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Last Year They Created A Black Film Festival For San Antonio, This Year SABIFF Will Be Available To The World

Last Year They Created A Black Film Festival For San Antonio, This Year SABIFF Will Be Available To The World

SABIFF
Last year they created a Black film festival for San Antonio. This year, the San Antonio Black International Film Festival will be available to the world. Photo: Ada Babino and Patsy Whitfield at the SABIFF 2019 opening night at the Carver Community Cultural Center. Photo courtesy of SABIFF.

It’s film festival season and the San Antonio Black International Film Festival (SABIFF) isn’t letting covid-19 stop its show. Like many other film and entertainment productions, SABIFF is moving its 2020 iteration online. The multi-day virtual festival will run Oct. 1 through Oct. 4 and features a series of screenings, panels and workshops. It will be hosted on its virtual platform sabiff.tv.

This is the second San Antonio Black International Film Festival. It was founded in 2019 by native indie filmmaker Ada M. Babino and a group of community filmmakers and community movie enthusiasts, according to a press release.

Babino and her team are on a mission “to support and advocate for quality Black films and filmmakers, and expose audiences in San Antonio and beyond, to multi-dimensional filmworks and diverse narratives from the global Diaspora.”

SABIFF
Ada Babino, above, founded the San Antonio Black International Film Festival (SABIFF) after noting the need for Black-focused content when she moved back home to the city from Washington DC. Photo: Teri Gentry

“We were based specifically in San Antonio, but because we have to go virtual, we have the ability to reach the world, so it’s a good opportunity to expand and really get the information out there,” Babino told Moguldom in an exclusive interview.

A graduate of Howard University, Babino has more than three decades of production experience with companies including BET and WHUT. She said she noted a gap in Black cultural content when she moved back home to San Antonio from Washington, D.C.

“I was always in Black environments, then I came back home to an 80-to-90 percent Hispanic population. Black folks are 7 percent of the population and you’re like, ‘Wait a minute what’s here for us?’ When I got back here, it was just a need,” Babino said.

She also said there is still an overall need for more Black content-focused film festivals.

“Film festivals are typically regional. Everybody started off small in their particular city or area of interest because quite frankly there’s a need for it,” Babino said. “If you look at film festivals globally in scope, you as a Black person are really an afterthought in the type of programming that’s done in those festivals.”

Mentored by Howard professor and filmmaker Haile Gerima – who is best known for his award-winning film “Sankofa” – Babino said she met “like-minded, culturally astute” people in San Antonio, which “affirmed” to her they could make the festival happen.

She used the connections she made over the course of her career to put on two successful events in 2019 – the first during Black History Month and the second in October. Gerima was among the participants.

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“It was just pulling people I had really developed relationships with for the last 30 years and bringing their assets here, and it went really well,” Babino said. “We got partnerships with some major venues that jumped on the chance to present at their venues and we moved from there. It was a really nice festival and our goal is always to build and grow an audience.”

Admitting she wasn’t thrilled about the first year’s turnout, Babino said those who did come gave them a “good response” that was “very positive” and “they voiced or expressed that they would like to see more.”

Her words were underscored by glowing testimonials on FilmFreeway.com, which is where Babino and her team put out the open call for the festival.

“I really enjoyed my time at this festival! The entire crew was welcoming & supportive! The program was amazing. My film was shown in the ‘She Rises’ block. It was a wonderful diverse group of films – documentary, narrative, documentary, horror – that focuses on stories with a strong female lead. Ingenious! I will definitely be a longtime supporter and promoter of this festival!!!” wrote Barbara K. Asare-Bediako.

Cinema Under the Stars at La Villita Arneson River Theater in San Antonio, Texas for San Antonio Black International Film Festival’s 2019 Closing Film. Photo Courtesy of SABIFF.

In the upcoming 2020 festival, SABIFF is gearing up to reach a global virtual audience.

Notable aspects of this year’s festival include a screening of the Jay-Z focused documentary, “A Genius Leaves the Hood,” by Moguldom Studios, owned by veteran media mogul and filmmaker Jamarlin Martin of Nubai Ventures.

Martin will also conduct a workshop entitled “Game on: Indie Films to e-Commerce Remix – The Digital Master P Model.”

The festival also includes a special 30-year-anniversary screening to commemorate Charles Murphy’s classic “To Sleep With Anger” starring Danny Glover on opening night. It will be followed by a Zoom reunion with cast members Glover, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Mary Alice and Carl Lumbly.

A variety of film screenings will incorporate themes such as social justice and love.

San Antonio Black International Film Festival team with writer/filmmaker Charles Murray from SABIFF 2019. Photo Courtesy of SABIFF.

Another highlight will occur when the San Antonio Black International Film Festival awards its first Ankh Award (Ankh is an Egyptian symbol for life) to Charles Burnett this year for his inspiring body of work. There will also be an awards ceremony for filmmakers.

Ticket prices vary. Festival-goers have the option to attend some events for free, while others range from making a donation to $15 for a full-day pass or $25 for a full-access pass. For a full schedule of events, click here.

Babino said she’s looking forward to helping change some people’s paradigm about Black films.

“This is an annual thing for us. We’re building and when you’re building, it takes time,” Babino told Moguldom. “You have films by, for and about people of African descent, that’s your initial primary audience, but an audience to me is really crossing all barriers because for me I don’t have to be Italian to go see an Italian film. I see all kinds of films. It’s just a matter of people changing their mentality. … It’s just opening people’s brains to having more of a culturally pluralistic view of film and culture period.”