EEG 8452

Format: DVD

Color / Full Screen

Run Time: 43 Mins

Language: English & Haitian Creol / English Subtitles

UPC: 793573845276
ISBN: 978-0-615-39623-1

Special Features
About the Filmmakers
Director's Commentary
Theatrical Trailer
Haiti: Past and Present Slideshow

Street Date: August 30, 2011

2011 Associated Press Award
Best Documentary

Haitian-born film maker Jonas Nosile put together a small team and traveled to Haiti to film Haitian history from its early successful struggles for independence through to its contemporary – less victorious - battles with poverty. Nosile poses tough questions about the degree of Haitian’s responsibility for their dilemma. Will this island nation find a way to break with the legacy of its tragic past? Will the resilient spirit of her people be enough to overcome the obstacles and catastrophes facing the country today? The answers may surprise it's audience.

The film is comprised of interviews from all walks of life and social status: University scholars, evangelical pastors, Voodoo priests/vodouisants and the Haitians in the streets who battle poverty on a daily basis. Overall, it’s a sad story to be told. The Haitian people have shaken the feather of slavery, chased away European domination and helped free American and Latin American peoples. Yet, Mother Nature seems to show no mercy on them, and these same people have found themselves the victims of a 7.1 magnitude earthquake, killing over 200,000 of its people.

Filming began in early 2008. While the film is not entirely about the recent earthquake, the natural disaster took place during final production of the documentary and offered an additional glimpse and almost eerie retrospection into the strength of the Haitian people and their ability to endure and triumph in the face of adversity.