Joel Zito Araújo, noted documentary filmmaker will introduce his first full-length feature film Daughters of the Wind (Filhas do Vento) at at the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The Festival, in its ninth year, presents and discusses new and noteworthy films by independent filmmakers from around the world. Besides Araújo, the festival will screen several other new films including The Underground Railroad in Mexico from the ColorLine Project, AfroArgentinos by Argentinean directors Jorge Fortes and Diego Ceballos, ANC Hip-Hop Revolucion by director Melina Fotiadi, and African/American from first time doc filmmaker Askia Holloway. This year’s schedule also includes a screening of The Lost Boys of Sudan in cooperation with UNC-TV.

Araújo was born in Nanuque, Minas Gerais in 1954. He holds a Doctorate in communication science from the School of Communication and Arts of São Paulo University. He has been a guest professor at the Radio-TV-Film department of the University of Texas, Austin, since August 2001. Since 1984 he has made 24 documentaries and 22 mid-length films.

Araújo is well known as a director of 24 documentary films dealing with social issues in Brazil particularly the condition of the nation’s Afro-Brazilian population. Two of his more noted documentaries Denying Brazil, which examines the depiction of Blacks on Brazilian TV, and The Exception and the Rule, will also be featured at the film fest.

Daughters of the Wind (Filhas do Vento) brings together the largest black cast in the history of Brazilian cinema. It is a story about love and salvation between sisters, mothers and daughters and is set in a small inner-state town of Minas Gerais, where the ghosts of slavery and racism underline the characters’ dramas in a subtle and powerful manner.

The film the recently captured six awards at the Gramado Film Festival in 2004, best director, actress (Léa Garcia and Ruth de Souza), actor (Milton Gonçalves), supporting actress (Thalma de Freitas and Taís Araújo), supporting actor (Rocco Pitanga) and the critics’ prize. Daughter’s of the Wind also features TV and screen actor Maria Ceiça, who is also the wife of Araújo and will also be in attendance at the festival. Later in the festival she will discuss her role in the film, O Testamento do Senor Napumoceno.

For information call the telephone number listed below. All film showings and discussions are free and open to the public. Free parking is available in the Bell Tower lot each evening after 4 pm. For screenings at the Stone Center directions are available at the web address provided below.
For the Nov. 1 screening at Graham Student Union directions are available at http://www.unc.edu