STATELESS
SHOWTIME
PRIMETIME | 1261FF21
Thu, Nov 4 | 7:00 PM (AST)
Canada, Dominican Republic | 95 Minutes | Documentary
Spanish with English subtitles
Grenada Premiere
SYNOPSIS
In 1937, tens of thousands of Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent were exterminated by the Dominican army, based on anti-black hatred fomented by the Dominican government. Fast-forward to 2013, the Dominican Republic’s Supreme Court stripped the citizenship of anyone with Haitian parents, retroactive to 1929. The ruling rendered more than 200,000 people stateless, without nationality, identity or a homeland. In this dangerous climate, a young attorney named Rosa Iris mounts a grassroots campaign, challenging electoral corruption and advocating for social justice. Director Michèle Stephenson’s new documentary Stateless traces the complex tributaries of history and present-day politics, as state-sanctioned racism seeps into mundane offices, living room meetings, and street protests.
Filmed with a chiaroscuro effect and richly imbued with elements of magical realism, Stateless combines gritty hidden-camera footage with the legend of a young woman fleeing brutal violence to flip the narrative axis, revealing the depths of institutionalized oppression.
Michèle Stephenson
Filmmaker, author, artist, Michèle Stephenson, pulls from her Panamanian and Haitian roots to think radically about storytelling and disrupt the imaginary in non-fiction spaces. She tells compelling, deeply personal stories that are created by, for and about communities of color that reimagine and provoke. Her feature documentary, American Promise, was nominated for three Emmys and won the Jury Prize at Sundance. She is a Guggenheim Fellow and a Creative Capital artist.
@michele0608 on Twitter, @michele_0608 on IG
THE CREW
Director/ Writer/Producer
Michèle Stephenson
Producers
Jennifer Holness , Lea Marin
Executive Producers
Anita Lee, Joe Brewster, Sudz Sutherland
Executive Producer for Black Public Media Leslie Fields-Cruz
Executive Producer for Latino Public Boadcasting Sandie Viquez Pedlow
Directors of Photography
Alfredo Alcántara, Tito Rodriguez, Naiti Gámez, Nadia Hallgren, Jaime Guerra, Pedro Arnau Bros Santana
Field Producers
Johanné Gomez-Terreiro, Susibel Espaillat, Tony Then-Repozo
Editor
Sophie Farkas-Bolla
Additional Editor
Andres Landau
Consulting Editors
Ricardo Acosta, Lawrence Jackman
Music Composed by
Ben Fox
Key Cast
Rosa Iris Diendomi-Álvarez, Teofilo Murat, Gladys Feliz