For eight years, director Kimberlee Bassford had been crafting an intimate portrait of Sia Figiel, a groundbreaking Samoan writer celebrated worldwide as the first to give voice to the struggles of Samoan girls and women. She and her team had followed Figiel''s triumphs and hardships, from literary stardom to a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, and had nearly completed the film when tragedy struck. What emerges is a searing exploration of mental illness in all its complexities. Deeply nuanced and human, the film is at once a compelling tribute to one woman’s extraordinary life and a reckoning with the devastating consequences of what happens when care for mental health is inconsistent or absent.

Kimberlee Bassford is a documentary filmmaker from Hawai‘i who advances equality and social justice by spotlighting stories of girls and women of color, Asian American and Pacific Islander cultural identity, and mental health. Her feature documentary BEFORE THE MOON FALLS has won six juried awards including Best Documentary at CAAMFest, Best Feature at the DOCUTAH International Film Festival and the Grand Jury Prize at the Festival International du Film documentaire Océanian (FIFO).