Dangerous Living: Coming Out in the Developing World John Scagliotti / Egypt, Honduras, India, Samoa, Pakistan, Honduras, Vietnam, USA / 70 min.
[Screening sponsored by the Radical Media Society]
Dangerous Living: Coming Out in the Developing World , is a feature-length documentary that explores the immense changes that occurred for gays, lesbians and transgender people living in the Global South. In the last decade of the 20th Century, a new heightened visibility began spreading throughout the developing world and the battles between families, fundamentalist religions, and governments around sexual and gender identity had begun. But in the West, few people knew about this historic social upheaval, until 52 men on Cairo 's Queen Boat discothèque were arrested for crimes of debauchery. That explosive story focused attention to the lives and trials of gay people coming out in the developing world and the film chronicles those events.
Dangerous Living opens with one of the Cairo 52 defendant's, Ashraf Zanati, who was tortured, humiliated, beaten and forced to spend 13 months in prison. His simple, but powerful statement sets out the basic theme for the film: “My sexuality is my own sexuality. It doesn't belong to anybody. Not to my government, not to my brother, my sister, my family. No.” [Screening Friday evening, March 10]
A Woman's Face Alannah Campion / Uganda, England/ 2005 / 12 min. A Woman's Face is a documentary short exploring the link between gender inequality and the disproportionate spread of HIV and AIDS among women in Sub-Saharan Africa. Filmed on location in Kampala , Uganda , the filmmakers ask women in different communities if they feel men and women are equal in Uganda today. Women offer a wide range of answers, spanning the class system and highlighting the multiple truths and complexities of AIDS in Africa today. [Screening Friday evening, March 10]
Mardi Gras: Made in China David Redmon / USA , China / 2005 / 62 min. Mardi Gras: Made in China follows the "bead trail" from the factory in China to Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras, poignantly exposing the inequities of globalization. First-time director David Redmon cleverly illuminates the clash of cultures by juxtaposing American excess and consumer ignorance against the harsh life of the Chinese factory worker. [Screening Friday evening, March 10]
Armenian Lullaby Irina Patkanian / Armenia, Russia, USA / 2005 / 5 min. Filmmaker Irina Patkanian's great great grandfather, Rafael (1832-1892) wrote a poem about an Armenian mother whose baby can only go to sleep to the sound of battle songs in a land ravaged by wars. In the summer of 2003, Irina visited Armenia to shoot her film Armenian Lullaby. She created a moving video poem - a beautiful montage of images propelled by the reading of Rafael Patkanian's poem by Lilit Pipoyan. [Screening Friday evening, March 10]
The Fence Alexandre Trudeau / Israel, Occupied Territories, Canada / 2004 / 46 min. Filmmaker Alexandre Trudeau spent a season working and living with families in Israel and in the West Bank . His documentary The Fence is the intimate tale of families on opposing sides of the security barrier in the Jenin-Afula area.
Israel claims that the security barrier was erected over the past year and a half to protect civilians in the periphery of the West Bank - communities that have been regularly targeted by suicide bombers. But the fence follows a controversial route often well inside the boundaries of the occupied Palestinian territories and forms a one-side border, unilaterally policed by Israeli soldiers. The Palestinians perceive the fence as prison walls that have come to symbolize the greatest obstacle yet in their pursuit of freedom and self-determination under Israeli occupation.
Following the daily lives of ordinary people, the story reveals two opposing worlds and points of views: the Israelis' longing for security and the Palestinians' quest for freedom. Embracing and empathizing with both perspectives, The Fence is sober testimony to how these two neighbouring peoples have never been more at odds with each other. [Screening Friday evening, March 10]
Wetback: The Undocumented Documentary - Arturo Perez Torres / Mexico,Canada/ 2005 / 90 min. Wetback - The Undocumented Documentary is a feature length documentary that follows several immigrants from Central America and Mexico on an extraordinary and extremely dangerous journey to North America . The film begins in Nicaragua and takes the viewer on a journey through five borders and many other dangerous obstacles.[Screening Saturday afternoon, March 11]
Who Shot My Brother German Gutierrez / Colombia, Canada / 2005 / 95 min. Some phone calls can turn your life upside down. That's what happened to filmmaker German Gutiérrez when he got a call from Colombia informing him there had just been an assassination attempt on his older brother Oscar, a political activist hated by the establishment but adored by the disenfranchised. In this film, German Gutiérrez, who has been living in Montreal for the past thirty years, recounts his quest to find the hired gunmen who tried to kill Oscar, and also to expose the roots of the violence that has taken hold of his native country.
