Ralph Arlyck's Following Sean, a Gotham Award nominee for best documentary, has been released on DVD. In 1969, Arlyck made a short film, Sean, about a precocious four-year-old who lived upstairs from him in a crash pad full of hippies in the Haight-Asbury section of San Francisco. Thirty years, three generations and a lifetime later, Arlyck returned to find Sean, his freewheeling father, sarcastic communist grandma and the rest of his boisterous family. The Following Sean DVD, a Docurama/New Video release, runs 87 minutes and includes the original 1969 short film. Following Sean also airs on PBS' P.O.V. on July 31.

Gabriela Bohm's new film The Longing: The Forgotten Jews of South America screened at the Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival in April. The Longing, set in Ecuador, tells the story of a group of Jews who attempt to regain their birthright. The group includes three women who travel 36 hours by bus from Colombia, and a couple from a small Ecuadorian town. The group has found an American rabbi on the Internet who was committed to helping "lost Jews" reclaim their identities. He meets them in Ecuador, where he has difficulty getting the local Jewish community's support in facilitating their conversions. Ultimately, he convinces several local Jews to participate. The film provides a rare glimpse into the conversion process, including the ritual mikvah (submersion) and Beit Din (rabbinical court).

Robin Hessman was selected to receive the Garrett Scott Documentary Development Grant. Created by family, friends and colleagues this year following the 2006 death of the young, innovative filmmaker Garrett Scott, the grant recognizes first-time filmmakers for their works-in-progress. Hessman's solo directorial debut is Russia's Pepsi Generation, a film about the last generation of Soviet children to grow up behind the Iron Curtain. She has produced several documentaries, including the Peabody Award-winning Tupperware!

The Los Angeles Central Library presented a screening in April of Tom Jones' award-winning documentary The Real Deal. The film chronicles the evolution and impact of the Los Angeles Poverty Department (LAPD), the first performance group in the nation made up principally of homeless people, and its founder, John Malpede. Following the screening, a panel featuring Malpede, Jones and Los Angeles community leaders discussed the making of the film and the issue of homelessness in Los Angeles. In addition, Malpede and members of the LAPD are working with the Nieuwpoort Theater in Gent, Belgium, developing and performing a special program with participants from the local community as well as hosting screenings of The Real Deal.

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has given the second annual MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions to eight organizations in six countries. One of the recipients is Chicago-based Kartemquin Educational Films. Started in 1966 by three University of Chicago graduates, Kartemquin Films has become internationally recognized, producing such award-winning documentaries as Hoop Dreams and The New Americans. Kartemquin envisions the documentary "as a vehicle to deepen our understanding of society through everyday human drama." The organization's documentaries are supported by civic engagement efforts to spur discussion and build support for social action.  

Producer Brigid Kelly's independent documentary Charlie's Lake premiered in April on KCET in Los Angeles. The film explores a year in the life of Jon Whitmer, a man with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, as he and his family wrestle with the unexpected and reflect on what makes the fight worthwhile. www.montanapbs.org/CharliesLake

Richard Propper reports that independent nonfiction distributors Ocule Films, Solid Entertainment and online stock footage house Stock Footage World have created a strategic alliance that will enable the newly-created distribution house to expand sales into larger media platforms across the globe. This partnership, which will be known as O.S.I., will provide award-winning documentary specials and features, hit reality and nonfiction series, as well as stock footage to the worldwide marketplace. O.S.I. will also include a new media arm dedicated to the repurposing and delivery of its library through IPTV and mobile formats. 

Isodore Rosmarin's film Blood and Tears: The Arab-Israeli Conflict opens June 8 at The Quad Theater in New York City; THINKFilm is the distributor. Rosmarin and his team of Middle East experts went right to the source: ministers and mullahs, fanatics and peaceniks, soldiers and terrorists, and ordinary families battling extraordinary forces as they try to live a normal life. The filmmakers interviewed top officials from both sides, from former Israeli prime ministers to senior Palestinian officials to the leaders of the militant extremist group Hamas, Sheikh Bitawi and the late Dr. Abdel aziz Rantisi. Rosmarin and his team interviewed renowned Mideast scholars Bernard Lewis and Fouad Ajami and the foremost Palestinian scholar, Rashid Khalidi. Blood and Tears explores the origin of the confrontation itself, and challenges many of the deep-rooted myths we all hold about this epicenter of human conflict. The DVD will be released August 28.

After graduating from the Los Angeles County Arts Commission (LACAC) six-month Arts Leadership Initiative (ALI) executive training program, IDA Executive Director Sandra Ruch was awarded a Center for Social Innovation (CSI) Fellowship. She has been accepted into and will be attending the prestigious National Arts Strategies (NAS) Executive program for Nonprofit Leaders (EPNL-Arts) at the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) Center for Social Innovation this summer. This is one of the most respected executive nonprofit training programs in the US. The tuition is covered by both the CSI Fellowship and a fellowship from the LA County Arts Commission. Fifty executive directors, selected from the most significant nonprofit institutions nationally, will be attending.

The Association of Commercial Stock Image Licensors (ACSIL) has completed the ACSIL Global Survey of Stock Footage Companies 2007, a bcomprehensive and detailed examination of the issues and challenges faced by leaders in the footage-licensing field. "This report allows individual companies to understand their own performance within the context of the broader industry," says ACSIL Co-President David Sheehan. "To have so many participants share information is one of the many delightful outcomes of commissioning this study." www.thrivingarchives.com.

Renee Sotile and Mary Jo Godges' Christa McAuliffe: Reach for the Stars will be in Wal-Mart stores across the country this summer. Barbara Morgan, who is featured in the film and was McAuliffe's back-up, will get her chance to fly to space. Twenty-one years after the Challenger tragedy, Morgan will be continuing the Teacher in Space mission, launching into orbit on board Space Shuttle Endeavour on June 28, 2007. www.TEACHER1986.com.

Jilann Spitzmiller and Hank Rogerson's Shakespeare Behind Bars was voted Best Spiritual Documentary of 2006 in the online competition. http://www.beliefnet.com/bfa