Familienlos(2023)

Come Find Me(en)

After the collapse of the Communist regime in 1989, over 100,000 children were discovered living in Romanian orphanages. Follow Nori Vito, one of those orphans, as she journeys from her adopted American home to Romania and Greece to find the family she lost almost 30 years ago.

Without Mercy(de)

The animated documentary - a mix of live-action footage and animation - tells of the brutal everyday life in the orphanages of the 60s / 70s. Often led by Christian orders, more than one million children were physically and physically abused here. The anonymous protagonist tells of her childhood and her very personal struggle against the nuns' arbitrariness and their ruthless authority.

People We Come Across(fi)

What happens when a group of Finns travel to a tiny village in Benin to participate in a vaccination study? By participating, they can aid in the development of a diarrhea vaccine for children in developing countries – and, at the same time, have a different kind of vacation in West Africa. The complicated side of helping people and the clashes between two cultures rise to the forefront of Mia Halme’s delicious documentary film.

S21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine(fr)

Documentary of the S-21 genocide prison in Phnom Penh with interviews of prisoners and guards. On the search for reasons why this could have happened.

Les enfants de Vercheny(fr)

The Donut King(en)

Cambodian refugee Ted Ngoy builds a multi-million dollar empire by baking America's favourite pastry: the doughnut.

Defending Brother No.2(nl)

Two Dutch lawyers, Michiel Pestman and Victor Koppe, travel to Cambodia in 2011 to defend Nuon Chea in an international tribunal. Nuon Chea, also known as Brother No. 2, was the second man after Pol Pot in the Khmer Rouge regime. He is being charged with mass murder and crimes against humanity. For four years, the documentary follows the lawyers in their attempt to give this man a fair trial, but the UN tribunal is beset by local interests and a government which consists partly of other former members of the Khmer Rouge who would really like all of the blame to rest solely on the defendant. What should've been the crowning achievement in the careers of the lawyers turns out very different.

Finding Hope Home(en)

The story of Pastor Lucy and her husband Duncan Ndegwa, who began feeding and sheltering children from the streets of Nairobi, Kenya in 1996.

Bophana: A Cambodian Tragedy(km)

Based upon documentation of forced confessions made during the Khmer Rouge era in Cambodia, this film reconstructs the relationship of a young woman, Hout Bophana, and Ly Sitha before they were tortured in executed in 1977.

Side by Side(km)

Through daily routines in a rural village, an indigenous elder couple recall their strange marriage to their grand-daughter, and sometimes to each other, in the changing rhythm of nature around them.

Rain Falls from Earth: Surviving Cambodia's Darkest Hour(en)

On April 17, 1975, the face of Cambodia would forever be changed. As Khmer Rouge soldiers marched into the capital city of Phnom Penh, the unsuspecting people of Cambodia had little idea they would be forced into a living nightmare that would last nearly four years. Rain Falls From Earth is a story of courage, a story of survival and a story of eventual triumph over the Communist regime that was responsible for the deaths of over two million people. The voices of many Cambodians are heard as they convey their thoughts, ideas and emotions - the very things they were forced to abandon in the "killing fields" of Cambodia. Their stories are an eyewitness account to genocide.

Waiting for the Sun(en)

In China more people are on death row than the rest of the world combined. The children of the convicts are often left alone, stigmatized and living in the streets. Grandma Zhang, as the kids call her, is a former prison guard who has founded an orphanage in Nanzhao.

The Last Season(en)

In search of the lucrative matsutake mushroom, two former soldiers discover the means to gradually heal their wounds of war. Roger, a self-described 'fall-down drunk' and sniper in Vietnam, and Kouy, a Cambodian refugee who fought the Khmer Rouge, bonded in the bustling tent-city known as Mushroom Camp, which pops up each autumn in the Oregon woods. Their friendship became an adoptive family; according to a Cambodian custom, if you lose your family like Kouy, you must rebuilt it anew. Now, however, this new family could be lost. Roger's health is declining and trauma flashbacks rack his mind; Kouy gently aids his family before the snow falls and the hunting season ends, signaling his time to leave.

Kampuchea inför kriget(sv)

Documentary about Cambodia featuring a long interview with Pol Pot

Hexenkinder(de)

The movie recalls children who suffered mental and physical harm both during the last century, particularly in religious orphanages, and during the time of early modernperiod witch-hunts. It shows that the mindsets and behavioural patterns of both time periods are more alike than one might think.

Kinshasa, générations Matuidi(fr)

Let All Children Smile(ro)

The film's protagonists are the orphaned children taken into custody by the state and institutionalized at Children's House no. 6 from Bucharest. For Mészáros, the concern for the situation of children left orphaned during the Second World War is autobiographical: the director directly experienced the absence of parents in her own childhood.

Blood Brother(en)

Rocky Braat went to India as a disillusioned American tourist. When he met a group of children with HIV/AIDS, he decided to stay. He never could have imagined the obstacles he would face. Or the love he would find.

CREATURE OF GOD(el)

The Missing Picture(fr)

Rithy Panh uses clay figures, archival footage, and his narration to recreate the atrocities Cambodia's Khmer Rouge committed between 1975 and 1979.