Film executive produced by alum Pamela Harris and Vivian Kleiman receives Oscar nomination

January 25, 2016

A film co-executive produced by a UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism alumna has been nominated for an Oscar for documentary short by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Pamela Harris, who graduated in 2007 from the documentary program, was an executive producer of the black-and-white animated documentary titled, “Last Day of Freedom.”

Vivian Kleiman, a longtime friend of the Journalism School, was also an executive producer of the documentary. Kleiman was instrumental in creating the Marlon T. Riggs Fellowships at the J-School, named for one of the first directors of the School’s doc program.

“I believe in the power of art,” said Harris. “I believe in the power of storytelling to help us think differently.”

She was spurred to participate in the project, she said, because the story told by Bill Babbitt, who provides the central voice in the documentary, made her weep.

“This to me was an opportunity to do something about a system I feel is very broken,” Harris said. “The system of criminal justice is a broken system.”

“Last Day of Freedom” is a 32-minute film about Babbitt. In 1999, his brother Manny was executed at San Quentin prison. Manny was an African-American veteran of the Vietnam War and suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and schizophrenia. He was convicted of murder for beating to death a 78-year-old woman in Sacramento. Bill helped the police arrest his brother, expecting that the state would not seek the death penalty for a mentally ill man.

The film touches on such subjects as the care of veterans, mental health treatment, racism and capital punishment in a novel way. The film’s co-producers/directors Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman, based in San Francisco, animated the film using 32,000 drawings.

Kleiman, a veteran filmmaker, said she was thrilled to see the Academy embrace their work as the first animated nominee in the short-form documentary category.

“The spotlight on the death penalty will truly be given a new perspective,” said Kleiman. “People respond enormously to the Oscars, for better or for worse. It’s truly wonderful that the subjects will be given fresh perspective.”

For Harris, it was also important to her, as an African-American woman, to have co-executive produced the film.

“I think it happens a lot in documentary”—that lots of white people are telling people of color’s stories. It’s also important to recognize there are lots of wonderful, talented, skilled producers and directors out there who are of color.”

After graduating from the J-School, Harris worked on her own film in Uruguay where she was staying thanks to a Fulbright grant.

In an age when anyone with a smartphone can edit film, Harris said, her master’s degree has been helpful in distinguishing her as a serious filmmaker.

“When I’m out there in the field there are very few black women in production. I don’t know where they are and don’t see them. I’m often the only black woman on set. Having the credentials and training has been critical for me to survive,” she said.

“We’re so proud, though not surprised, by this honor paid to Pamela Harris, who’s an outstanding J-School alum,” said the dean of the J-School, Ed Wasserman.

“Congratulations to two terrific filmmakers, who are emblematic of the growing power of women in the documentary field.”

By Atia Musazay (’17)

 

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