At the Performing Arts Center Thursday, all seats were filled with more standing and sitting in the aisles for a conversation about Just Mercy, with Bryan Stevenson and Michael B. Jordan.

After screening of Maynard at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, Maynard “Buzz” Jackson 3rd and his wife, Wendy Eley Jackson spoke on a panel with Vernon Jordan and current Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.

Featured speakers at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, running from August 6 to 11, are Spike Lee and Barry Jenkins, screenwriter and director of Academy Award winning film, Moonlight.

This year’s Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, August 7 to 12, is bringing heavy hitters including Kathryn Bigelow and Spike Lee to the performing arts center.

A post-modern dance performance led by Reggie Wilson will introduce the 14th annual Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival.

The 13th annual African American Film Festival takes place from August 10 to August 15. There will be an opening night reception August 10.

The Yard comes together with the African American Film Festival with Camille A. Brown and Dancers on Saturday, August 16, at 6:30 p.m.

For a week in August, MVAAFF brings to the Island films either directed, produced or starring African Americans. This year, MVAAFF received over 200 submissions from as far away as Iceland and Africa.

Run and Shoot may sound like a basketball slogan, but it’s actually the name of a transmedia company that founded the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival ten years ago. This year’s festival, headed by husband and wife team Floyd and Stephanie Rance, will feature close to fifty films, including shorts and feature-length films, which will screen at the Performing Arts Center, the Oak Bluffs Public Library and the Harbor View Hotel.

Stephanie and Floyd Rance are parents of six-year-old, though their child is a film festival. And this year, their Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival is pitching a family-friendly theme: there will be a new focus on children’s entertainment, and new limits on language in the selections.

The Rances, who own Run and Shoot Filmworks in New York city, are the organizers of the film festival which begins today and runs through Saturday. Films will be shown in Oak Bluffs and Vineyard Haven.