For filmmaker Saul Landau, who has interviewed the likes of Fidel Castro and Zapatista leaders in Chiapas, Mexico, the recent popularity of political documentaries must give him cheer. With more than 40 films to his credit, he has been putting a focus on human rights and social and political issues long before Fahrenheit 9/11, Bowling for Columbine and The Fog of War took the spotlight.
Landau's films will be featured at the Sixth Annual Cinefest film festival Thursday-Saturday, Feb. 24-26. The festival, The Landau Legacy with Special Guest Haskell Wexler: Films from the Americas and Beyond, is a three-day extravaganza of documentary and politically charged filmmaking. Cinefest is one of the premier Latino film festivals in the United States. This year's event features the work of three internationally renowned filmmakers who have focused their attention on themes related to Latin America.
The festival will take place on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus and in the Madison community. All events are free and open to the public, except for a Friday evening Evening of Solidarity benefit at the Barrymore Theater. Adult admission to the event is $10; student admission is $5. All other film screenings are on a first-come, first-served basis.
Landau's film work has garnered numerous awards, including the Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Award, the George Polk Award for Investigative Reporting and the First Amendment Award, as well as an Emmy.
In addition to making films, Landau is an internationally known scholar, author and commentator, and is the director of Digital Media Programs at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, Calif. He received an Edgar Allen Poe Award for his book Assassination on Embassy Row,a report on the 1976 murders of Chilean Ambassador Orlando Letelier and his colleague, Ronni Moffitt.
Joining Landau at Cinefest is Haskell Wexler, one of the most important cinematographers working in film today. Some of his better-known films include One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,Coming Home,Bound for Glory and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? He received five Academy Award nominations and earned two Oscars for best cinematography. Wexler is the first cinematographer in more than 35 years to receive a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.
Like Landau, Wexler produces documentaries that concentrate on politics and human rights. Landau and Wexler worked together on Report on Torture. Made in 1971, it examined methods of torture inflicted upon political prisoners by Brazil's military police.
Also participating in Cinefest is Greg Landau, Saul Landau's son. Greg Landau is an award-winning music video producer and educator, a two-time Grammy nominee and a producer of more than 30 CDs, film sound tracks and videos. For the last 20 years, he also has made documentaries in Latin America with his father and Wexler. His Rock Down Central Americais a music documentary that follows a Nicaraguan reggae band back to its hometown during the 1988 Sandinista revolution.
