{"id":9344,"date":"2025-10-20T13:20:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T13:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/9344\/"},"modified":"2025-10-20T13:20:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T13:20:11","slug":"queens-world-film-festival-kicks-off-15th-year-with-gathering-of-creative-community-at-borough-hall-qns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/9344\/","title":{"rendered":"Queens World Film Festival kicks off 15th year with gathering of creative community at Borough Hall \u2013 QNS"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"More\t\t\t<\/p>\n

More than 40 filmmakers and their creative teams helped kick off the 15th Queens World Film Festival at Borough Hall. <\/p>\n

Photo by Paul Frangipane<\/p>\n

The first couple of Queens cinema, Katha and Don Preston Cato, held the official kickoff of their 15th Queens World Film Festival<\/a> in the Helen Marshal Cultural Center at Borough Hall on Oct. 15 with more than 40 filmmakers and their creative teams who networked and showcased their film posters.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s theme is \u201cConnections: Missed, Made, and Yearned For,\u201d with screenings of 125 films from 17 nations, including 18 films from Queens alone from Nov. 5 to Nov. 16 at Kaufman Astoria Studios and the Museum of the Moving Image.<\/p>\n

Katha Cato, the executive director of QWFF, kicked off the event by reading the First Amendment.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt must be protected moment by moment, second by second, and I depend on this room to do that. This is not the time to put your cameras down,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is not the time to stop talking to the people on the right or the left of your body and ask them how they are, ask them what they hope for.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"QueensQueens World Film Festival executive director Katha Cato implored the creatives to stand by the First Amendment, under attack by the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Queens Borough President Donovan Richards concurred during his welcoming remarks.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m so excited about this festival kicking off, and I know this has been such a challenging time for this country, for our borough, and I think about all of the values that we celebrate through your films, thorough your stories, all of the values we celebrate that are under attack,\u201d Richards said. \u201cWe\u2019re not gonna cower in fear based on what we see the Trump administration doing, we\u2019re gonna be proud to tell our stories in Queens County because this is a place where we can all tell our stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now in its 15th year, the Queens World Film Festival has screened nearly 2,000 films from 98 nations and built an international reputation for bold, independent programming and it consistently in the top 100 reviewed festivals on FilmFreeway.com and is a member of the Film Festival Alliance.<\/p>\n

\u201cFilmmakers are reaching higher and digging deeper than ever before, unveiling astonishing work that reflects the intensity and longing of our times,\u201d QWFF Founding Artistic Director Don Preston Cato said. This year\u2019s festival will have 22 films by Asian filmmakers or featuring Asian actors.<\/p>\n

\"LegendaryLegendary filmmaker Warrington Hudlin accepted the \u201cSpirit of Queens\u201d award and told the crowd that the borough is the place for storytellers.Photo by Paul Frangipane<\/p>\n

The Catos bestowed the annual \u201cSpirit of Queens\u201d award to IndieCollect\u2019s Warrington Hudlin, the founder of the Black Filmmaker Foundation. The award-winning director, producer, metaverse pioneer, and media activist spoke to the crowd after accepting his award saying that Queens is the place for storytellers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re a filmmaker, this is where you want to be,\u201d Hudlin said. \u201cThis is the place for storytelling and you guys who are filmmakers in this festival, you\u2019ve been anointed to tell your stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hannah Engelson directed, produced and shot \u201cGrandma + Isabella,\u201d a documentary short about a grandmother and her great granddaughter in the Rockaways. Engelson filmed them for over four years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe film begins in the morning and the little girl is 4 years old and it ends at night and she\u2019s 8 years old,\u201d Engelson said, adding she was raised by her grandmother and wanted to show that relationship in her film that is observational with no interviews, all candid.<\/p>\n

\"MoreMore than 40 filmmakers and their creative teams helped kick off the 15th Queens World Film Festival at Borough Hall.Photo by Paul Frangipane<\/p>\n

Engelson wanted to convey the importance of caregiving as real work.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat this grandmother does is a lot and I see that it\u2019s a lot as someone who\u2019s filmed her, as someone who was raised by my grandmother, it\u2019s a lot,\u201d Engelson said. \u201cBeing able to put it up on screen, it\u2019s a way to recognize that and celebrate that work. That\u2019s what films are good at.\u201d<\/p>\n

This will be her first time screening at the Queens World Film Festival.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI specifically wanted to start screening in New York and I was specifically hoping for Queens so that the grandmother and her community could come to the screenings,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m so excited to be here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Paul Frangipane.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than 40 filmmakers and their creative teams helped kick off the 15th Queens World Film Festival at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9345,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[7917,7918,9,24,63,122,7919,124,123,7920,7921],"class_list":["post-9344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-hannah-engelson","tag-katha-cato","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-borough-president-donovan-richards","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-queens-world-film-festival","tag-warrington-hudlin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9344\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}