Past Films

This art-heist-thriller-meets-portrait-documentary delves into the disappearance of over 100 "treasonous" paintings by the co-director's father, revolutionary Iranian artist Nickzad (Nicky) Nodjoumi.

Following the unlawful killing of her younger brother by police in a suburb of Strasbourg, France, her family in mourning, Malika embarks on a legal battle for justice. However, her quest for truth is in danger of jeopardising her family. 

Without a free press how can our communities make decisions and uncover the truth? Bad Press follows one news outlet's fight to survive. When the elected leaders of the Muscogee Nation, the fourth largest Native American tribe, suddenly curb press freedom and give officials authority to edit all news stories before they reach the public, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government’s corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian Country.

This rousing film gives front seat access to the lively, political, and impassioned student Film Club, where students meet weekly and unpack critical issues facing young people in Nigeria today.

This stunning new drama by Academy-Award nominated Polish director Agnieszka Holland zeroes in on the human collateral and political opportunism at stake in Europe’s battle over migration.

After the sudden death of her husband, Nawal is facing hardship. In the absence of legal documents, her brother-in-law swoops in to claim her assets, as well as guardianship of her young daughter.

Filmmaker Ella Glendining asks: "What does it take to love yourself fiercely as a disabled person in a non-disabled world?" Born with a rare disability, Ella Glendining searches the world for another person with a body that looks like hers. In the process, she challenges society’s ableist assumptions and demonstrates the infectious joy that can come from accepting ourselves and bodies and lives - just as they are.

In 2019, protests broke out after the Indian government enacted the Citizenship Amendment Act, which overtly discriminates against Muslims. Nausheen Khan follows the women at the forefront of the resistance.

Mediha, a teenage Yazidi girl recently returned from Islamic State (ISIS) captivity, turns the camera on herself, capturing an astonishing journey as she confronts her past in order to fight for her future.

On the eve of a major championship game for her LGBTQ+-inclusive volleyball team, Sofia is faced with an unwanted pregnancy. Seeking an abortion—criminalised in Brazil—she becomes the target of a fundamentalist group determined to stop her.  

In 2007, Reyhaneh Jabbari, 19, is sentenced to death in Iran for the murder of a man who tried to rape her. The efforts her family and supporters undertake open a window into the mass oppression and silencing of women in Iran, and the risks taken by those who defend and support them.

When undocumented mothers Jeanette and Ingrid face deportation and separation from their young children, they and their communities rally support to keep them safe despite the risks. A story of courage and allyship, Si Pudiera Quedarme is a timely look at the transformative power of communities uniting for justice.  

Summer Qamp follows a group of LGBTQ+ youth as they attend a camp like no other: a judgment-free zone where they explore their authentic selves while building community, finding joy, and making memories that will last a lifetime.

Russian artist Victoria (Vika) Lomasko’s work has always been political. However, as tensions in Russia rise and her new project on patriarchal violence evolves, Vika’s art has become even more essential... and dangerous.

As Indigenous Brazilian forest guardians in the Amazon fend off attacks from illegal loggers, miners, and exporters, we bear witness to what happens when Indigenous rights, land stewardship, and political corruption converge.

As the Refugee Olympic Team prepares to compete at the Tokyo Olympics, We Dare to Dream chronicles their hopes and desires as they fight for a better life.            

In 2018, US soldier Karina Lopez survived a sexual assault at Fort Hood military base. When Vanessa Guillen, another Latina service member, disappeared and is then murdered, Karina steps forward to share her story, creating the #IAmVanessaGuillen hashtag. Hundreds of service members chime in, exposing the cycle of abuse occurring on military bases and demanding justice. 

Controversial Afghan pop star and activist Aryana Sayeed mentors young hopefuls as they prepare to appear on their country’s hit TV show Afghan Star. With two young women on the verge of being named the show’s first ever female winners, the Taliban take over and their lifelong dreams of becoming pop stars are suddenly under threat.

Sport has a long and problematic history of policing women athletes' bodies. Category: Woman focuses on four women athletes from the Global South who are required to undergo medical intervention to compete in their sport, despite being in perfect health, and explores what happens when sexism and racism collide.

Single mother and organizer Clarissa Doutherd is building a powerful coalition of parents. They’re fighting for child care and early education funds, desperately needed by low and middle-income parents and children across the United States.

In Delikado, three environmental defenders are tested like never before in their battle to save their home, Palawan, an island in the Philippines, from the illegal destruction of its forests, fisheries, and mountains.

Doaa el-Adl is one the most prominent of the very few female cartoonists in the Arab world. Draw me Egypt - Doaa El-Adl, A Stroke of Freedom creatively blends documentary, cartoons and animation to bring to life this courageous artist’s thoughts on politics and feminism as she uses her talent to advocate for women’s rights.

