A Place in the City
SA, 2008, 30min, English Subtitles
Director: Jenny Morgan
www.famamu.org
(Screens with The Father Inside)

The ever growing rift between South Africa’s economically marginalised and its democratic government is told through members of Abhlali baseMjondolo, a shack dwellers’ movement lobbying for basic service delivery and opposing the removal of residents of informal settlements to new housing outside the city of Durban.

Members argue that the eThekwini municipality’s recently instituted Slum Clearance Act, passed in the interest of creating a world class African city, is unconstitutional and will end their already limited access to economic opportunities.

At the heart of Abahlali's struggle is the fight for meaningful citizenship rights for South Africa's poor majority.
Courtesy of the Director

Anthrax War

Just weeks after 9/11, the United States was confronted with the frightening reality of biological terrorism. Anthrax-laced letters sent to government and media offices in Washington and New York spread fear and panic around the world. Millions were put at risk, scores were infected and five people died. For the first time in modern history, the United States Congress was shut down.

This terrifying investigation into the world of bio-weapons and defence leads the filmmaker from the United States to the United Kingdom, and eventually to South Africa as he follows a trail of murder, espionage, corporate interests and ethnic-specific germ weaponry research led by Apartheid South Africa’s “Doctor Death” Wouter Basson.
Courtesy of the Director

Anthrax War - trailer from Field Agent C on Vimeo.

Blue Gold: World Water Wars

This riveting film follows numerous worldwide examples of people fighting for their basic right to water, from court cases to violent revolutions to U.N. conventions to revised constitutions to local protests by concerned citizens. It brings into sharp focus the effects of corporate privatisation, water exportation, political and economic manipulation and military control over one of the planet’s most precious assets.

Included in this terrifying portrait is the fact that in every corner of the globe, the limited resource is rapidly being polluted, diverted, pumped and wasted. The film’s powerful argument is that the result will be the desertification of the earth, a situation that could see future wars fought over water, not oil.
Courtesy of the Director

Awards

• Vancouver International Film Festival 2009-Audience Choice
• Newport Beach Film Festival 2009-Best Documentary
• European Independent Film Festival 2009-Best Ecology Film
• Belot International Film Festival 2009-Best Documentary

Crude

Three years in the making, this feature from acclaimed filmmaker Joe Berlinger, is the epic story of one of the largest and most controversial environmental lawsuits on the planet. The inside story of the infamous “Amazon Chernobyl” case, Crude is a real-life high stakes legal drama, set against a backdrop of the environmental movement, global politics, celebrity activism, human rights advocacy, the media, multinational corporate power, and rapidly-disappearing indigenous cultures.

The landmark case takes place in the Amazon jungle of Ecuador pitting 30,000 indigenous and colonial rainforest dwellers against the U.S. oil giant Chevron. The plaintiffs claim that Texaco–Chevron spent three decades systematically contaminating one of the most biodiverse regions on Earth, poisoning the water, air and land. The plaintiffs allege that the pollution has created a “death zone” resulting in increased rates of cancer, leukaemia, birth defects, and a number of other health ailments.

Presenting a complex situation from multiple viewpoints, the film subverts the conventions of advocacy filmmaking while bringing an important story of environmental peril and human suffering into sharp relief.
Courtesy of the Director

Awards

• One World Media Awards- Best International Documentary
• Independent Film Festival of Boston-Grand Jury Prize
• Yale Environmental Film Festival-Grand Jury Prize
• Thessaloniki Documentary Festival-World Wildlife Fund Documentary Award
• AFI Dallas International Film Festival-Current Energy Filmmaker Award
• Big Sky Documentary Film Festival-Best Editing
• Nashville Film Festival-Human Spirit Award
• Santa Cruz Film Festival-Earth Vision Environmental Film Award
• Reel Earth Film Festival-Reel Earth Award, International Features

Heart of the Factory

Zanon/Fasinpat in Argentina is the only factory in the world where workers' management has been operating for more than four years. The documentary captures the remarkable story of this "factory without bosses" -- Fasinpat ("Fabrica Sin Patrones").

Since the country went bankrupt due to government and corporate looting in 2001, Zanon/Fasinpat workers have been challenging traditional assumptions about work, workers, globalization and capitalism. They make collective decisions in a popular assembly, all earn the same pay, rotate supervisory tasks, make safety a priority, and give back to the neediest from the surplus that the factory produces.

The workers face inevitable internal dilemmas and conflicts, but these dim in comparison to the real threat of evictions, death threats and an often violent and hostile state response.
Courtesy of the Directors

Awards

• Best Documentary Film in the competition “Otras Miradas” organizated by Latin American Council of Social Sciences (CLACSO). March 2008.
• First Kodak Award Best Latin American Project ( FICCO – Mexico 2009 )
• Special Jury Award – Latin American Film Festival of Catalunia

The saga of Venezuela’s revolution is told through the state oil company PDVSA – the economic juggernaut that is funding Hugo Chavez’s socialist transformation.

Filmmaker Lucinda Broadbent uses the structure and style of the Latin American telenovela to tell the tale of Chavez’s rise and his continuing battle with the villainous conservative opposition inside and outside the company. Between these powerhouse opponents hang the lives of millions of Venezuelans desperate for their drop of “red oil”.

Will the hero Chavez deliver on his promises by converting the state-owned multi-national into a successful co-operative? Or is he simply a megalomaniacal baddie in disguise?
Courtesy of Deckert Distribution