I’M FREE NOW, YOU ARE FREE Available from Third World Newsreel
A Film on Philadelphia’s MOVE Movement and Incarceration Available from Third World Newsreel
Three years ago, on June 16, 2021, political prisoner Debbie Africa was released from prison after forty years of incarceration and separation from her son Mike Africa Jr.
I’m Free Now, You Are Free is a 15-minute short documentary about the reunion and repair between Mike Africa Jr and his mother Debbie Africa — a formerly incarcerated political prisoner of the MOVE9.
In 1978, Debbie, then 8 months pregnant, and many other MOVE family members were arrested after an attack by the Philadelphia Police Department; born in a prison cell, Mike Africa Jr. spent just three days with his mother before guards wrenched him away, and they spent the next 40 years struggling for freedom and for each other. In 2018, Mike Africa Jr. successfully organized to have his parents released on parole. “I realized that I had never seen her feet before,” was a remark he made when he reflected on Debbie’s homecoming.
Winner of the Best Short Doc Award at the TIDE Film Festival, and directed by upcoming filmmaker Ash Goh Hua, this film meditates on Black family preservation as resistance against the brutal legacies of state-sanctioned family separation. Watch the trailer on Vimeo.
FILM SCREENINGS
Allied Media Conference
BlackStar Film Festival (World Premiere)
Camden International Film Festival
Hamptons International Film Festival
Hold, Hope and Heal: Spatial Justice in Black Spaces on Archive Acts
TIDE Film Festival (Best Short Doc Award)
Cucalorus Film Festival
Community Screening with Mayday Space, co-sponsored by Campaign to Bring Mumia Home, COVID Bail Out NYC, Common Notions
Reel Love Fest (Special Jury Mention)
Big Sky Documentary Film Festival
Athena Film Festival
Las Cruces Film Festival
Salem Film Festival
Ann Arbor Film Festival (in competition)
Screening Scholarship Media Festival
San Diego Intl ShortsFest
Sheffield DocFest (International Premiere)
BAMcinemafest
Third Horizon Film Festival
ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Ash Goh Hua (any pronouns) is a filmmaker and cultural worker from Singapore, based in New York. They create documentary and experimental-based works informed by the politics of abolition and autonomy, utilizing a subversively collaborative filmmaking process to build collective power. Ash is a Jacob Burns Creative Culture Fellow, a NeXtDoc Fellow, and a Common Notions collective member. Their films have screened and won awards at film festivals internationally. Visit ashgohhua.com.
Contact Third World Newsreel for more information about public screenings and educational streaming.
Email: twn@twn.org
Film Info: https://twn.org/catalog/pages/responsive/cpage.aspx?rec=1534&card=price
Film Press Kit: https://twn.org/catalog/guides/i-m-free-now-you-are-free-press-kit.pdf
