Moondance Film Festival Names Armenian Genocide Film As Finalist

May 1, 2003

Los Angeles, California – The ANC-WR announced today that a new documentary entitled “A ROAD LESS TRAVELED” (The Handjian Story) has been selected as a finalist at the internationally renowned Moondance Film Festival. The film documents the eyewitness accounts of two Genocide survivors Kourken Handjian of Erzinga, and Malvine (Papazian) Handjian of Izmir. These individuals’ firsthand harrowing testimonies from opposite sides of the Ottoman Turkish Empire provides a glimpse into the Turkish government’s planned and executed policy of ethnic extermination of its Armenian population during and after World War I. The personal accounts also tell the story of acts humanity by individual Turks without which many of the survivors would have perished.

Switching back and forth between the survivors, the film tells the story of the Genocide from the Turkish frontier in the east to Turkey’s European cities on the Mediteranean coast, culminating in the story of how the two orphaned survivors met and rebuilt their lives together. Produced by Filmaker/Composer Denise Gentilini in collaboration with French filmmaker Mireille Kaloustian, the movie has been chosen as a finalist both in the category of Feature Documentary and Original Music and will be screened at the annual festival’s May event in Boulder, Colorado.

For further details on the MoonDance Film Festival or “On a Road Less Traveled” visit the Festival website at www.moondancefilmfestival.com.

The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) is the largest and most influential Armenian-American grassroots political organization. The ANCA actively advances a broad range of issues of concern to the Armenian-American community.

#####

For Immediate Release
Media Contact: Ardashes Kassakhian
Email / Tel: (818) 500-1918
Armenian National Committee of America
Western Region
104 N. Belmont, Suite 200, Glendale, CA 91206 * Tel. (818) 500-1918