KASSIM THE DREAM

Documentary Competition
(Uganda , USA, 2008, 87 mins)

AFI FEST 2008 Audience Award Winner and Festival Best Documentary

AFI SILVERDOCS American Film Market Award Winner

DIR: Kief Davidson
PROD: Kief Davidson, Liz Silver
EXEC PROD: Luke Thornton, Forest Whitaker, Keisha Whitaker, Joshua A. Green
DP: Tony Molina Jr.
EDITOR: Kief Davidson, Tony Breuer
MUS: Leonardo Heiblum, Jacobo Lieberman, Andres Solis

Kassim "The Dream" Ouma is a complex character. He's the 2004 IBF Junior Middleweight champion of the world, a father, a young man who hasn't seen his mother since he was a teen, and a former Ugandan child soldier who was abducted into a rebel army at the age of six. Kassim brings this powerful and painful personal history into the ring with him every time he fights. Despite the fact that Kassim is closer to the "American Dream" than most people will ever be, his wartime experiences in Africa still gnaw at his conscience. And it's this ache that sets Kassim on a journey to reclaim his past by seeking a military pardon from the president and government responsible for his abduction as a child. Kassim isn't asking for anything more than a safe return to the country he fled, but the government publicly declares that if Kassim returns to Uganda, he will be tried for desertion and, if found guilty, executed. Director Kief Davidson (THE DEVIL'S MINER), an AFI alum, and executive producer Forest Whitaker give us an intimate portrait of a captivating and charismatic young athlete who has reached the point in his life when he feels compelled to transform a legacy of sorrow into hope and inspiration. KASSIM THE DREAM received the American Film Market/SILVERDOCS Award at the 2008 SILVERDOCS AFI/Discovery Channel Documentary Festival.

Biography
Kief Davidson's film THE DEVIL'S MINER received a DGA Award nomination for Outstanding Achievement in Documentary Directing and won the coveted FIPRESCI Film Critics Award. Davidson has also directed and produced documentaries for The Discovery Channel, ABC News, PBS, ARTE and A&E. As a narrative filmmaker, Davidson wrote and directed the dark comedy MINOR DETAILS.

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