Take Us Home

Images

Worku and his sister in Gondar

Fekadu watches his family leave

Website

http://www.takeushomefilm.org

Topics

Human Development: Aid, Children, Emergency Relief, Poverty, Refugees, Social Exclusion
Human Rights: Civil Rights, Race Politics, Religion, Social Exclusion
Politics: Civil Society, Codes of Conduct, Ethics & Value Systems

Identity Niches

African, Children, Jewish, Religious

Budget

Raised to date: $370,000.00
Estimate to complete: $400,000.00
Total Estimated Budget: $770,000.00
The budget numbers above are accurate as of 12/17/2008

Status

Post Production

Media Type

Video

Project End Use

TV

Key Personnel

Aileen LeBlanc
Producer/Director
Aileen LeBlanc is a journalist, producer and director whose work in television, film and public radio has earned more than 50 regional and national awards. She is producer and director of the documentary “Take Us Home – The airlift of Ethiopian Jews to Israel.” She also produced and directed documentaries “The Story of YSI” and “Dayton Codebreakers” which is in national broadcast on public television (PBS).

After an initial career in theatre as a lighting designer, LeBlanc began her broadcasting life as a weekend cameraman for the local news at an ABC affiliate in Wilmington North Carolina. Over the next 11 years she worked her way through positions in public service, promotions and creative service and into management at a CBS affiliate. For two years she ran and co-owned Imaginations Advertising, an advertising/marketing agency.

LeBlanc then applied for a production job in public radio and instead was given her own show “Sounds Local” which she produced and hosted for seven years at WHQR in Wilmington. She brought the program to Ohio in 1999 when she was hired at WYSO in Yellow Springs as News Director. Her public radio work has been heard on NPR, RTE, CBC, Monitor Radio, Pacifica and Voice of America.

“Dayton Codebreakers” was nominated for three regional Emmy awards by the National Academy of TelevisionArts and Sciences.

LeBlanc’s radio documentaries, “The Hopfers,”“The Making of A Lion in the House,”and “Murray Ebner: Holocaust Survivor,” have been awarded first place honors by The National Federation of Community Broadcasters, Public Radio News Directors Incorporated and the Ohio Associated Press respectively. And she was twice named "Best Reporter in Ohio: by the Ohio Society for Professional Journalists.

Mike King
Director of Photography
Michael is an award-winning independent producer/ director of photography with over twenty years of experience in feature films, documentaries, shorts and music videos. His credits include the underground cult classics, "Deadbeat at Dawn", "The Manson Family" —voted Best Feature at the 2004 NY Underground Film Festival; "Ghost Month", for which King won a Best Cinematography Award; as well as many award winning independent documentaries, shorts and commercial/industrial productions.

He photographed Steven Bognar’s 2003 Sundance Film Festival short film, "Gravel", which is currently airing on the Sundance Channel. In the fall of 2003, he photographed Daniel McCormack’s production, "Turning the Corner", the first feature project to utilize Panasonic’s new AJ-SDX900 24p, DVCPRO50 camera system. A recent DVD release, "No Pain, No Gain", directed by Samuel Turcotte, won a Silver Award at the 2004 Houston Int’l Film Festival for best first time director.

Michael, a graduate of Wright State University's BFA Film Program, was nominated for a regional Emmy Award for his work on the documentary, "Dayton Codebreakers" in 2006.

Stephen Bognar
Editing Consultant
All four of Steven Bognar's films premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. His first, the feature documentary, "Personal Belongings", went on to screen in 27 other festivals including IDFA, San Francisco, Gen Art and Atlanta, where it won the audience award. "Personal Belongings" has also screened at Lincoln Center, the Wexner Center for the Arts and the Northwest Film Center. The film aired nationally in the U.S. on the PBS series P.O.V., in France/Germany on ARTE and internationally in nine other countries. With Julia Reichart Bognar won a national Emmy award for the documenraty "A Lion in the House," which aired on PBS' Independent Lens in June of 2006.

Bognar's documentary short "Picture Day" screened in 20 film festivals internationally, including IDFA, Full Frame and the British Short Film Festival. "Picture Day" also screened at the Guggenheim Museum and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences Contemporary Documentary series. "Gravel", his experimental narrative short, played many festivals after its Sundance premiere, and is seen on the Sundance Channel. Bognar has written for the "Independent Film & Video Monthly" and "Indiewire", and has worked for 12 years as a media arts educator in schools, teaching media literacy to thousands of kids.

Steven Bognar is the recipient of grants and/or fellowships from the Creative Capital Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, the Ohio Arts Council and, with Julia Reichert, the Rockefeller Foundation.

Outreach/Engagement Plan(s)

The film will profoundly connect with individual communities and raise humanitarian consciousness through dialogue. The film’s producers are working to develop a network of community-based organizations and educational institutions with a particular focus on
connecting with communities in transition and/or experiencing recent diversification. A key partner in this effort is CET, Cincinnati's Public Television affiliate, that will be the presenting PBS station for the program. (CET will present the program to all stations in the PBS network.)

The production team is also in the process of forming a Partners Council comprised of local, regional and national community partners representing organizations whose missions focus on any of the social, racial, economic, political and religious issues presented in "Take UsHome". Council members’ considerable knowledge and understanding of many of these key issues will assist us in the post-production phase of the filmmaking process; and ensure that the film remains attentive and responsive to these concerns. We also wish to provide our partner organizations with the opportunity to present community-wide forums on the film and the global issues it illuminates.


Targeted educational institutions will include middle and high schools as well as universities. For these audiences, a curriculum and materials will be developed to provide background, context and to introduce the subject matter. Questions to be addressed may include: How would you react if a large number of foreign immigrants suddenly moved into your community? Should families ever be forced by immigration agencies to choose between staying together or being separated so some members may achieve a better life? Is any form or degree of racism ever tolerable? What should an individual’s response be when he/she witnesses acts of discrimination or racism? When should the government become involved?

Funders