SAKAE ISHIKAWA
Producer, Director, Editor
Sakae Ishikawa is a director / producer that started her film career as an editor. A graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, she began her career as a staff assistant editor at Maysles Films Inc., working with esteemed editors such as Deborah Dickson, Charlotte Zwerin, Bob Eisenhardt and Bruce Sinofsky. In 1994, she left Maysles to be the first assistant on a feature, Todd Haynes’ acclaimed independent film, “Safe.” Realizing her love for the unscripted documentary, Ishikawa went on to become an associate editor for “Suzanne Farrell: Elusive Muse”, a 1997 Academy Award Nominee. In 1998, she moved to Istanbul, Turkey where she worked on an eight part documentary series about a modern day Turkish caravan retracing the Silk Road. It was there that she developed a love for Turkish people and culture. Upon her return, she edited “The Education of Gore Vidal”, an entry in the 2003 Sundance Film Festival, which was directed by Deborah Dickson. She also worked at New York Times Television on several shows including “Raising the Flag”, which looked at the history of U.S. military occupations around the world and “Battle Plan Under Fire” which looked at the military’s new strategies post-September 11. Ishikawa continues to work with many Maysles alumni, such as Deborah Dickson, Susan Froemke, and Bruce Sinofsky. In 2007, she edited “Witnesses to a Secret War”, which looks at the plight of the Hmong, an agrarian hill tribe from Laos and their clandestine involvement with the CIA during the Vietnam War. It will air on PBS’ Global Voices series in 2009. In 2008, she co-edited a feature length documentary on Bill Withers, the singer-songwriter which premiered at South by Southwest in March 2009 and was selected for Silver Docs 2009. She was also an editor on “Quest for Honor”, a film about honor killings in Iraq which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2009. She is a contributing editor to the Metropolitan Opera’s HD broadcast series.

İREM ÇALIKUŞU
Production Manager, Translator
İrem Çalıkuşu is a dancer and yoga instructor in New York City. Originally from Istanbul, her life as a dancer started at the Theater Reseach Lab with Mustafa Kaplan. Deeply moved by a Butoh dance performance she saw in Istanbul, she went on to complete a Master's thesis on Butoh and post war politics in Japan at the Anthropology Department of UMass, Amherst. She has studied with Akira Kasai, Ko Murobushi, and Takuya Muramatsu as well as training for 2 years at the Cunningham School for Dance. Her biggest inspiration was the 5 months she spent training with Min Tanaka at the Body Weather Farm. Irem has been showing her own work in various venues such as Dixon Place, Movement Research at Judson Church, Cave Art Space and Cunningham Studio in New York City.

SCOTT ANGER
Director of Photography
Scott Anger is an award-winning freelance journalist, producer and cinematographer with more than 20 years of experience. Much of his work has focused on the consequences of armed conflicts in the Middle East, South Asia and Southeast Asia. He began his career as a freelance photojournalist working on assignment for a number of publications including; TIME Magazine, National Geographic Traveler, The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle and The Los Angeles Times. In 1995, Scott added aural storytelling to his photography and produced audio essays, photo-reportage and news reports for a number of publications and radio networks in the United States and Europe including National Public Radio, British Broadcasting Corporation, Radio Blue Danube and Australian Broadcasting. From 1998 to 2000, he was a full-time radio correspondent and bureau chief based in Islamabad, Pakistan. Scott returned to visual storytelling as an independent videojournalist after the terrorist attacks in 2001. He shot and field produced segments of ‘SAUDI TIME BOMB’ for the PBS documentary program FRONTLINE. The film won a number of awards, including an Alfred I. duPont Gold Baton for Excellence in Journalism from Columbia University. Since then, Scott has worked on four other FRONTLINE films, including RETURN OF THE TALIBAN which he co-produced. Another film, TRUTH, WAR AND CONSEQUENCES won an Alfred I. duPont Silver Baton for Excellence in Journalism. Scott's independent film work includes HOME FRONT, by director Richard Hankin. The film premiered at the TriBeCa Film Festival and was broadcast on SHOWTIME in 2006. Scott began documenting the plight of the Hmong while working as a photojournalist in central California in the late 1980s. In 2007, he was a co-producer and cinematographer for "Witnesses of a Secret War" which was shot in the Hmong refugee camp of Wat Tham Krabok in Thailand. Scott is presently a deputy editor for video at the Los Angeles Times.