Moving Windmills: The William Kamkwamba Story
People:
Tom Rielly (Co-Director, Executive Producer)
Ben Nabors (Co-Director, Producer)
Jonathan Oppenheim (Editor)
Carlos Pavan (Assistant Editor)
Grants:
$20,000 for post-production in 2010
Awards:
Winner, Best North-American Filmmaker Award, Pangea Day Film Festival 2008
Winner, Cinema Prosperite Film Competition, 2008
Participant, Good Pitch Tribeca Film Festival, 2010
Grantee, Gucci Tribeca Documentary Institute, 2010
About the Project
In 2001, William Kamkwamba, a young man from a village in Malawi, was forced to drop out of school due to a devastating famine. Turning to self-education, William saw a picture of a windmill in a textbook. Using scrapyard parts such as a broken bicycle, tractor fan, plastic pipes, bamboo and wires, William built a series of windmills that would change his life and the life of his family forever.Moving Windmills follows William as he travels abroad to speak at the TED Conference, visits America to learn from renewable energy pioneers, joins the first pan-African high school, publishes a book detailing his accomplishments, departs on a media tour where he sees the overwhelming impact of his story, and manages the construction of a new school in his village, addressing the educational shortage there.
This is a documentary about struggle and success, about imagination and innovation. It is about tragic conditions and awe-inspiring accomplishments. Moving Windmills shows the power a single person has to change his community and inspire people to improve their lives.
This is also a film about the challenges one must face in realizing their dreams. William’s initial victory did not come easy, nor have his contemporary experiences. When leaving his village and confronting other cultures, William has struggled to understand the behaviors of the developed world. He has also grappled with education, being a talented applied scientist but not a well-trained student.
Ultimately, Moving Windmills is an inspirational, yet complex, coming-of-age story. As William's popularity has grown, as he has straddled two different worlds and come to learn new attitudes and new lessons, we have followed him, capturing a pivotal moment in the life of a young man of insight and the community that supports him.