Margaret Mead Film Festival

About

The American Museum of Natural History's Margaret Mead Film Festival is presented by the Museum's Public Programs Division in the Department of Education. Held annually each fall, the Mead Festival was founded in honor of pioneering anthropologist Margaret Mead, one of the first anthropologists to recognize the significance of film for fieldwork. The Mead Festival screens documentaries, experimental films, animation, and hybrid works that increase our understanding of the complexity and diversity of the peoples and cultures that populate our planet.

In 2010, the Margaret Mead Film Festival implemented the Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award. The Award recognizes documentary filmmakers who embody the spirit, energy, and innovation demonstrated by Margaret Mead in her research, fieldwork, films, and writings. The award is given to a filmmaker whose feature documentary offers a new perspective on a culture or community remote from the majority of our audiences' experience as well as displays artistic excellence and originality in storytelling technique. Films selected for the Margaret Mead Film Festival that are U.S., North American, or World Premieres are eligible for the Award. The award winner is selected by a jury of industry professionals.              

Awards

The Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award

Each year the award is given to a filmmaker whose feature documentary offers a new perspective on a culture or community remote from the majority of our audiences' experience as well as displays artistic excellence and originality in storytelling technique.

Rules

• Non-narrative films and videos including feature length documentaries, hybrid works, shorts, experimental films, essay films, animation, and new media
• Productions must have been completed within the last three years
• Films selected for the Margaret Mead Film Festival that are U.S., North American, or World Premieres are eligible for the Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award

Preview Formats: DVD or online screener.
Blu-Ray screeners are NOT accepted.

Presentation Formats: HDCam, 35mm, 16mm, Quicktime ProRes, DCP. Not all formats are available in all venues.

Audio language: original

Subtitles language: english

Premiere Requirements

No premiere requirement

Jury and Organizers

The American Museum of Natural History’s Margaret Mead Film Festival is presented by the Museum’s Public Programs Division in the Department of Education.