“Despite the ongoing brutality, the nation is not on its knees. The movie’s essence is singing, hugging, volunteers bearing gifts, and children drawing pictures for the soldiers who are keeping them safe. That's beauty: People who know how to laugh and love.” – filmmaker Evgeny Afineevsky

When a circus tent is put up outside his apartment, filmmaker Reid Davenport, a wheelchair user, reflects on the corrosive legacy of the “freak show” and the paradoxical spectacle and invisibility of disability.          

In the UK, years of austerity have pushed people to their limits and youth violence has been on the rise. BikeStormz, a movement of young bikers, attempts to offer a safe and welcoming space. However, new forms of conflict arise when police and “concerned citizens” threaten arrest for their very existence.

Nic, Leo, Andrea and Raff are four trans masculine friends from Italy on a journey of self-discovery as they seek to determine their own gender identities while together dealing with society’s imposed physical, legal, and social boundaries, and the labyrinthine process of navigating the medical system.

Canada-based co-directors Habibata Ouarme and Jim Donovan capture personal stories and deep moments of support in a small community of women from West Africa, who are confronting social norms and embracing the inherent power in pleasure and love for their own bodies. 

No U-Turn by celebrated Nigerian director Ike Nnaebue takes us on a journey with Nigerian citizens leaving their country, traveling north through Africa and beyond in search of work and opportunity to build a future, despite the known and unknown challenges lying ahead.

The US healthcare system is the most expensive in the world; almost half of all Americans reportedly struggle to pay for health care. Pay or Die explores the crushing financial reality for millions of insulin dependent Americans living with diabetes, as pharmaceutical companies push the price of this life saving medication to exorbitant levels, making record breaking profits. This is only further bolstered by the government’s lack of regulation.  

When residents of the Liberty Square public-housing community in Miami learn about a $300 million revitalization project, they know that the sudden interest comes from the fact that their neighborhood is located on the highest and driest ground in the city. Now they must prepare to fight a growing form of racial injustice—climate gentrification.

Silent Love is a coming-of-age and a coming-out story. Aga, 35, is legally adopting her teenage brother, Milosz, after their mother’s death – a process that invites intense probing into her lifestyle. However, there’s something she can’t share in their conservative Polish village: her long-term relationship with her girlfriend Maja.

In August 2021, staff at the most widely read newspaper in Kabul, ‘Etilaat Roz’, are left with an impossible choice after the Taliban seize power: stay and continue reporting—risking torture, imprisonment, and death—or join thousands of others attempting to flee the country. ‘Etilaat Roz’ staff member Abbas Rezaie films his colleagues as they navigate the days that changed their lives and the direction of the country.   

The Grab reveals a new world order in which global power will be held by those who control not oil, but food.

Dominic Ongwen is the first former child soldier prosecuted by the International Criminal Court (ICC). Theatre of Violence follows Ongwen’s lawyer and his team as they investigate, build a defence strategy, and try to answer the central question: how do we define “justice” when the perpetrator is also a victim? 

Uýra, a trans Indigenous artist, travels through the Amazon on a journey of self-discovery using performance art to teach Indigenous youth that they are the guardians of ancestral messages of the Amazon Forest. In a country that kills the highest number of trans, Indigenous, and environmentalist youth worldwide, Uýra leads a rising movement while fostering unity and providing inspiration for the LGBTQIA+ and environmental movements in the heart of the Amazon Forest. 

In March 2022, Russian troops withdraw from a small town in the Kyiv region, and Ukrainian citizens emerge from their homes to clean their streets, rebuild, and face a new day while grieving all that’s been lost. This film poignantly captures how a small community continues with life amid trauma and loss, while war rages on close by.

Shobe, Aisha and Suma from are poised to make history as Bangladesh’s first women surfers in an international surf competition. But society and poverty pose major hurdles.

When a courageous young woman and a radical lawyer discover a pattern of illegal involuntary sterilizations in California’s women’s prison system, they take to the courtroom to wage a near-impossible battle against the Department of Corrections. 

In a country where voting rights are under attack, the ability to boycott, or “vote with your dollar,” has been an important and impactful way for citizens of the United States to bring about change.

Kendra Mylnechuk Potter was adopted into a white family and raised with no knowledge of her Native American parentage.

When members of Falun Gong hack China's state TV to expose brutal repression - lives are changed forever. Award winning filmmaker Jason Loftus and celebrated comic book artist Daxiong tell the resilient story of those fighting for religious freedom.

A Mexican-American teenage farmworker dreams of graduating high school, when ICE raids in her community threaten to separate her family and force her to become her family's breadwinner. Fruits of Labor is a lyrical, coming-of-age documentary feature about adolescence, nature and the ancestors.

