“Mr. Bongo: I’m Going to Live Until I Die”
Jack Costanzo a.ka. “Mr. Bongo was born September 24, 1919, in Chicago, Illinois, and from an early age, was attracted to Latin rhythms; his instrument of choice the bongo, and later on, the conga. In those days nobody was willing to teach a young man of Italian descent how to play the bongo. Regardless, Jack pushed through the barriers teaching himself, and the rest is history. Dubbed “Mr. Bongo” for his extraordinary skill and stylings, Jack would perform and record with a cavalcade of legends; ie, the Lecuona Cuban Boys, Nat King Cole, René Touzet, Perez Prado, Stan Kenton, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Xavier Cugat, Peggy Lee, Frances Faye, The Supremes, Ann Miller, Henry Mancini, Buddy Cole, and many, many others.
Stranglehold
2019 NORTH DAKOTA HUMAN RIGHTS FILM FESTIVAL SCREENING LINEUP ANNOUNCED
Tuesday, November 5
THE EMPIRE ARTS CENTER • GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA
AFTERNOON SESSION | 1:30 – 4:00 PM
Ofra & Khalil (Narrative Short / Spain)
Mother, Daughter, Sister (Documentary Short / United States)
Stranglehold (Documentary Feature / United States)
December 24, 2017 update: One week after starting this documentary project my staff began resigning after interrogations by the FBI started. That was in 2015. Search warrants were executed in 2016 on sealed affidavits(meaning they lied to get them). I met with OIG agents who were very professional and respectful in November 2017. Then everything seemed to be resolved. One month after screening Stranglehold at the North Dakota Human Rights Film Festival I was charged with crimes I didn’t commit, by the State of Alaska which has a much lower threshold to bring charges.
If I could go back in time I would not have even opened the laboratory, because it deflected attention from our mission. The problem is, the money from the Lab was what we used to develop the network of clinics, and recruit providers, etc.
The opioid epidemic is not what you think it is. Watch the real-time struggle of an Alaska physician on the front-lines of the battle. Motivated to help patients like his father, a veteran with chronic pain who spiraled out of control after being pushed off pain meds, Dr. Zipperer established a network of clinics in Alaska dealing with the problem before it had reached the nightly news. As the practice grew, major insurance networks began balking at paying for the care. During the course of filming, the clinical operation he led came under an intense “investigation” which was conducted as a campaign of disruption by an FBI agent with a known history of significant abuses. What would have been one of the earliest looks at the epidemic and the plight of these patients was sidelined and only intermittently worked on as the implosion continued. This documentary presents an alternative view of the current epidemic from the inside, and arrives at some startling conclusions which you may not have considered before now.
Whisper Of The Ancestors
The “Whisper Of The Ancestors” trailer was screened at the L.A. Asian – Pacific Film Festival May 1, 2011.
In this documentary, we follow sixty-two-year-old Filipino-American, US Marine Leandro Cosme Laigo, as he honors his ancestral roots. From Ilocos Norte, Leandro receives the markings symbolizing one’s life and soul; in doing so restoring the customs of his forefathers. The first tattoo of this kind in more than fifty years, “Whisper of the Ancestors” documents the revivification of a neolithic art form indigenous to the Philippines, and a Vietnam veteran’s spiritual sojourn.
View the Full-Length documentary: