Holocaust Survivor Vera Sharav Up Next on THE SOUNDS OF FILM

Holocaust Survivor Vera Sharav’s Warning to the World on the Next SOUNDS OF FILM

Tune into an important eugenics-themed SOUNDS OF FILM featuring Holocaust survivor Vera Sharav, THE MEANING OF HITLER directors Petra Epperlein and Michael Tucker, and Emmy-winning director of BELLY OF THE BEAST, Erika Cohn.

Vera Sharav is a public advocate for human rights who is the founder and president of the Alliance for Human Research Protection (AHRP) which serves as an information resource and public interest watchdog organization whose goal is to unlock the walls of secrecy in biomedical research and bring accountability to that endeavor.

She has been an invited presenter at various professional and academic forums: World Federation of Science Journalists, London; National Academy of Sciences Policy Fellow program and National Public Health Association re: screening for mental illness; Consumers Institute for Medicines and Health, Stockholm — re: America’s overmedicated children; Columbia University; NY Hospital, Cornell; U.S. military medical ethics forum; University of Texas.

Her recent peer-reviewed publications include: Screening for Mental Illness: The Merger of Eugenics and the Drug Industry, Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry (2005); Conflicts of Interest in Biomedical Research Harm Children With and Without Disabilities,” Journal of Disability Policy Studies (2004); “The Impact of FDAMA on the recruitment of children for research,” EHPP (2003); “Children in Clinical Research: A Conflict of Moral Values,” American Journal of Bioethics (2003); The ethics of conducting psychosis-inducing experiments,” Accountability in Research (1999).

THE MEANING OF HITLER is a fascinating consideration of the lasting influence of Hitler in the 21st century that couldn’t be more timely.

The latest documentary from Michael Tucker and Petra Epperlein (Gunner Palace, Karl Marx City) is a provocative interrogation of our culture’s fascination with Hitler and Nazism set against the backdrop of the current rise of white supremacy, the normalization of antisemitism and the weaponization of history itself. The film traces Hitler’s movements, his rise to power and the scenes of his crimes as historians and writers, including Martin Amis, Deborah Lipstadt, Saul Friedlander, Francine Prose, Yehuda Bauer and famed Nazi hunters Beate and Serge Klarsfeld, weigh in on the lasting impact of his virulent ideology. As fears of authoritarianism and fascism now abound, the film explores the myths and misconceptions of our understanding of the past, and the difficult process of coming to terms with it at a time in our history when it seems more critical than ever.

Petra Epperlein & Michael Tucker are an award-winning married filmmaking team. Their credits include the 2004 Iraq-set box office hit Gunner Palace (Telluride, TIFF), The Prisoner Or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair (TIFF 2006, Independent Spirit Award nomination), How to Fold a Flag (TIFF 2009), Fightville (2011), The Flag (2013, CNN Films), and Karl Marx City (TIFF, NYFF), which was released theatrically in 2017.

BELLY OF THE BEAST features a courageous young woman and a radical lawyer who discover a pattern of illegal involuntary sterilizations in California's women's prison system, and take to the courtroom to wage a near-impossible battle against the Department of Corrections. With a growing team of investigators inside prison working with colleagues on the outside, they uncover a series of statewide crimes - from dangerously inadequate health care to sexual assault to coercive sterilizations - primarily targeting women of color. But no one believes them. This shocking legal drama captured over seven years features extraordinary access and intimate accounts from currently and formerly incarcerated women, demanding our attention to a shameful and ongoing legacy of eugenics and reproductive injustice in the United States.

Erika Cohn is a Peabody and Emmy Award-winning director/producer who Variety recognized as one of 2017's top documentary filmmakers to watch and was featured in DOC NYC's 2019 "40 Under 40." Most recently, Erika completed THE JUDGE, a Peabody Award-winning and Emmy-nominated film about the first woman judge appointed to the Middle East's Shari'a courts, which premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival and was broadcast on PBS' 2018 Independent Lens series. Her work has been supported by IFP, The Sundance Institute, Tribeca Institute, Hot Docs, Sheffield, ITVS, Women in Film, BAVC and the CPB Producer's Academy among others.

THE SOUNDS OF FILM is the nation's longest running film and music themed radio show. For the past 30 years, the program has delivered a popular mix of interviews and music to listeners all over Long Island, parts of Connecticut and streaming live worldwide on the internet. Past people interviewed for the show include Jim Breuer, Cheech & Chong, Jason Biggs, Thora Birch, Alec Baldwin, Billy Joel, William H. Macy, John Debney, Howard Shore, Kurtis Blow and Ralph Macchio.

Worldwide listeners can tune into the SOUNDS OF FILM'S internet livestream on Thursday at 6 pm EST at wusb.fm.