Expected Guests

PANELISTS:

LUCA CAPPONI • WHAT LIES OVER THE MOUNTAIN (Early Production/Development)
What Lies Over the Mountain is a personal documentary about an Ecuadorian woman who migrated to a small village in northern Italy in the 1980s. Decades later, her sons return with her to the remote Andean village where their parents met, carrying their father’s ashes and confronting family secrets, migration, and the search for belonging across generations.
DIRECTOR STATEMENT: “With this film, I turn the camera toward my own family for the first time. The heart of the story is a return with my mother and brother to the remote tropical village where my parents first met. Through this journey, I will use the camera as a healing tool, exploring silence, memory, and migration across generations, with the intent of creating a space where cinema becomes reflection, confrontation, and care.”
LUCA CAPPONI is an Italian-Ecuadorian observational filmmaker based in Berkeley. His work explores migration, identity, and marginalized communities. He is a BAVC MediaMaker Fellow developing his first personal documentary, What Lies Over the Mountain.

TRANH TRAN • FINDING MÁ (Post Production)
Separated for over 20 years by foster care and prison, an Amerasian Vietnamese and Black family reunite to heal old wounds, starting with finding their houseless mom.
DIRECTOR STATEMENT: “I became a filmmaker as an organizer in prison, where storytelling was both resistance and survival. I began this journey to share stories that could liberate my people from cages and support the healing of our hurting communities. Finding Má is my most intimate offering toward that vision, rooted in love, pain, and dignity.”
THANH TRAN is an Amerasian Vietnamese and Black filmmaker, music artist, and community organizer. He co-founded Uncuffed, an award winning podcast, and ForwardThis Productions. He leads New Krma Media, supporting system-impacted artists. A Film Independent Amplifier Fellow, he directs Finding Má and is Board member of the Andrus Family Foundation.

ALEX J. BLEDSOE • OAKLEAD (Fundraising/Post-Production)
In Oakland, California, we fight to protect one another from lead poisoning in our own homes and schools – and uncover over a century of environmental racism.
DIRECTOR STATEMENT: “I began filming when I realized my community in Oakland is one of 3,000 communities across the U.S. experiencing lead poisoning at an even higher rate than Flint, Michigan. Worldwide, 1 in 3 children is lead poisoned. OAKLEAD centers our community members who are most affected by the lead poisoning epidemic, both behind the scenes and in front of the camera. OAKLEAD is a documented rehearsal in how our solidarity, in life and film production, can change our material realities and build healthy communities.”
ALEX J. BLEDSOE is a filmmaker and multidisciplinary artist working to dismantle exploitative systems and uplift everyday rehearsals of freedom. Her debut feature documentary, OAKLEAD, is a grantee of the Sundance Documentary Film Program, Berkeley Film Foundation, Redford Center, Fund for Investigative Journalism, and winner of the Jonathan Logan Elevate Award for Investigative Journalism. Alex is a 2025 BAVC MediaMaker and a California Arts Council Individual Artist Fellow. She is the co-founder of Breaktide, an all women-of-color film production company based in the Bay Area. She has been a guest columnist for the Washington Post, and a live featured guest on KQED Forum for her filmmaking and activism.