Millsaps College presents directors Thomas Nybo and Simon Umlauf on Monday, March 10, as part of the Southern Circuit tour of independent filmmakers. Following a screening of their movie “Guerrilla Radio: The Hip-Hop Struggle Under Castro,” Nybo and Umlauf will engage the audience in a discussion of their work and the film. The screening and discussion will begin at 7 p.m. in the Ford Academic Complex, Room 215. The event is free and open to the public. For more information, please contact Austin Wilson at 601-974-1305 or wilsola@millsaps.edu.
The evening will open with an opening short by Clay Walker entitled “The Cole Nobody Knows.” The documentary profiles Chicago native Freddy Cole, the virtually unknown but equally talented brother of Nat “King” Cole.
“Guerrilla Radio” explores how the anti-authoritarian nature of hip-hop plays out in the world of Castro’s Cuba, where dissent against authority is all but stamped out. Nybo and Umlauf take a close look at three impoverished Cuban artists and one Cuban American on the verge of making it big. To frame these biographical accounts, the filmmakers mix in an historical exploration of the roots of Cuban hip-hop, Castro’s rise to power and a look at the realities of Cuban existence.
Thomas Nybo has worked in Sudan, Lebanon, Congo, Yemen and more than 40 other countries for CNN, the United Nations, PBS FRONTLINE/World and other clients. He was an embedded war correspondent for CNN during the current war in Iraq, and reported for CNN from ground zero the week of September 11, 2001.
Simon Umlauf is currently a producer with Mountain View Group LTD, which is well known for creating award-winning corporate communications campaigns, educational programs, TV commercials and sales tools for Fortune 500 companies. Previously, Simon worked at CNN, starting as an unpaid intern and working his way up to a prime-time entertainment producer slot for CNN Headline News.
The 2007-2008 Southern Circuit is a program of the Southern Arts Federation in collaboration with the South Carolina Arts Commission. It is sponsored locally by Millsaps College, the Mississippi Humanities Council and the Mississippi Film Office.
