Hors Chant

The American Question

October 2024 •English

An 8-year journey into divided America, The American Question examines the insidious roots of polarization and distrust through past the past and present, revealing how communities can restore trust in each other to unite our country.

Of Fathers and Sons

November 2017 •Arabic

Talal Derki returns to his homeland where he gains the trust of a radical Islamist family, sharing their daily life for over two years. His camera focuses on Osama and his younger brother Ayman, providing an extremely rare insight into what it means to grow up in an Islamic Caliphate.

Syrie : les escadrons du djihad

August 2015 •French

A camera crew follows a Jihadi group for a week in Syria

Això era casa meva

June 2019 •Catalan

We Weren't Given Anything for Free

January 2014 •Italian

Annita Malavasi was just 22 when the Germans occupied Italy, their former allies, in 1943. As a partisan in the Italian resistance named “Laila”, she moved throughout the Apennines with and between fighting units, delivering information, transporting weapons, and taking part in battles. She spent over a year in the Apennines, fighting against the German occupation. At the same time, she had to assert herself against the men of the mountain villages. By the end of the war, Laila had risen among the ranks to become one of the few female commanders in the Italian resistance. This film chronicles the story of a lifelong struggle for emancipation that began with the battle for Italy’s liberation from fascism. Laila and her two comrades, Gina “Sonia” Moncigoli and Pierina “Iva” Bonilauri talk about their time in the Resistenza and what it meant to them and many other women.

Under the Wire

September 2018 •English

On 12 February 2012, two journalists entered war-ravaged Syria. One of them was celebrated Sunday Times war correspondent, Marie Colvin. The other was photographer, Paul Conroy. Their aim was to cover the plight of Syrian civilians trapped in Homs, a city under siege and relentless military attack from the Syrian army. Only one of them returned.

...und der Vater blieb im Krieg. Begegnung mit syrischen Waisen

June 1990 •German

Director Junge was commissioned by the GDR in the country for the first time in the summer of 1970; his film In Syria auf Montage accompanies German engineers who train workers in the Homs textile factory. Shortly after filming ended, Hafez al-Assad put himself under the dictator. Twenty years later emerged ... the father stayed in the war over a youth club with Syrian orphans in Bad Saarow, whose fathers had died in the Lebanon war and accompanied them to Syria, where they were housed in separate, elite "schools of martyr children". Multi-faceted documents that oscillate between peaceful and tense, hopeful and unsettled.

Bandite

January 2009 •Italian

Things That Do Us Part

November 2019 •Korean

Things That Do Us Part is a documentary that reframes the stories of three women fighters who dove into a tragic war in modern Korean history, using witness statements and reenactments.

Uprising in Jazak

February 1973 •

The elderly inhabitants of a village in Vojvodina look back on the war and the partisan battles. The film also examines how collective memories and myths enter the individual consciousness.

The Catastrophe Garden

April 2022 •English

It is a daring idea: to grow food from old mattresses in a desolate camp at the edge of a war zone. When a refugee scientist meets two quirky professors, they must confront their own catastrophes - and make a garden grow. Short film now streaming on Waterbear.com.

This Rain Will Never Stop

September 2022 •Ukrainian

This Rain Will Never Stop takes the audience on a powerful, visually arresting journey through humanity’s endless cycle of war and peace. The film follows 20-year-old Andriy Suleyman as he tries to secure a sustainable future while navigating the human toll of armed conflict. From the Syrian civil war to strife in Ukraine, Andriy’s existence is framed by the seemingly eternal flow of life and death.

Black Box Syria: The Dirty War

October 2020 •German

A look back over nine years of the Syrian Civil War, an inextricable conflict, like a black box, due to the competing interests of the many factions in presence and those of the foreign powers.

The Rebel

June 2011 •Italian

The adventures of Guido Picelli, a man who was a leading light in the history of twentieth-century Italy and Europe. Guido Picelli fought untiringly for the affirmation of social justice and opposed every form of totalitarianism.

The Way Out

January 2018 •English

Co-directors Michelle Shephard and David York take an intimate journey with the mother of a young Canadian woman named Amina who left home to join the war in Syria and become a member of ISIS. From Canada to Europe and Turkey and back again, they work various channels seeking what a CSIS officer calls the “exfiltration” of Amina from inside the so-called Islamic State and into the custody of Canadian officials.

Saved by Language

January 2015 •English

Can a language save your life? Yes it can, even an ancient one from the 15th century. Saved by Language tells the story of Moris Albahari, a Sephardic Jew from Sarajevo (born 1930), who spoke Ladino/Judeo-Spanish, his mother tongue, to survive the Holocaust. Moris used Ladino to communicate with an Italian Colonel who helped him escape to a Partizan refuge after he ran away from the train taking Yugoslavian Jews to Nazi death camps. By speaking in Ladino to a Spanish-speaking US pilot in 1944 he was able to survive and lead the pilot, along with his American and British colleagues, to a safe Partizan airport.

The Story Won't Die

April 2021 •English

THE STORY WON’T DIE, from Award-winning filmmaker David Henry Gerson, is an inspiring, timely look at a young generation of Syrian artists who use their work to protest and process what is currently the world’s largest and longest ongoing displacement of people since WWII. The film is produced by Sundance Award-winner Odessa Rae (Navalny). Rapper Abu Hajar, together with other creative personalities of the Syrian uprising, a post-Rock musician (Anas Maghrebi), members of the first all-female Syrian rock band (Bahila Hijazi + Lynn Mayya), break-dancer (Bboy Shadow), choreographer (Medhat Aldaabal), and visual artists (Tammam Azzam, Omar Imam + Diala Brisly), use their art to rise in revolution and endure in exile in this new documentary reflecting on a battle for peace, justice and freedom of expression. It is an uplifting and humanizing look at what it means to be a refugee in today’s world and offers inspiring and hopeful vantages on a creative response to the chaos of war.

This Is Not a Movie: Robert Fisk and the Politics of Truth

September 2019 •English

For more than forty years, British journalist Robert Fisk has reported on some of the most violent conflicts in the world, from Northern Ireland to the Middle East, always with his feet on the ground and a notebook in hand, travelling into landscapes devastated by war, ferreting out the facts and sending reports to the media he works for with the ambition of catching the interest of an audience of millions.

Douma Underground

August 2019 •Arabic

"With the barrel bombs falling on Ghouta, civilians sought shelter in the basements of their homes. I was one of them, holding on to my camera, I tried to film what I couldn’t express in words."

Quando i tedeschi non sapevano nuotare

November 2013 •Italian