The Wedding Contract

When a Balinese girl is denied permission to marry outside of her clan, there is a traditional solution for the family of the suitor: 1. Draw up a Wedding Contract. 2. Kidnap the Bride.

Director David Dawkins started a theater company that toured the Mississippi River for ten years. The company, funded by The National Endowment for the Arts, built a raft each summer in St. Louis and floated downstream to New Orleans, performing free shows in a circus tent at thirty river towns along the way. Dawkins worked with D.A. Pennebaker (Academy Award, Lifetime Achievement in Documentary Film) for twelve years, shooting and editing films such as The War Room (Academy Award Nominee) , Delorean, Jimi Plays Monterey, and Depeche Mode 101. David Dawkins was on the two-man crew that shot Doing Time: Life Inside the Big House (Academy Award Nominee) and the Academy Award winner I Am A Promise, both directed by Alan Raymond; and edited two award winning documentary series for ABC News, Johns Hopkins 24/7 and NYPD 24/7. Other editing credits include: Let’s Get Frank, a documentary feature on Barney Frank filmed during the tumultuous Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President Clinton; 60 Spins Around the Sun, a film produced by Jack Black and Laura Kightlinger on the comedian/political activist Randy Credico and his fight against the Rockefeller drug laws. He has recently finished editing a prime-time hour for ABC News on new advances in deep-brain surgery and deep-brain stimulation; and shooting and editing Power Struggle, a documentary feature profiling communities in Africa, Inner Mongolia, and the U.S. in their efforts to install renewable energy sources. David Dawkins has just completed directing and editing his feature documentary The Wedding Contract. a personal narrative produced by D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus. The Wedding Contract premiered at the Balinale in Bali and screened in the feature documentary category of IDFA in Amsterdam. His most recent editing assignment was Hate Rising, a coproduction of HBO and Univision.

Audience Award for Balinese Culture – Balinale, Bali International Film Festival (Indonesia)