Sisters Rising
WWAC presents the Brattleboro premiere of Sisters Rising
Q&A with the filmmakers following the screening
Thursday, July 8, 2021
7:00 pm at 118 Elliot
Free and open to the public, but seating is limited
$10 suggested donation at the door
Registration is required
Thursday, July 8, 2021
7:00 pm at 118 Elliot
Free and open to the public, but seating is limited
$10 suggested donation at the doo
Sisters Rising, an award-winning film by Brattleboro-area filmmakers Willow O’Feral and Brad Heck, is a powerful feature documentary about six Native American women reclaiming personal & tribal sovereignty.
Native American women are 2.5 times more likely to experience sexual assault than all other American women. 1 in 3 Native women report having been raped during her lifetime and 86% of the offenses are committed by non-Native men. These perpetrators exploit gaps in tribal jurisdictional authority and target Native women as ‘safe victims’. Sisters Rising follows six women who refuse to let this pattern of violence continue in the shadows: a tribal cop in the midst of the North Dakota oil boom, an attorney fighting to overturn restrictions on tribal sovereignty, an Indigenous women’s self-defense instructor, grassroots advocates working to influence legislative change, and the author of the first anti-sex trafficking code to be introduced to a reservation’s tribal court. Their stories shine an unflinching light on righting injustice on both an individual and systemic level.
Sisters Rising is the recipient of the Best Film Award – Women’s Voices Now Film Festival – 2021; Best Documentary Feature Award – American Indian Film Festival – 2020; Thaddeus Stevens Award – Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival – 2020; Honorable Mention Big Sky Award – Big Sky Film Festival – 2020.
Join the Sisters Rising afterparty with Willow and Brad by becoming a member or renewing your WWAC membership
WILLOW O’FERAL is the award-winning director, producer and cinematographer of two feature documentary films. Before Sisters Rising, her 2018 documentary Break the Silence: Reproductive & Sexual Health Stories was awarded La Frontera Queer Film Festival’s Best Documentary Feature Award and Planned Parenthood of Northern New England’s Choice Champion Award. Willow is a member of New Day Films, the longest-running distribution cooperative for independent documentary filmmakers in the US.
BRAD HECK is a filmmaker, cinematographer, and educator. Sisters Rising is Brad’s directorial debut. He co-produced Willow O’Feral’s feature documentary Break the Silence: Reproductive & Sexual Health Stories, and is a co-founder of Haptic Pictures production company. Previously in his career he worked as a cinematographer on commercial and independent projects, including documentaries featuring diverse visionaries such as Barack Obama, Howard Zinn and Miranda July, and was awarded a regional Emmy for his cinematography work for BRIC Media in NY. Brad is currently the Director of the MFA in Film Program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.