REEL WĀHINE OF HAWAIʻI is a series produced by Hawaiʻi Women in Filmmaking highlighting Hawaiʻi’s top women filmmakers. This short film series is also an intergenerational project: a collaboration between young women graduates of Hawai'i Women in Filmmaking's programs and a veteran team of filmmakers, eager to share their experience and expertise. The films preserve the untold stories of Hawai'i women filmmakers in their own words and in all their diversity to inspire the storytellers and leaders of tomorrow. It features active filmmakers, their personal challenges working in a male dominated industry and focuses on the changing world of media and the role women play in expanding Hawaiʻi’s industry in innovative ways. In the second season of REEL WĀHINE OF HAWAIʻI, the following creatives are profiled: Editor and producer LISA ALTIERI is best known for the documentary features she has edited about Pacific Islander culture and history including SKIN STORIES, PAPA MAU and UNDER A JARVIS MOON. Independent filmmaker and hula dancer LISETTE MARIE FLANARY creates documentary films that celebrate a modern renaissance of hula dance and Hawaiian culture including AMERICAN ALOHA: HULA BEYOND HAWAI’I, NĀ KAMALEI: THE MEN OF HULA, ONE VOICE, and TOKYO HULA, which premiered at HIFF in 2019. Writer and director ERIN LAU creates powerful narrative short films about families and relationships featuring strong women protagonists, including THE MOON AND THE NIGHT and EMPTY SPACES. At 25 she is already a working director in Los Angeles with a clear sense of her own voice, her creative process and a deep understanding of why she wants to tell stories based on her own Hawaiian culture and community. For half a century MYRNA KAMAE & Eddie Kamae were partners in life, music and film. Myrna produced and Eddie directed ten films about Hawaiian music, language and culture, beginning with LI‘A LEGACY OF A HAWAIIAN MAN in 1988. They documented renowned Hawaiian kumus (teachers) and kupuna (elders) to preserve their knowledge for future generations. MARLENE BOOTH is an award-winning filmmaker and instructor in film at the University of Hawai‘i, who has worked in film since 1975. She has produced and directed several major documentary films screened on PBS, at national and international film festivals, and in classrooms nationwide. Her film PIDGIN: THE VOICE OF HAWAI‘I screened at HIFF 2009. Animator LAURA MARGULIES creates by hand using oil paints, watercolors and gouache to create lush moving paintings in motion. From her commissioned works for Sundance and PBS to her personal films like HEPA! and ROLLING DOWN LIKE PELE, many of her animations are inspired by her work as a dancer and choreographer and her love of dance and music. Learn More at https://www.hawaiiwomeninfilmmaking.org/

Good Pitch Local Hawai'i is a dynamic program aimed at generating support for projects that use media to bring new ways of seeing and understanding of the islands to the attention of participants from across the Pacific and around the world. Created by Doc Society, in partnership with Ford Foundation and Sundance Institute, Good Pitch events have fostered collaboration and raised more than $30 million for media-based impact campaigns in 15 countries since 2008. The inaugural invitation-only day-long forum took place at the Waiwai Collective in Honolulu on November 6, 2019, the day after the Pacific Islanders in Communications Media Makers Summit and the day before the opening of the Hawaii International Film Festival, assuring synergy and cross-fertilization of participants among all three events. Good Pitch Local Hawai'i projects highlight issues ranging from climate change to cultural empowerment, conservation to immigration, policing, money in politics, and more - projects seeking to build communities of people who care about justice and equity from different perspectives, whose work can complement each other's and double efforts to achieve social good. Each pitch was followed by a brief moderated conversation with the audience to stimulate encouragement and support for the projects, interspersed with presentations by other guests about important and inspiring work happening in our communities. Good Pitch Local Hawaiʻi hopes to create more opportunities to bring events that inspire organizers, educators, entrepreneurs, philanthropists, media makers, policy advocates, and other agents of change. Learn more about the program and projects at https://goodpitch.org/events/gplhi19 Good Pitch Local shares this model of curated networking with new partners and places, meeting growing interest in evolving forms of media production and distribution with a focus on short, long, documentary, fiction, and multi-platform storytelling. The initiative supports high-impact projects by connecting media makers with local funders, organizers, educators, lawyers, policy makers, and press to shape innovative media that can galvanize communities and promote civic engagement.

An independent filmmaker and a hula dancer, Lisette creates documentary films that celebrate a modern renaissance of the hula and Hawaiian culture. She is the writer, producer and director of Lehua Films and her award-winning document- taries, "AMERICAN ALOHA: Hula Beyond Hawai'i", "Nā Kamalei: The Men of Hula", and "ONE VOICE" have broadcast nationally on public television and shown in film festivals around the world. Lisette is currently directing and producing a documentary entitled "Tokyo Hula" which explores the explosive popularity of hula in Japan. She is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts in Film and Television Production and received her MFA in Creative Writing at the New School University. Having lived in New York City for over twenty years, Lisette recently joined the faculty at the UH Mānoa as the Assistant Professor of Indigenous/Native Creative Media at the Academy for Creative Media. In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)