Os Comprometidos - Actas de um processo de descolonização

México, México: Mexique en mouvement

December 1968 •French

"Mexico begins where the roads end ”. Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes tells us about the history of Mexico: its invasions, its revolutions, its sacred lands, its forgotten legends, its religious rituals and this frightening misery. François Reichenbach and his camera sink into the dust, on this sacred land, where "the land never ends."

Hearts and Minds

December 1974 •English

Many times during his presidency, Lyndon B. Johnson said that ultimate victory in the Vietnam War depended upon the U.S. military winning the "hearts and minds" of the Vietnamese people. Filmmaker Peter Davis uses Johnson's phrase in an ironic context in this anti-war documentary, filmed and released while the Vietnam War was still under way, juxtaposing interviews with military figures like U.S. Army Chief of Staff William C. Westmoreland with shocking scenes of violence and brutality.

Rivers of Fire and Ice

November 1968 •English

A Wildlife Safari through Africa.

La Bataille d'Alger, l'empreinte

January 2018 •French

Cheikh Djemaï looks back on the genesis of Gillo Pontecorvo’s feature film, The Battle of Algiers (1965). Through archive images, extracts from the film and interviews with personalities, the filmmaker retraces the journey of a major work - from the events of the Algiers Casbah (1956-1957) to the presentation of the Lion of 'Or causing the anger of the French delegation in Venice - which left its mark as much in the history of cinema as in that of Algeria.

The Last of the Babingas

January 1990 •French

In the equatorial forest of Congo Brazzaville and the Central African Republic pygmies live. Over-exploitation and waste of resources have had a significant impact on the lives of Pygmies. The story is based on Mangala an old and wise voice of these disappearing people.

The Adventure

January 2013 •English

In 2011, as tens of thousands of migrants, Loss, and Madess Moussa arrived in Europe via Turkey. Required by EU law to remain in Greece, they only want one thing : to leave. Therefore earn the money needed to start is an obsession and all means are good. The film "The Adventure" follows the lives of these three Ivorians to Athens - their sense of enclosure, strategies to find money, failover illegally, attempts to start - and explores what is at stake, individually and collectively during migration: relations to other migrant communities, friendship, betrayal, solidarity, mafias and violence.

Villa Madjo

November 2023 •French

The Scientist of Sound

March 2017 •English

Thursday 27th of October 2016 – Teatro Espace, Turin. Mulatu Astatke is a musician, composer, arranger and Ethiopia’s cultural ambassador. He’s known as the godfather of ethiojazz, a unique blend of jazz, traditional Ethiopian music, latin, caribbean reggae and afrofunk. Born in 1943 in Jimma, Mulatu studied music not only in Ethiopia but also in UK and USA. In 2005 he contributed to the soundtrack of Jim Jarmusch’s film “Broken Flowers”, reaching a new public worldwide.

52 Blocks: Show and Prove

January 2007 •English

As beautiful and sleek as it is deadly, 52 Blocks merits special conservation efforts as the United States' only existing native martial culture, as it is indeed, the jazz of the martial arts world. Across the African diaspora, there are manifestations of African-derived warrior-dances, capoeira in brazil, mani in Cuba, ladja in Martinique, pinge in Haiti- yet the US offshoot has remained esoteric, because it was suppressed throughout slavery, Reconstruction and Jim Crow and then obscured in the criminal justice system. The history, interviews and training of the martial arts style that created Breakdance and boxing greats like Mike Tyson.

Ritos Populares: Umbanda no Brasil

February 1977 •Portuguese

A documentary based on the book Umbanda no Brasil by the scholar Mata e Silva, who is interviewed by the director. The book studies the Brazilian religion known as spiritism, a syncretism of African beliefs and magical rites, Indian beliefs and images, and Catholic symbols.

PsiQuis: Un Giro Decolonial

August 2023 •Spanish

PsiQuis: Un Giro Decolonial is a documentary that presents and discusses the psychological impact that colonialism has had on the Puerto Rican people. The director analyzes the traumas generated in Puerto Rican society by that colonial experience.

Concerning Violence

January 2014 •Swedish

Concerning Violence is based on newly discovered, powerful archival material documenting the most daring moments in the struggle for liberation in the Third World, accompanied by classic text from The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon.

Who Will Burry The Dead?

May 2016 •English

This documentary offers a deep, candid, and historical look at the Christian experience of America's largest and best-known tribes: the Dakota and Lakota. Its exploration into Native American history also takes a hard and detailed look at President Ulysses S. Grant's Peace Policy of 1873, which was, in effect, a "convert to Episcopalianism or starve" edict put forth by the American government in direct violation of its Constitution. The devastation it had on the values of the people affected were dramatic and extremely long-lasting. Grant's policy was finally ended over 100 years later by the Freedom of American Indian Religions Act in 1978. Interlaced with extraordinarily candid interviews, this documentary presents an insider's perspective of how the Dakota and Lakota were estranged from their religious beliefs and their long-standing traditions.

Cry Freetown

January 2000 •English

An account of the victims of the Sierra Leone Civil War and depicts the most brutal period with the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels capturing the capital city on January 1999.

De Charles de Gaulle à Emmanuel Macron, les gardiens de l'empire

March 2022 •French

Queering Yoga

October 2021 •English

A documentary about stories of personal transformation and healing through yoga in the Queer, Trans, QTPOC communities from the lens of decolonizing yoga.

The Nine Muses

September 2010 •English

Part documentary, part personal essay, this experimental film combines archive imagery with the striking wintry landscapes of Alaska to tell the story of immigrant experience coming into the UK from 1960 onwards.

The Rumba Kings

May 2021 •English

In the fifties, when the future Democratic Republic of Congo was still a Belgian colony, an entire generation of musicians fused traditional African tunes with Afro-Cuban music to create the electrifying Congolese rumba, a style that conquered the entire continent thanks to an infectious rhythm, captivating guitar sounds and smooth vocals.

De Gaulle, the Last King of France

March 2017 •French

Charles de Gaulle, the first president (1958-1969) of the Vth Republic, France’s current system of government, left his mark on the country . He was statesman of action and has been compared to a monarch. This film depicts the general’s personality through the great events of his presidential term, at a time when the world was undergoing considerable changes.

Listen to Britain

May 2022 •English

This spiritual successor to the 1942 original explores the vibrant yet tumultuous growth of Britishness over the past century. The film gives voices to a new reality of Britain, one that has been formed through the flourishing multiculturalism the country has seen since the original film was made. Academics and artists are interviewed to explore both past and present, and consider what a future Britain may look like.