USA,
2003, 90 min
Shown in 2003
CREDITS
- dir
-
John Shenk, Megan Mylan
- prod
-
Megan Mylan, John Shenk
- cam
-
John Shenk
- editor
-
Kim Roberts, Mark Becker
- source
-
Actual Films, Inc., 221 11th St., San Francisco, CA 94106. FAX: 415-575-0826. EMAIL: jon@actualfilms.net.
- premiere
-
World Premiere
-
COMMENTS
John Shenk, Megan Mylan, Santino Chuor (a "lost boy") in person.
OTHER
“Now it’s clear there is no heaven on earth,” says one of the thousands of the “lost boys” of Sudan after a year in the U.S. These men, a group of Sudanese orphans brought from U.N. refugee camps in 2001, could not have come from more difficult circumstances. In a country with more than two million casualties of the 47-year civil war, thousands of orphaned young boys suffered innumerable hardships and often death trying to make their way to safety. Filmmakers Megan Mylan and Jon Shenk chronicle a small group of these lost boys in their resettlement in the U.S. These young men hold high hopes of gaining enough education to cultivate a life that will someday lead them back to their own country. Peter, for instance, seeks out an education in the only way he can afford: public high school in Kansas. In this moving and often disturbing documentary, Peter’s loneliness and difficulty with assimilation is palpable, as we watch him not only try to recover from his traumatic past, but survive in this new foreign land. Lost Boys of Sudan is an extraordinary account that challenges issues of immigration and foreign aid, and will leave you questioning your own beliefs about race and cultural identity.
—Tessa Swigart
FACTOID #222
The SFIFF has honored some of cinema’s best lensers with tributes, including James Wong Howe (1974), Gabriel Figueroa (1984), Nestor Alemendros (1986), Ernest Dickerson (1991) and John Alton (1994). Cinematographer Haskell Wexler received a tribute as a featured filmmaker in the New Directors series, when he appeared with his directorial debut, Medium Cool.
