but inspired by Canada’s growing intake of asylum seekers, had an idea. What if he could find a way to bring a group of displaced boys from war-torn Syria and Iraq, who recently settled in Canada, to spend the summer at Pathfinder? If the camp experience could have such a profound effect on generations of boys already, imagine what it would be like for these refugee boys. 

BARBARA KOPPLE

Barbara produced and directed “Harlan County USA” and “American Dream”, both winners of the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Her other films include “A Murder In Mansfield”, “This is Everything: Gigi Gorgeous”, “Miss Sharon Jones!”, “Running From Crazy”, “The House of Steinbrenner”, “Woodstock: Now and Then”, “Shut Up and Sing”, “Havoc”, “A Conversation with Gregory Peck”, “My Generation”, “Wild Man Blues”, “Fallen Champ: The Untold Story of Mike Tyson”, for which she won a DGA Award for Outstanding Direction, and many more.  

Barbara directed the narrative feature “Havoc”, starring Anne Hathaway about a group of wealthy teenagers searching for an identity in Los Angeles. Her television work includes episodes of OZ on HBO and Homicide, for which she won a DGA Award for Outstanding Direction.

Barbara is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the DGA, Women in Film and Television’s Honorary Board, BAFTA, and actively participates in organizations that address social issues and support independent filmmaking.

WHITNEY BELL

Whitney Bell is the founder of Stories Of Women, a traveling vulnerability variety show, and Us By Design, a non-profit e-commerce store that has raised over $50k for a variety of organizations. Bell also writes about mental health, reproductive injustice, and privilege for Teen Vogue, Playboy, and many other outlets. She is a seasoned public speaker and her work has been profiled by The BBC, Vice, NPR, and INC magazine.