The second night of the Washington Jewish Film Festival offered several choices in several locations including the Landmark West End Cinema. First up was the moving documentary, Third Person about people who are intersex and living in Israel. The film, directed by Sharon Luzon, focuses on two people, Suzan and Ofer, both of whom represent the diversity of the country even though both are outsiders and living on the margins. Suzan is a Muslim woman who at age 35 finds out she was born with male and female parts and her parents decided then that she'd be female. Ofer, on the hand is a Spanish speaking Orthodox Jew whose parents decided not to remove any organs at birth. Ofer then undergoes surgery to make his body match his identity (although this proves to be complex). At the start of the film, the two don't know each other but become friends in part because Suzan starts a support group and seeks to educate the Israeli public about this misunderstood group of people. Read more...
The TFI Interactive Day has been a highlight of Tribeca Film Festival’s innovaction curriculum. This year, the focus shifted from interactive documentaries to virtual reality, multimedia installations and create-a-thons. 
VR was everywhere at the Tribeca FilmFest, where the standouts were animation productions, not video. Expect more, not necessarily better, as headsets spread. 
A funny thing happened on the way to Full Frame this morning. The man sitting next to me on my flight to Durham turned out to be headed for the film festival, but he was not a filmmaker. He was the subject of a film made some 20 years ago, 
“I don’t think I’ve figured that out yet,” Professor Jayaswal offered as she reflected on her search for personal identity, “It perpetuates my mission.” On March 22, 2016, in the Media Innovation Lab at American University, Leena Jayaswal, Associate Professor in the School of Communication narrated her personal journey growing up as an Indian-American artist during her lecture, “Motherland: Dissecting Identity and the Diaspora”.