Click Here

    Two Rosie Perez Films at the Festival ?  Yo Soy Boricua, Pa' Que Tu Lo Sepas! (I'm Boricua, Just So You Know!) directed by Perez and is her debut documentary.  This film takes viewers down the route of New York City's Puerto Rican Day Parade and through an exploration of her heritage.  Co-Director :Liz Garbus

    Just Like The Son - A petty thief's mentoring of an apparent orphan takes a profound turn when he kidnaps the boy from a foster home and drives him cross-country to his sister's house in Texas.  Stars Mark Webber and Rosie Perez.

Directed By: Morgan J. Freeman

Don Cheadle Documentary:  Journey Into Sunset
    Academy Award-nominee Don Cheadle and his family travel to Africa to examine the lives of northern Uganda's night commuters. These are children who must flee their homes every night in order to avoid being kidnapped and forced to fight for the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), which has abducted more than 30,000 children over the last two decades.

Laurence Fishburne- Five Fingers -- Five Fingers is one of three movies (Akeelah and the Bee & M:I:3) Fishburne appeared in at the festival.  He plays the leader of a terrorist group who kidnaps an idealist Dutch pianist.  The Dutchman, influenced by his Moroccan girlfriend, steals money from the Bank where he works to launch a food program in Morocco.  He is abducted as soon as he gets off the plane, along with his guide and subjected to intense interrogation by Fishburne.  If he does not give the correct answers, he stands to lose his fingers ? one at a time.  Unfortunately, Five Fingers is slow moving and disappointing.  Early in the film you know there will be an obvious plot twist at the end.  This kind of plot only works if there is a big pay off.   Five Fingers ends with a big let down; no real surprises. Fishburne is also one of the producers on the film.

The Family Film Festival - presents premieres and special presentations of top family films and animated features.  This year, Paramount Pictures Over the Hedges, screened in the last week of the Festival.

On Saturday, May 6 the now famous Tribeca Film Festival Street Fair began an all-day celebration in the heart of Tribeca with family-friendly interactive entertainment (i.e. face painting).  Many vendors set up and everyone enjoyed music, food and fun.

The 2006 Tribeca Film Festival Awards Ceremony took place on Saturday, May 6 at the Golden Bridge Restaurant in Chinatown. Awards were given for both narrative and documentary feature-length and short films.  Below are just a few of the winners.

• BEST NEW NARRATIVE FILMMAKER
  Director: Marwan Hamed  - Yacoubian Building (Egypt)

The most expensive Egyptian film ever made, The Yacoubian Building is a sprawling, star-studded epic that spans all the social classes populating contemporary Cairo. In three fast-moving hours, it dramatizes topical issues like adultery, political corruption, Islamist terrorism, and the hitherto taboo subject of homosexuality

Screenwriter: Waheed Hamed

Producers: Sameh Gobran, Adel Shaker
Cast: Adel Imam, Yousra, Nour El Sherif, Hind Sabry, Khaled Sawi, and Mohamed Imam

         NEW YORK LOVES FILM

            BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE -When I Came Home (USA)

            Director:  Dan Lohaus

Iraq War veteran Herold Noel suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and lives out of his car in Brooklyn. Using Noel's story, this documentary examines the wider issue of homeless U.S. military veterans-from Vietnam to Iraq-who have to fight tooth-and-nail to receive the benefits promised to them by their government.

Producers: Dan Lohaus, Nancy Roth

• BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT - Native New Yorker

            Director:  Steve Bilich (USA)

 Native New Yorker is a kind of Manhattan travelogue seen through the eyes of Native American Terry "Coyote" Murphy. Starting from Inwood Park, Coyote makes his way down Broadway and winds up at ground zero.

The last day of screenings was Sunday May 7^th.  This year the festival once again provided a large variety and a great balance of international, independent and domestic films with subjects that range from terrorism and love to hip hop and politics.

For more information on the Tribeca Film Festival visit their website at www.tribecafilmfestival.org.

-------------

Dianne Quander is a writer in New York City.  She can be reached at dqstyle7@earthlink.net