BROOKLYN, N.Y., March 27, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/
-- "Return to Homs," a moving and searing account of the
besieged and devastated Syrian city, is the winner of LIU's first George Polk Documentary Film Award.
Writer-director Talal Derki and cinematographer Orwa Nyrabia will
be recognized at a special screening of the film at the Brooklyn
Academy of Music (BAMcinématek) on Wednesday, April 8, at 7:30 p.m.
LIU announced the winners of the
66th Annual George Polk Awards in Journalism last month, who will
be celebrated in a ceremony at The Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan on Friday,
April 10. These journalists exhibit fearlessness and courage
and represent more than 13 media outlets across the country. In
addition to the film screening and awards luncheon, LIU will host a comprehensive program in
association with the LIU David J. Steinberg Seminar of the George
Polk Awards on April 9, entitled
"Dangerous Lines: Cartoonists and Other Subversives."
"For more than six decades, the George Polk Awards have honored
a number of documentary filmmakers," said John Darnton, curator of the awards. "Now we
have established a separate award to recognize the ever-increasing
importance of documentary films that inspire and help shape
national conversations about important issues."
Darnton said that a committee led by filmmaker Nancy Buirski, founder of the Full Frame
Documentary Film Festival in Durham,
N.C., and a former picture editor of The New York Times, reviewed all entries and
nominated three finalists for the Polk Awards Committee to
consider. "We used the traditional Polk criteria for the new
documentary award," he said, "placing a premium on investigative
and enterprising reporting accomplished by resourcefulness and
courage."
The film screening will be followed by a question and answer
session with Buirski and Derki.
"Return to Homs" follows the path of Abdul Basset Saroot, former
goalkeeper of the Syrian national soccer team, and his friends from
protesters to insurgents after watching friends and colleagues die
from government sniper fire and others disappear following arrest.
Saroot was seriously wounded in his effort to support the largely
futile efforts of the badly outgunned Free Syrian Army. The film
debuted in the U.S. at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, where it
won the World Cinema Grand Prize for Documentary. Some of its
footage was shot by the film's subjects and smuggled out to Derki
and Nyrabia after conditions in Homs became too dangerous for them
to remain there.
The George Polk Awards are conferred annually to honor special
achievement in journalism. The awards place a premium on
investigative and enterprising reporting that gains attention and
achieves results. They were established in 1949 by LIU to commemorate George
Polk, a CBS correspondent murdered in 1948 while covering
the Greek civil war.
For tickets to the screening of "Return to Homs," visit
www.BAM.org/PolkAwards (general admission $14, BAM Cinema Club Members $9, Seniors/Students/Veterans $10 with valid ID).
For further information on the George Polk Awards, please visit:
polkawards.org.
LIU
LIU is one of the nation's largest
private universities. Since its founding in 1926, LIU has provided high quality academic programs
taught by world-class faculty grounded in the liberal arts and
sciences. LIU offers 500 accredited
programs to more than 20,000 students in the New York City metropolitan region.
LIU has an active network of over
180,000 alumni that includes leaders in industries across the
globe. LIU is recognized for its
commitment to experiential education, service learning, and
entrepreneurial thinking. LIU empowers
students with skills they need to excel in the classroom, in their
careers, and beyond. Visit liu.edu for more information.
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SOURCE Long Island University