STORY AND PHOTOS BY KAREN BOSSICK

Peggy Goldwyn rifled through a change of clothes in a room behind the stage in The Community Library. Would black be suited for Wednesday night, or turquoise blue?

With the Family of Woman Film Festival going virtual, Goldwyn spent an afternoon at The Community Library pre-recording introductions to the lineup of films she’ll show free of charge Wednesday through Sunday to an audience around the world via the library’s Livestream.

She didn’t want everyone to think she wore the same outfit night after night so she changed clothes—and jewelry--between each recording session.

The festival will kick off at 6 tonight with a Bonni Curran Memorial Lecture delivered by Dr. Natalia Kanem, undersecretary general of the United Nations and executive director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Goldwyn said she was blown away as she pre-recorded that lecture.

“She is the best Bonni Curran speaker ever,” she said. “She asked me about the young people in the valley and I told her about the various groups we have worked with, including the Advocates, Amnesty International, Nosotros Unidos and I Have a Dream. And, even with a prepared script, she addressed part of her words specifically to the young people here. She was very specific about places like Beirut and Yemen and also talked a lot about the specific needs that women have in a time of crisis and how those needs are often overlooked.”

The talk, which can be Livestreamed at https://livestream.com/comlib, will be archived by The Community Library so those who cannot watch it tonight can watch it later.

Goldwyn showed “The Life and Times of Molly Ivins’ a documentary on the late syndicated columnist from Texas, last week for festival donors.

Ivins, known as “the mouth of Texas” and “six feet of trouble,” penned her opinions when being liberal in Texas was worse than being Communist.

“The next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president, pay attention,” wrote Ivins, who coined the word “Shrub” as she wrote about “the short but happy political life of George W. Bush.”

Tom Michael, the general manager of Boise State University Public Radio, noted in a conversation with Goldwyn following the film how Ivins considered ignorance the root of all evil and said those who want positive change need sustained outrage. She wrote about police brutality while working for the Minneapolis Tribune years before the George Floyd killing, he added.

Peggy Goldwyn described how she grew up in El Paso when Texas was full of Democrats applauding FDR ideals. “I was shocked and horrified when I went to Austin and saw colored drinking fountains she said. “Ivins’ story is relevant because, as she noted, Texas is just like everything only more so.”

The theme of this year’s festival is “Women Who Won’t Be Stopped.” Films will air on The Community Library’s Livestream page at https://livestream.com/comlib. No registration is required for viewing, with the exception of “A Girl from Mogadishu.” To register for that, go to https://thecommunitylibrary.libcal.com/event/6912336

Here’s the lineup of films, which air at either 4 p.m. or 6 p.m.:

• Wednesday, Sept. 9, 6 p.m. “A Girl from Mogadishu,” a 113-minute drama from Somalia and the Republic of Ireland.

  Based on a true story, this dramatization follows Ifrah Ahmed’s perilous journey as a refugee. Forced to marry as a teenager, she flees this abusive marriage and makes her way home in the midst of civil war to try to reconcile with her family.

  The audience will experience the terror of bombs falling and chaos just as Ifrah does and rejoice when she exercises the potential buried inside her to serve as a leader in a campaign to end female genital mutilation.

  Director Mary McGuikian and Ifrah Ahmed will participate in a recorded conversation from their current home in Ireland.

• Thursday, Sept. 10, 6 p.m. “Councilwoman,” a 57-minute documentary from the United States.

  Carmen Castillo, an immigrant grandmother, wins a seat on the city council in Providence, R.I. A Dominican immigrant, she has a full-time job cleaning hotel rooms. And skeptics say she doesn’t have the education to govern while corporate interests fight her efforts to raise the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour.

  Both Castillo and filmmaker Margo Guernsey will do a live interview with Boise Mayor Laura McLean  following the film.

• Friday, Sept. 11, 6 p.m. “Apache 8,” a 57-minute documentary from the United States.

  This film features the all-female Apache 8 unit, which has protected its reservation from fire for more than 30 years, in addition to fighting wildfires across the nation. The group has earned the reputation of being fierce, loyal, dependable and tougher than their male colleagues, despite gender bias and the problems that come with living on an impoverished reservation.

  Director Sande Zeig combines archival footage and present-day interviews to focus on four women from different generations of Apache 8 crew members. Zeig and firefighter Katy Aday will do a live interview with Tracy Andrus of the BSU Andrus Center for Public Policy following the screening.

• Saturday, Sept. 12, 4 p.m. “The Perfect Candidate,” a 104-minute dramatic comedy from Saudi Arabia.

  The film features Haifaa al-Monsour, Saudi Arabia’s first female director who burst into world view with her film “Wadjda” about a young Saudi girl who becomes a student of the Koran to win a bicycle in a contest.

  “The Perfect Candidate” features a young Saudi doctor who runs for city council to get the unpaved, rutted, constantly flooded street near her clinic fixed. She is assisted by the grandson of a crotchety old man who insists on being examined by a real—i.e., male—doctor, and who remains a thorn in her side until he admits he voted for her.

  The film has not had a commercial theatrical release due to the COVID pandemic.

• Sunday, Sept. 12, 4 p.m. “The King of Masks, a 91-minute drama from China.

This film revolves around Wang, the King of Masks, an elderly street performer who enchants audiences with the complicated art of face-changing during the 1930s, a time of political turmoil in the Sichuan province.

Illustrating Chinese folk tales by split-second changes of masks is an art traditionally passed on to a son or grandson, but Wang has no heir. To compensate, Wang buys an orphan boy at an illegal child market but soon learns his new apprentice is a girl and sends her way away.

When she refuses to leave, she surprises him by performing street acrobatics to draw a crowd but he still refuses to relent. When she accidentally sets the sampan on which they live on fire, she runs away, then compounds her mistake by rescuing a kidnapped boy and taking him to Wang. But—whoops!-- Wang is arrested as a kidnapper and scheduled to be executed.

The movie won many international awards when it was released in 1995.

The short documentary “Akashinga” from Zimbabwe will show just prior to “The King of Masks.”

To learn more, visit www.familyofwomanfilmfestival.org.