Tune in to Women’s Voices at 7:00 PM Pacific Time on KZYX Monday May 16 for an interview with two filmmakers, Emmy award winning Dayna Goldfine, and Jen McGowan who will screen films at the upcoming Mendocino Film Festival June 3-5. I’ve just taped an interview with Dayna, who has, with her husband Dan Geller, been making documentary films for more than 25 years, including Ballets Russes (available on Netflix, by the way) and Isadora Duncan: Movement from the Soul as well as several other award winning documentaries. Something Ventured, the Geller/Goldfine film to be shown at 2 PM Saturday, June 4 at the festival, is a fascinating, quirky weaving of the stories of venture capitalists and entrepreneurs from the 1950s to the 1970s, and follows their stories into the present, with insightful, revealing, and often funny interviews. In spite of egos, personalities, and enormous risk, the people in these films intrepidly created companies like Apple, Cisco Systems, Atari, Genentech and other icons of our day. This film is fascinating and fast paced – and one of the reasons I love the documentary form. Can hardly wait to see more of their films.
Both women will be part of a panel discussion on Saturday at 11 AM at the festival: Women Behind the Camera, discussing the role of documentary and narrative women directors in the industry. Jen McGowan, who began her career in acting at NYU, will screen a short narrative film, Touch, as part of the Short Films program, screening Friday and Sunday. I’m looking forward to speaking with Jen, and learning about her plans for her first feature film. 