Democracy in Poland hanging by a fragile thread, as the government begins arresting judges whose rulings are not to their liking. In Judges Under Pressure the public and judges take to the streets.

The Klabona Keepers is an intimate portrait of the dynamic Indigenous community that succeeded in protecting the remote Sacred Headwaters, known as the Klabona, in northwest British Columbia from industrial activities. 

This film follows a small group of brave LGBTI+ activists in Tbilisi, Georgia as they attempt to conduct the first Pride march in the country, where homosexuality remains highly stigmatized.  

In Midwives, amid an environment of ever-increasing chaos and violence against the Muslim Rohingya population in Myanmar, two midwives, one Buddhist and one Muslim, work side by side in a makeshift clinic in western Myanmar, providing medical services to the Rohingya of Rakhine State.

Mujer de Soldado is a deeply moving picture of female solidarity that finally provides space for the dignity of women's experiences that has long been denied.

Myanmar Diaries by the Myanmar Film Collective, an anonymous group of filmmakers, reveals the realities of life since February 1, 2021, when the country’s military overthrew the civilian government. 

On The Divide follows the story of three Latinx people living in McAllen, Texas who, despite their views, are connected by the most unexpected of places: the last abortion clinic on the U.S./Mexico border. As threats to the clinic and their personal safety mount, these three are forced to make decisions they never could have imagined.

"Possible Selves" follows two California teenagers in foster care through their tumultuous high school years. It is the first major documentary to focus on the lived experience of foster kids themselves rather than on the foster care system. 

The exhilarating behind-the-scenes story of Extinction Rebellion (XR), following the group as it takes daring steps to draw attention to the climate emergency – and confront both internal tensions and the harmful power structures present in the climate movement itself.

Seven UK community members strive for freedom and dignity as they navigate the British asylum system, after fleeing persecution.

Three generations removed from the Holocaust, Yaar is a young Jewish Berliner desperate to leave the past behind.

The Hamlet Syndrome depicts the young Ukrainian generation scarred by war and political breakthroughs.

The Janes showcases a group of brave and bold women, many speaking on the record for the first time, who built an underground, clandestine network in 1970s Chicago for women seeking safe, affordable, illegal abortions.

Deep in Mali, in West Africa on the edge of the Sahel Desert, lies the peaceful city of Gao—a quiet way station for passersby with their eyes set on Europe in hopes of finding opportunity, safety, and a better future. The Last Shelter is an emotional portrait of this town and the generous people who live in it. 

The New Greatness Case offers remarkable access to a group of young Russians entrapped by the secret service, resulting in unjust trials and prison sentences – echoing the intensified crackdown on dissent and free expression in Russia we see on the news every day.

The Return: Life After ISIS is a unique portrait of a group of Western women who pledged their lives to ISIS, but now want to return home to restart their lives.

With continuing women's abuses and a high incident of sexual assault and domestic abuse taking place, Karachi’s feminists organize a women’s march, facing down threats from Pakistan’s state, media and radical religious right.

This Stained Dawn is not just about one protest, but about the often times revolutionary act of political organizing in itself.

Northern Iraq's first lingerie store not only sells underwear, but also acts as a meeting place where women connect to their bodies and sensuality after overcoming the traumas of oppression, war, and conservative morality. With brave honesty a group of Kurdish and Yazidi women chat candidly, revealing the challenges they face in a male-dominated society.

This Spike Lee and Spike Jonze executive produced drama tackles one of the darkest issues of our time - radicalization - in an unmissable story of cultural and intergenerational trauma on the outskirts of Paris.

Mustafa lives on the Palestinian-controlled side of the wall, and Salwa and their children on the Israeli side. One day he gets the call every parent dreads: his son has been in an accident and is in the hospital. He will do anything to reach his son, and after being denied access through the checkpoint on a technicality, Mustafa embarks upon a journey to cross the border illegally.

A La Calle captures the remarkable courage of the Venezuelan people as they unite to restore liberty, fundamental rights, and the rule of law

In Seattle, communities are working to break the cycle of incarceration. A promising new restorative justice program based on Indigenous peace-making circles aims to bring healing to families and communities while reforming the justice system.

Bringing to light the foundations of systemic racism in one community that has spanned generations, A Reckoning in Boston shows that transformation, healing and social change begins within each of us.

Rappler, a major Philippines online news site, investigates and uncovers countless government-sanctioned murders under President Rodrigo Duterte

In Apart we bear witness to how familial love and courage combat the inter-generational trauma caused by the war on drugs.

Bajo Fuego exposes the lived reality behind the politics, that has left many Colombians in a continued state of war.

Director Alexander Nanau follows a team of investigative journalists at the newspaper Gazeta Sporturilor as they uncover a vast health care fraud that siphoned off urgent hospital funding and diluted disinfectants while enriching the country's most powerful moguls, hospital managers, doctors, and politicians

 Forget Me Not reveals a path to a more inclusive society that starts with welcoming diversity in the classroom.

