Reel Wāhine of Hawai'i - Kimberlee Bassford
The Reel Wāhine of Hawai'i short film series chronicles talented and pioneering women filmmakers who tell Hawaii stories uniquely through a camera lens.
- Filmmaker(s)
- Vera Zambonelli
- Category
- Short Film
- Subject Matter
- Women, Biography
- Featured In
- Pacific Pulse
Director/producer Kimberlee Bassford juggles filmmaking with teaching and raising a young son and daughter. Her films feature powerful female protagonists, including Cheerleader (Student Academy Award), Winning Girl (PBS broadcast), and Patsy Mink: Ahead of the Majority about the first U.S. congresswoman of color who co-authored Title IX, which mandated equal treatment for women and men in education.
Directed by Vera Zambonelli
Vera Zambonelli is a Hawaiʻi-based independent filmmaker and researcher.Vera is the founder and executive director of Hawaiʻi Women in Filmmaking. For over 10 years, Vera has been advocating for gender justice in filmmaking through an intersectional lens. In 2017, Vera launched the production of REEL WĀHINE OF HAWAIʻI, a short doc film series that redresses gender inequity in the film industry by documenting the real-life stories of Hawai‘i women filmmakers. She directed four of the 18 films, featuring producer and HIFF founder Jeannette Paulson Hereniko, animator Laura Margulies, independent filmmaker Kimberlee Bassford, and legendary Joan Lander of Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina. Her latest initiative is the Wāhine in Film Lab. Vera has been teaching at the Academy for Creative Media West Oʻahu and the Women's Studies Department at UH Mānoa since 2016. Vera serves on the Indie Media Arts West's leadership committee to connect representatives from media arts organizations in the Western region of the United States, and she is part of the Creative Resurgence Collective of Hawai’i-based creatives, artists, advocates, and arts administrators dedicated to imagining and cultivating abundant Hawai’i futures. Vera holds a M.A. in Japanese Studies from Ca’ Foscari, University of Venice, a M.A. in Political Science from Johns Hopkins University, and a Ph.D. in Urban Planning from the University of Hawaiʻi Mānoa.
