Connie Field

Academy Award nominated and Emmy winning director Connie Field is a pioneering social documentary filmmaker. Before getting involved in film she worked as an organizer in many social and human rights organizations where she established her commitment to progressive social change which she has carried into her film career. Many of her films focus on hidden histories, stories that had not been told before which should be an important part of our collective memories. Her work has been broadcast in over 30 countries including Japan, Brazil, South Africa, Britain, Australia, Denmark, Germany, France, Spain, England, and in the US. She is a recipient of the John Grierson Award as most outstanding social documentarian, and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship and is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. "The Whistleblower of My Lai" is a doc/opera fusion that tells a story that captures both the best and worst of humanity through the examination of one incident in one man's life: army helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson and his discovery of the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. "Al Helm: Martin Luther King in Palestine" explores a cross cultural arts collaboration between African Americans and Palestinians, collective memory, shared dreams, and theater as a cultural force for social change which won the Audience Award at the Mill Valley Festival and the Justice Matters Award at the DC International Film Fest. She produced and directed "Have You Heard From Johannesburg" a seven part series on the global movement which ended Apartheid in South Africa which won a Prime Time Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmaking, and awards as Best Limited Series, IDA; Best Documentary of 2010, Village Voice, Time Out New York, and the Audience Award when it was broadcast on PBS's Independent Lens. Her feature documentary "Freedom on My Mind" (1994) is a history of the civil rights movement in Mississippi. It won numerous prizes including an Academy Award nomination; the Grand Jury Prize for best documentary at the Sundance Film Festival; Distinguished Documentary Award, International Documentary Association and was named "One of the Ten Best Films" of 1994 by a variety of film critics, including the San Francisco Examiner and The Oakland Tribune. It was broadcast on PBS's American Experience. She was a member of Boston Newsreel Films where she worked on productions and distribution. She was a co-director on "Forever Activists" (1990 Academy Award Nominee), and she produced, directed and edited the feature documentary "The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter" (1980). "Rosie" earned numerous international awards for Best Documentary (including Gold Hugo, Chicago; John Grierson, Blue Ribbon, American International Festival; Golden Marazzo, Festival dei Popoli; Gold Award, Houston; Cine Golden Eagle; Golden Athena, Athens Festival; British Academy Award Nominee), was named "One of the Ten Best Films of the Year" by a number of publications, including the Village Voice and Film Comment, was voted "Best Independent Feature of the Year" in American Film Magazine, was translated into 20 different languages; and is listed in the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress. It was broadcast on The American Experience. Other work includes "Salud !" (2007), a doc on Cuba's role in the struggle for global health equity (Henry Hampton Award, Council on Foundations and the Audience Award, Pan African Film Festival).