After a turbulent U.S. presidential election and a rollercoaster start to President Donald Trump’s administration, this year’s Tribeca film festival will come with a statement.
Environmental, political and social issues all feature strongly in the 200-strong selection of feature films, documentaries, television shows and immersive installations on offer during the April 19-30 festival.
Co-founder Jane Rosenthal said choices for the 16th festival included themes of the environment “and the fact we are an open society and everyone is welcome here.”
“Artists can express things sometimes that no politician can,” Rosenthal told Reuters Television.
Films about food waste, the protests over the Dakota Access Pipeline and the endangered white rhino are among a dozen projects linked to Earth Day, which falls in the middle of the festival on April 22.
A retrospective documentary about Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez, who was at the center of a 2000 custody and immigration battle; a documentary on maverick political operative Roger Stone; and “Copwatch,” about the U.S. citizens who film police activity and arrests, are just some of the offerings tackling social and political issues.
On a lighter note, the festival will open next Wednesday with a documentary about record producer Clive Davis – the man behind the success of singers like Whitney Houston, Kelly Clarkson and Jennifer Hudson.
The closing weekend sees a 45th anniversary reunion and screening of the cast and director of Oscar-winning Mafia movie “The Godfather” and its 1974 sequel “The Godfather: Part II.”
Francis Ford Coppola, Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall are all expected to join a conversation after the April 29 screenings.
The Tribeca film festival was founded in 2002 by De Niro and Rosenthal to revitalize lower Manhattan after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.