Projects in genres: Human Rights

Synopsis

Three-time Academy Award® nominee Johnny Depp plays celebrated war photographer W. Eugene Smith in a real life David vs Goliath story, pitting Smith against a powerful corporation responsible for poisoning the people of Minamata, Japan in 1971. New York, 1971. W. Eugene Smith (Johnny Depp) is a celebrated photo-journalist and photo-essayist, but he feels devoid of inspiration. He is at such a low ebb he even considers suicide. Then a Japanese-American woman Aileen (Minami) shows up to convince him to come to the Japanese coastal city of Minamata, whose community has been ravaged by mercury poisoning, the result of decades of gross industrial negligence by Japan’s Chisso Corporation. Eugene eventually agrees to go, with the reluctant and secret support of Life Magazine head Robert Hayes (Bill Nighy). With Aileen, Smith immerses himself in the community, documenting the people’s efforts to live with Minamata Disease and their passionate fight to achieve recognition and compensation from Chisso. It is a life-changing experience — one which brings Eugene redemption, love, new purpose and his greatest-ever photograph. A photograph that will change the world and provide desperately needed fuel to the fledgling environmental protection movement. 'Minamata' is a moving redemptive story of how one man’s powerful photograph impacted the world, yet in order to find it he had to open his heart. Official Selection Berlin International Film Festival 2020 - Berlinale Special - World premiere

Synopsis

Forensic Architecture meticulously reconstruct an accident involving a boat full of migrants close to the European coast. The work is based on video material recorded by artist and survivor Amel Alzakout as the boat was sinking. Official Selection Berlin International Film Festival 2020 - Forum Expanded - World premiere

Synopsis

On his wedding anniversary, Yusef and his young daughter set out in the West Bank to buy his wife a gift. Between soldiers, segregated roads and checkpoints, how easy is it to go shopping? BAFTA Film Awards 2021 - Winner - Best British Short Film Academy Awards 2021 - Nomination - Best Short Film (Live Action)

Synopsis

Haunted by the ghost of war, a stoic Syrian Barber is trying to build a home for himself and his family on a remote Scottish island. He must find a way to survive this new unfamiliar life and protect the memory of Syria for his young children. Official Selection Sheffield Doc/Fest 2021 - World premiere

Synopsis

A beekeeper on the island of Anglesey faces losing her ancestral home to the development of a nuclear power plant.

Synopsis

Based on the book 'The Reason I Jump' written by Naoki Higashida, a non-verbal autistic Japanese boy. Translated from Japanese in 2013 by acclaimed novelist David Mitchell, the book is now a worldwide bestseller, offering an illuminating and life-enhancing guide to Planet Autism – a planet that has very different laws from the one most inhabit. The book, written when its author was unknown and only 13, is now a bestseller in 27 languages, and has become one of the world’s most widely-read guides to Autism, offering an extraordinary passport to another world. The book's question-and-answer format gives a remarkable insight into the thoughts and feelings of an autistic person who cannot talk; a Rosetta stone that allows us to hear what it’s like to be autistic. This feature documentary is a cinematic translation of the experiences revealed in the book, weaving Naoki’s writings around stories of non-verbal autistic people across the globe, immersing us in their unique sensory worlds, full of intensity, richness, and beauty - and sometimes shadows and terror. Official Selection Sundance Film Festival 2020 - World Cinema Documentary Competition - World premiere Grierson Awards 2022 - Winner - Best Single Documentary – International

Synopsis

A creative documentary about the relationship between fathers in prison and their children at home. In addition to the focus of presenting three incarcerated fathers, we gain insight into the changed lives of their families and children. As we become familiar with their daily lives, we witness the distance and even the closeness that grows between the inmates and their families. As a way of keeping contact, the inmates write fairy tales for their kids which we then make into films with the children playing the lead roles. The stories convey messages that the fathers have come to see as basic truths during the course of their own lives and believe are important to pass on. Within these stories, in the freedom created by fiction, father and child can be united once again.

Synopsis

Sandra (Dunne), on the surface of it, is a young Mum struggling to provide her two young daughters with a warm, safe, happy home to grow up in. Beneath the surface, Sandra has a steely determination to change their lives for the better and when it becomes clear that the local council won’t provide that home, she decides to build it herself from scratch. With very little income to speak of and no savings, Sandra must use all her ingenuity to make her ambitious dream a reality. At the same time, she must escape the grip of her possessive ex-husband and keep him away from her and her girls. The lionhearted Sandra draws together a community of friends to support her and lend a helping hand and it is the kindness and generosity of these people and the love of her young daughters that help rebuild her own strength and sense of self. Official Selection Sundance Film Festival 2020 - World premiere Official Selection BFI London Film Festival 2020

Synopsis

In patriarchal Nepal, Belmaya, at 21, has given up on finding happiness. An uneducated Dalit, with an oppressive husband and baby daughter, she yearns for freedom. Rewind to 2006, when she was a rebellious teenager living in a girls’ home. Grabbing the chance to learn photography, she wanted to change her world. But the home locked away her camera. I Am Belmaya follows her transformational journey from 2014 as she once again picks up the camera, this time to train as a documentary filmmaker. But are her husband and community ready for this? Struggling against violent opposition, Belmaya makes a personal film, Educate Our Daughters, which wins hearts and awards, taking her to places she never dreamed she would go.

Synopsis

Shot in one single take, the film follows a 13 year old Bangla girl from East London escaping a forced marriage with the help of her girlfriend. Part of the Arri Trinity challenge.

Synopsis

A snapshot of an edgeland, Tilbury in Essex, during the months leading to the Brexit deadline in March 2019. The film moves back and forth between the individual, human-scale portraits of migration and the representation of the town’s economic activity.

Synopsis

Built from conversations with trans feminine people around the world, particularly the UK, Indonesia and Canada, the film documents We Dig, a threatre performance which centres around the actual excavation of a giant hole - a literal representation of a queer community needing to bury itself for protection.