Six New Projects Selected for Funding Through ITVS International Call

ITVS recently contracted six projects from ITVS International Call 2009, providing them with production funding and eventual U.S. television broadcast. This year's application process was highly competitive and included 482 submissions from 82 countries––spanning the globe and offering insights from countries such as Chile, Kenya, Vietnam and Jordan. 

Since the launch of the Call in 2005, nearly 91 international programs have been supported through ITVS International's Global Perspectives Project and its International Media Development Fund. All six documentary projects are slated for eventual broadcast on PBS, including prime-time slots on the Emmy Award-winning PBS series Independent Lens and the new PBS WORLD series Global Voices. The programs may also be distributed on commercial outlets, including the Sundance Channel, the National Geographic Channel and HBO, and on online video sites, such as Caachi, Jaman, SnagFilms and others. 

The submission deadline for projects to be considered for the next ITVS International Call is February 5, 2010. 

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The 2009 International Call projects selected for funding and U.S. television broadcast include:

74 SQUARE METERS (Chile) By Tiziana Panizza and Paola Castillo
Iselsa, Kathy and tribal leader Iván will accomplish a dream. Along with 150 other marginalized families from Valparaíso, Chile, they were chosen for a social experiment, which moves them from their precarious homes to a middle-class neighborhood. But their new neighbors consider them criminals who put their homes at risk.

THE LAST WHITE MAN STANDING (Kenya) By Justin Webster, Mette Heide and Don Edkins
Tom Cholmondeley, heir to the largest, white-owned estate in Kenya, stands accused of murdering a black poacher on his land. The film follows the ongoing case and describes its sociopolitical context.

THE TEAM (Kenya) By Patrick Reed
Kenyans scramble to produce a dramatic TV soap opera series, hoping controversial storylines can bridge ethnic divisions. Can they captivate an audience and help transform a nation? Can one of the lowliest of art forms contribute to the loftiest of ideals—real social change?

TEACHER (Vietnam) By Leslie Wiener
For the past 15 years, Nguyen Van Hung, once a homeless drug addict, has dedicated his life to helping street children survive AIDS in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. TEACHER is the story of one man's fight against an epidemic that claims its victims by the millions, and the innocent children and teenagers struck by the reality of a global nightmare. 

THIS IS MY PICTURE WHEN I WAS DEAD (Jordan) By Mahmoud Al Massad
What if one’s death was not the end of his journey? Four-year-old Bashir was killed in the assassination of his father, a top PLO lieutenant. What if Bashir was brought back to life, to dig through his past only to learn that the dream that he and his father died for is becoming a nation turned against itself?

THE RODRIGUEZ PROJECT (South Africa) By Malik Bendjelloul
American music artist Rodriguez releases an album in 1970 and fails completely. He lives his whole life working as a manual laborer without learning that his album becomes massive in South Africa. Twenty-five years later, a Johannesburg detective finds Rodriguez; as he travels to South Africa and discovers that there he is more famous than the Rolling Stones. 

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