MENTORS
Leanne Ferrer
Leanne Kaʻiulani Ferrer is the Executive Director of Pacific Islanders in Communications (PIC). She is an award-winning filmmaker and has over 30 years of experience in the film and television industry. Leanne has been with PIC for 10 years where she is responsible for the overall health of the organization while building networks and strategic partnerships.
Leanne was recently a Fellow for the Chief Executive Program of the National Arts Strategies and a Juror for Festival International du Film documentaire Océanien (FIFO) in Tahiti. She is the Board President for Hawai‘i Woman in Filmmaking and on the Good Pitch Local - Hawai'i Steering Committee.
Stanley Nelson
Stanley Nelson in 2000, Nelson and his wife, Marcia A. Smith, founded Firelight Media, a non-profit production company dedicated to using historical film to advance contemporary social justice causes, and to mentoring, inspiring and training a new generation of diverse young filmmakers committed to advancing underrepresented stories. Firelight received a MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions in 2016.based in New York among the premier documentary filmmakers working today. His feature-length films combine compelling narratives with rich and deeply researched historical detail, shining new light on both familiar and under-explored aspects of the American past.
In addition to honors for his individual films, Nelson and his body of work have garnered every major award in the industry. He is a MacArthur “Genius” Fellow, and was awarded an individual Peabody Award, the 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts Sciences, and received the National Medal in the Humanities from President Barack Obama.
Palikapu Dedman
Palikapu Dedman was a respected Kānaka Maoli cultural practitioner, activist, and founder and president of the Pele Defense Fund. For decades, he dedicated his life to protecting Native Hawaiian cultural practices, sacred lands, natural resources, and iwi kūpuna. His advocacy included the protection of Wao Kele o Puna and Hawaiian burial sites throughout Hawaiʻi.
For more than 20 years, Palikapu served as a mentor, teacher, advisor, advocate, and friend to filmmaker Keoni Kealoha Alvarez. He helped guide Keoni's journey to understand and protect Hawaiian burials, teaching him that caring for iwi kūpuna is a lifelong kuleana. His knowledge, strength, and commitment continue to influence Keoni's filmmaking, cultural advocacy, and mission to protect the resting places of Hawaiian ancestors.
Fred Vanderpoel
Fred Vanderpoel is a Clio Award winning advertising and film director who has written and directed the feature film REDLOVE, THE ART AND CONSEQUENCE OF ILLUSION redlovemovie.com and published "HOW TO AD" YOUR ADVERTISING ACADEMY IN A BOOK. Fred is the Executive Producer, director, dp and editor of HIONART TV hionart.com
Marco Williams
Marco Williams is a documentary filmmaker and professor of film production at Northwestern University. His films have received several awards, including the Gotham Documentary Achievement Award for Two Towns of Jasper and he has been nominated three times for the Sundance Film Festival grand jury prize.
In 1994, Williams and six other young filmmakers, including P.J. Pesce and Academy Award nominee Bernard Joffa (the 1990 Best Live Action Short 'Senzeni Na?'), were featured in movie journalist Billy Frolick's book called 'What I Really Want to Do Is Direct: Seven Film School Graduates Go to Hollywood'. The book followed the lives of seven young, would-be directors over three years as they struggled with the ups-and-downs of the Hollywood world. He graduated from Harvard University and UCLA School of Film.