International Film competition.
Award WINNERS 2018
Grand Prix of the 2018 Festival des Libertés 2018
LAST MEN IN ALEPPO – by Feras Fayyad
The jury has awarded the Grand Prix of the Festival des Libertés to Last Men in Aleppo, a film that depicts daily life in Aleppo under the bombs of the Syrian regime and its Russian ally. The jury found this to be top-notch documentary work, filmed up close with the residents over a period of three years. By following the volunteers of the White Helmets, the film plunges us into the horror of the daily bombings that strike the local population indiscriminately. With reserve and finesse, it shows a terrible reality that many of us know only through media headlines. By putting images to this tragedy, the film helps us better understand what is pushing people to flee their country or to risk their lives by staying.
Studio L'équipe Award 2018
THE CLEANERS – by Moritz Riesewieck and Hans Block
The jury awarded their Special Mention to The Cleaners, a film that depicts a reality that has remained invisible until now: the ways in which major Internet companies and Facebook in particular moderate the content posted on their platforms. While nobody disputes the legitimacy of removing some content, such as terrorist propaganda or child pornography, other forms of content are deleted on the basis of vague criteria, implemented by ‘moderators’ without any real training or knowledge of the context of that content. This form of censorship implemented by private operators represents a major issue for the freedom of expression and access to information in the years to come.
RTBF Award 2018
THIS IS CONGO – by Daniel McCabe
This Is Congo: forgotten, lost, mired in a never-ending war, a country that nobody wants to talk about any more, far, far away from Kinshasa. In Kivu, soldiers and rebels confront each other in the mud, rain and blood, amidst the thunder of bullet and mortar fire. An exhausted population fights over the bags of rice thrown from a humanitarian aid truck. They hang on to a broken-down sewing machine and dream of gemstones. A damning assessment of a country with magnificent landscapes, but whose history is riven by violence, like a curse. The documentary reminds us forcefully and brutally about the terrible human stakes of the upcoming elections, which will be crucial for the country’s future.
SMART Award 2018
ISLAND OF THE HUNGRY GHOSTS – by Gabrielle Brady
This year, the SMART Award jury has decided to recognise Island of the Hungry Ghosts, a film directed by Gabrielle Brady. The jury has chosen to support an absolutely singular film, owing to its original treatment of the theme of immigration, both universal and ripped from current headlines, and its examination of the personal situation of a therapist and her patients on Christmas Island, a little-known Australian territory off the coast of Java. By means of its highly artistic approach, the documentary stands apart in its aesthetic choices, in which the mystical island becomes a character in its own right, thanks to its wild beauty, history and inhabitants, whether they are the Chinese who arrived a century ago, the migrants who are at the heart of this film or the millions of crabs, which in a surreal natural phenomenon, leave the forest to reach the sea.By subtly blending these different aspects, the film fascinates viewers and confers a dimension that is both poetic and political to the therapist’s desperate struggle to support the migrants.
Special Mention - SMART
THE SILENCE OF OTHERS – by Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar
The SMART jury has also decided to award an honourable mention to the documentary The Silence of Others, directed by Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar. The film dramatically captures the struggle of Spanish citizens to prevent the atrocities committed under Franco’s dictatorship from being swept under the rug forever. In a very dignified and moving way, the film reveals a reality that remains somewhat unknown despite being so close to us. First, there is the trauma of a shameful past that has been deliberately buried, and then, the unswerving desire of the victims and their families who demand just one thing: for justice to finally be done.
FIDH Award 2018
THE SILENCE OF OTHERS – by Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar
The FIDH jury is pleased to announce that its 2018 award has been given to The Silence of Others.This documentary, filmed over a period of six years, depicts the fight led by victims of the Franco regime who are asking for truth, justice and reparations and who come up against a political wall and the ‘pact of forgetting’ imposed by the amnesty law passed after Franco's death in 1977. More than 100,000 persons thrown into mass graves have been ‘forgotten’. Nearly 300,000 ‘stolen babies’ who were ‘adopted’ by pro-Franco families, as well as tortured political opponents were all ‘forgotten’.These victims are not taking action out of a sense of vengeance against their former torturers, many of whom still have streets named after them throughout Spain. Instead, they are legitimately asking for justice. However, the Spanish legal system refuses to hear them, hiding behind an amnesty law that prevents the scars from healing. In a country that remains divided by this question of memory, these Spanish citizens bring the matter before the courts in Argentina in order to have the guilty convicted of crimes against humanity.This documentary shows with precision and sensitivity how a well-established democracy in the heart of Europe is pursued by its old demons when it does not dare confront its past and refuses to recognise victims and determine who is responsible. However, there is no other way out. Without justice, no mourning is possible. And justice must be done in the name of all the victims of the Franco regime who continue to suffer every day deep in their bones from this indifference and contempt by the Spanish government.
Special Mention - FIDH
THE CLEANERS – by Moritz Riesewieck and Hans Block
The Cleaners is an original and passionate documentary that shows us the cleaners of the Web, people who work in the shadows to rid the Web of pornography, violence and hatred. But at what price? In a hangar in the Philippines, an army of employees reviews tens of thousands of social media posts every day and decides which ones to delete. The rules to follow are defined in advance: no dead children, no naked bodies... But to do about a nude painting of President Trump by the artist Illma Gore or a photo of a dead Libyan child on the beach who drowned while crossing the Mediterranean? Reality, often complex and nuanced, is poorly served by this industrial-scale cleaning, in which a binary choice between ‘delete’ or ‘ignore’ must be made in just a few seconds. By means of troubling interviews, the film unveils not only the terrible psychological effects that such images can have on people who look at them day in and day out, but also the political and democratic questions raised by this digital clean-up. Who controls what we see? And what we think? At what point does this cleaning become dangerous? This film puts the finger on essential questions for our modern, connected societies. They directly affect our daily lives without us even being aware of them, and does so in a lively and concrete way. With this special mention from the jury, FIDH intend to salute this documentary, which changes those who see it, even if it has more questions than answers.
Salvador Allende Award 2018
THE SILENCE OF OTHERS – by Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar
The Salvador Allende Centre and the town of Evere have the pleasure of announcing the winner of the 2018 Salvador Allende Award, The Silence of Others by Almudena Carracedo and Robert Bahar. More than just a film, this documentary is a warning cry to Spaniards and Latin Americans who, to get rid of their past dictatorships, have accepted negotiated transitions, giving birth to shaky democracies where silence is a must. These transitional pacts have prevented the investigation of all the crimes committed in the past. In the end, the victims and their families have woken up the justice system and obtained the opening of a trial procedure. Thanks to the directors who remind us that time is of the essence; many families want to know what has become of kidnapped children and missing relatives before they die. By paying the debt of justice and by recognising their wrongs, these societies will become more responsible democracies.