HIV Story Project - STILL AROUND wins Festival Award

Report from The Out in the Desert 2012 – Tucson’s International LGBT Film Festival On Feb 27th Marc Smolowitz announced STILL AROUND – the film short portion of the HIV Story Project screened in Tucson, AZ at the Out In The Desert LGBT International Film Festival over the previous weekend. The film was represented at the event by the HIV Story Project’s Executive Producer, Marc Smolowitz. This was the festival inaugural affair and he says that it was small, friendly and well organized also that the audience was extremely kind and enthusiastic. At this inaugural event STILL AROUND won the CRYSTAL CACTUS JURY AWARD for BEST FEATURE DOCUMENTARY. The jury was an independent group of evaluators, largely film professionals and academics from Arizona, and at the closing night event, there was a strong consensus that STILL AROUND was an impressive and important contribution to the canon of films about AIDS. The HIV Story Project and STILL AROUND was conceived initially as part of the Shanti L.I.F.E. Program’s L.I.F.E. Goes On (LGO) Project that quickly evolved - under the aegis of Jörg Fockele and Marc Smolowitz as an independent non-profit, multi-platform story telling/media endeavor. (http://www.thehivstoryproject.org/)