This beautifully filmed political documentary takes a courageous look at what Colombia has become: a lawless, neo-liberal Far West run by a corrupt middle class; an Eldorado where oil is more precious than gold and where Americans are the puppet-masters pulling the strings while drug traffickers, guerrillas, and paramilitaries engage in all-out combat with each other as the war on drugs rages on. [Screening Saturday afternoon, March 11]
Two Worlds Colliding Tasha Hubbard / Canada / 2004 / 49 min. Two Worlds Colliding chronicles the painful story of what came to be known as Saskatoon 's infamous "freezing deaths," and the schism between a fearful, mistrustful Aboriginal community and a police force that must come to terms with a shocking secret.
One frigid night in January 2000, a Native man, Darrell Night, finds himself dumped by two police officers in -20° C temperatures in a barren field on the city outskirts and finds shelter at a nearby power station. He survives the ordeal but is stunned to hear that the frozen body of another Aboriginal man is discovered in the same area. Days later, another victim, also Native, is found.
When Night comes forward with his story, he sets into motion a chain of events: a major RCMP investigation into several suspicious deaths, the conviction of the two constables who abandoned him and the reopening of an old case, leading to a judicial inquiry.
It remains to be seen whether the gulf between the two worlds can be bridged.[Screening Saturday afternoon, March 11]
Bhopal : The Search for Justice Lindalee Tracey/Peter Raymont / India, Canada/ 2004 / 53 min.
On December 2, 1984, the Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal , India , leaked poisonous methyl isocyanate gas, killing at least 15,000 men, women and children. Hundreds of thousands more were permanently maimed. Union Carbide is now owned by the Dow Chemical Corporation.
Twenty years later, amid charges of corruption, graft and suppression of medical and environmental research about the tragedy, the victims are still not adequately compensated and cared for. Journalist Raajkumar Keswani, whose prediction of the Union Carbide disaster proved prophetic, documents the legacy and introduces us to the leading scientists, doctors and activists in his search for justice. [Screening Saturday evening, March 11]
No More Tears Sister: The Anatomy of Hope and Betrayal Helene Klodawsky / Sri Lanka, Canada / 2004/ 78 min. A story of love, revolution, and betrayal, No More Tears Sister explores the price of truth in times of war. Set during the violent ethnic conflict that has enveloped Sri Lanka over decades, the documentary recreates the courageous and vibrant life of renowned human rights activist, Dr. Rajani Thiranagama. Mother, anatomy professor, and symbol of hope, Rajani was assassinated at the age of thirty-five. Stunningly photographed, using rare archival footage, intimate correspondence and poetic recreations, the story of Rajani and her family delves into rarely explored themes - revolutionary women and their dangerous pursuit of justice. [Screening Saturday evening, March 11]
Detail Avi Mograbi / Israel, Occupied Territories / 2003 / 8 min. An Israeli army tank drives back and forth. A Palestinian family stands outside with a sick child, hoping an ambulance will arrive to take them to the hospital. “Go home,” orders again and again the distorted voice coming from the armoured vehicle's loudspeaker. The vehicle blocks off the Palestinians' path and forces the ambulance to turn back, then the soldier begins shouting at the filmmaker himself. This short documentary is a detail of Avi Mograbi's next film, soon to be released. It is a detail, turned into a somber and cryptic short, of the reality Palestinians experience in the Occupied Territories.[Screening Saturday evening, March 11]
Rocked: Sum 41 in Congo - George Vale, Adrian Callender / Canada / 2005 / 53 min. A gripping honest and unscripted firsthand account of an African country in turmoil seen through thee eyes of internationally acclaimed rock band Sum 41. While in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the band members get caught in the middle of a tense battle between heavily armed rebel soldiers and government troops. The band takes us there to meet the children of a country that has suffered one of the world's worst humanitarian crises and the most deadly war ever documented in Africa. [Screening Saturday evening, March 11]
NOTE: The documentary and feature films and videos presented in the festival are individual works of art and journalism, and have not been produced by Amnesty International. The perspectives or opinions presented in these films and videos are not necessarily those of Amnesty International, and Amnesty International has not necessarily researched or verified any specific facts presented in the films.
FILMS HAVE NOT BEEN RATED; SOME FILMS MAY NOT BE APPROPRIATE FOR VIEWERS YOUNGER THAN 17. DISCRETION IS ADVISED.