The Winder Cultural Arts Center – a host site for the 2012 - 2013 Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers - presents “An Encounter with Simone Weil” with Director, Producer, and Editor Julia Haslett as part of the South Arts Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers in the Colleen O. Williams Theater at The Winder Cultural Arts Center, 105 East Athens Street, Winder, GA at 3:00 PM, October 7, 2012. At the completion of the film screening, there will be a moderated discussion with Ms. Haslett about the film and her work. A light reception will follow.

This screening is free and open to be public. Sitting is limited to 225 persons.

"Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity." These words, written by Simone Weil, French philosopher, activist, and mystic, provide the engrossing entry point to “An Encounter with Simone Weil,” Julia Haslett's exploration of moral responsibility against the backdrop of 21st - century America. Nobel Prize winner Albert Camus described Weil as "the only great spirit of our time." She was a tireless advocate for the poor and unemployed. Haslett's own struggles with suffering––her father committed suicide and her brother battles severe depression––are interwoven with Weil's dramatic life story, to create a deeply moving film about living life with compassion.

The Southern Circuit Tour of Independent Filmmakers is a program of South Arts. Southern Circuit screenings are funded in part by a grant from South Arts in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts. South Arts, a nonprofit regional arts organization, was founded in 1975 to build on the South's unique heritage and enhance the public value of the arts. South Arts' work responds to the arts environment and cultural trends with a regional perspective. South Arts offers an annual portfolio of activities designed to address the role of the arts in impacting the issues important to our region, and to link the South with the nation and the world through the arts. For more information, visit www.southarts.org.