Andrea Wozny ’05 and Nikhil Melnechuk ’07 have organized the screening of political documentaries that will be shown on campus starting this Sunday evening.

The presentation of three different films, called The Screen Democracy Film Festival, will be held in the CFA Cinema at 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 24, 25 and 26 and will include talks by guest speakers directly involved in the making of the documentaries.

“We hope to bring people together to discuss the issues raised in the films, particularly in light of the Nov. 2 elections,” Wozny said.

Wozny and Melnechuk are also working together in an effort to create a Wesleyan student television station called WesTV.

“Andrea and I had the idea of putting together this film festival as close to election as possible to try to get people really motivated about issues dealing with the media,” Melnechuk said.

The Screen Democracy Film Festival is being sponsored by Dialogue As Progress, a Wesleyan student group headed by Wozny that meets weekly to discuss issues concerning the media. The festival is also being sponsored by the Student Media Action Coalition (SMAC), another Wesleyan student group that presents films each week to promote awareness of today’s media abuses.

The first film, “Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear and the Selling of American Empire,” criticizes the Bush administration’s drive to war. The film places Iraq in the context of a two-decade, neo-conservative struggle for United States global dominance and examines how this plan was sold to the public through the manipulation of intelligence, political imagery and American’s fears after 9/11. The guest speaker will be Sut Jhally, executive producer and founder of The Media Education Foundation, an organization that produces and distributes video documentaries.

“We are still blind to what mass media is really about,” Jhally said in an interview published on the Media Education Foundation website. “Media companies stay in business because they get their money from advertisers and they provide advertisers [with] audience attention.”

The aim of the Media Education Foundation (MEF), founded in 1991, is to produce and distribute video documentaries that encourage critical thinking and debate. It focuses on the relationship between media ownership, commercial media content, and the democratic demand for the free flow of information, diverse representations of ideas and people, and informed citizen participation.

Wozny, who is a sociology major, took a year off from her studies to intern at the Media Education Foundation in Northampton, Mass., where she was assigned to work on the film, “Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire.”

“The producer, Jeremy Earp, allowed me to shadow virtually the entire process of filmmaking,” Wozny said. “Whether it has involved watching him write e-mails requesting interviews, or discussing the content of the film, I have been able to internalize the making of this film—from the smallest production details to the largest issues of content. He has given me the opportunity to pitch ideas, has frequently asked for my opinion and [with] this type of treatment he has encouraged me to see my own potential.”

The second film that will be shown is “A Patriot Act.” This film posits that there are threats facing our constitution under the Bush administration and examines them carefully. The featured speaker will be media studies and political analyst Mark Crispin Miller, author of “The Bush Dyslexicon.”

“Outfoxed,” which will be screened on Oct. 26 as the final documentary, questions the legitimacy of Fox News’ objective reporting. Guest speaker Jeremy Glick, featured in the film during his interview with Bill O’Reilly, is the co-editor of “Another World is Possible: Conversations in a Time of Terror.”

“I realized that film was a medium to combine my passion for social justice and allow me to create more awareness for the social and political issues I study,” Wozny said.

Tickets for The Screen Democracy Film Festival will be on sale at the Box Office (3355) and at the door for $3.