 Filmed over five years, I Am Samuel is an intimate portrait of a Kenyan man balancing pressures of family loyalty, love, and safety and questioning the concept of conflicting identities.

In The Same Breath, directed by Nanfu Wang (One Child Nation), explores the parallel campaigns of misinformation waged by the Chinese and US leadership and their devastating impact on millions of lives since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Join us for a special viewing of the Academy Award winning film, Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (If You’re a Girl), which follows a class navigating the disadvantages young girls face in Afghanistan today – gaining an education and skateboarding.

Compared to Russian musician-activists Pussy Riot and dubbed “Vietnam’s Lady Gaga,” Khôi must go to great lengths to disseminate her music as she fights to champion women’s rights, LGBT rights, and free speech.

Faced with intimidation, violence, and criminal prosecution, we follow Máxima’s tireless fight against a gold-mining operation looking to seize her land and destroy environmental resources her community relies on.

Missing in Brooks County is a potent reminder of the life and death consequences of a broken immigration system.

A story of love across borders, and the compromises a family must make when it is torn apart by circumstances beyond its control. When Rana and Muhkles are forced to flee the war in Syria in a desperate search for stable and secure futures for their family, they are separated from their children.

Capturing a crucial moment for women's rights, The 8th tells the incredible story of how Ireland overturned one of the world's most restrictive laws on abortion.

An intimate portrait of an evolving artist, spanning worlds and cultures, art and religion, national and gender identities.

At the age of 14 every school child in Germany is taught about the atrocities that occurred under Nazi rule. Filmmaker Elena Horn returns to her small hometown in rural Germany to follow four children as they first learn about the Holocaust. 

This film unpacks the devastating power of corporations to achieve profit at any cost versus the individuals and movements determined to secure a more sustainable future for us all.

non-stop work has resulted in an unexpected phenomenon: the flourishing of 24-hour daycare centers. Dee’s Tots Daycare, a home-based center in a New York suburb, has become a lifeline for families in the community. Through intimate stories of two working mothers and their beloved caregiver, Nunu, we see how this daycare patches up the gaping holes in a threadbare social safety net and provides a personal response to an urgent problem. s resulted in an unexpected phenomenon: the flourishing of 24-hour daycare centers. Dee’s Tots Daycare, a home-based center in a New York suburb, has become a lifeline for families in the community. Through intimate stories of two working mothers and their beloved caregiver, Nunu, we see how this daycare patches up the gaping holes in a threadbare social safety net and provides a personal response to an urgent problem. 

Unapologetic illuminates the love underpinning the anger and frustration that comes with being Black, queer women in the US, and elevates those who are most often leading the way while being denied the spotlight.

Sparked by the plague of gun violence ravaging their schools, Us Kids chronicles the March For Our Lives movement over the course of several years.

Two teenage sisters, Ibadeta and Djeneta, lie in a vegetative state in the small Swedish home of their Kosovar family. Their mysterious illness is known as “resignation syndrome,” a condition that can affect asylum-seeking children, often following a threat of deportation. Their youngest brother, Furkhan, imagines a life beyond the snowy expanse of his temporary backyard—and into the far reaches of space. 

WHO WE ARE brings history to life, exploring the enduring legacy of white supremacy and our collective responsibility to overcome it.

When she was 12 years old, actress and filmmaker Maryam Zaree found out that she was one of a number of babies born inside Evin, Iran’s most notorious political prison. 

When MIT Media Lab researcher Joy Buolamwini discovers that most facial-recognition software misidentifies women and darker-skinned faces, as a woman of color working in a field dominated by white males, she is compelled to investigate further.

In the wake of famous 1969 counterculture festival Woodstock in upstate New York, Camp Jened hosted their own wild getaways. Teenagers with disabilities spent their summers escaping their parents’ overbearing care and widespread societal prejudices to discover themselves, express opinions freely, and have lots of fun at the same time.

When a Chinese-American police officer kills an innocent, unarmed black man in an unlit stairwell of a New York City housing project on November 20, 2014, communities across the city erupt with demands for legal accountability.

Join us for an exclusive European sneak preview of a ground-breaking and history-making documentary film.

In a quest for understanding, this film encourages us to let go of our preconceptions – for example, about people with autism or dwarfism – and celebrate our loved ones for all that makes them uniquely themselves. 

As the US and Germany grapple with racism, nationalism, and a fight against diversity, our protagonists move from their 20s into their 30s and face major turning points in their lives.

Gather celebrates the fruits of the indigenous food sovereignty movement, profiling innovative changemakers in Native American tribes across North America reclaiming their identities after centuries of physical and cultural genocide.