6 Weeks to Mother's Day(2017)

Liyana(en)

A talented group of orphaned children in Swaziland create a fictional heroine and send her on a dangerous quest.

Memory Books(en)

In Uganda, AIDS-infected mothers have begun writing what they call Memory Books for their children. Aware of the illness, it is a way for the family to come to terms with the inevitable death that it faces. Hopelessness and desperation are confronted through the collaborative effort of remembering and recording, a process that inspires unexpected strength and even solace in the face of death.

Cannibals and Crampons(en)

The explorers Bruce Parry and Mark Anstice climb the remote and little known mountain Puncak Mandala in the Indonesian part of New Guinea. They have to cross remote jungles, climb icy cliffs and navigate the curiosity and fear of indigenous peoples in order to get to the top.

Elephant Whisperer(en)

Sangduen Chailert, or Lek, as she is generally known, has already rescued over 200 elephants. She has dedicated her life to saving the Asian elephant and founded a special camp, The Elephant Nature Park to protect them. We follow this winner of Time Magazine’s “Asian Hero of the Year” Award in her work. Lek is on a mission to save the Asian elephant in her native Thailand. This film looks at the plight of the Asian elephant, as it goes from being a widely used domestic animal, to becoming a burden on modernizing communities. With experts predicting its extinction within four decades, Lek’s work is needed now more than ever and she has gathered a large group of supporters and volunteers in her quest for a better future for the Asian elephant. This moving film demonstrates Lek’s natural understanding of and rapport with these huge animals and will stir the viewers emotions as it highlights the often desperate state some elephants are kept in.

My Boyfriend, The Sex Tourist(en)

A look at global sex tourism, focusing on the situation in Venezuela and Thailand.

Art as a Weapon(en)

Street art, creativity and revolution collide in this beautifully shot film about art’s ability to create change. The story opens on the politically charged Thailand/Burma border at the first school teaching street art as a form of non-violent struggle. The film follows two young girls (Romi & Yi-Yi) who have escaped 50 years of civil war in Burma to pursue an arts education in Thailand. Under the threat of imprisonment and torture, the girls use spray paint and stencils to create images in public spaces to let people know the truth behind Burma's transition toward "artificial democracy." Eighty-two hundred miles away, artist Shepard Fairey is painting a 30’ mural of a Burmese monk for the same reasons and in support of the students' struggle in Burma. As these stories are inter-cut, the film connects these seemingly unrelated characters around the concept of using art as a weapon for change.

Realized Dreams(ar)

A film promoting orphan's cause.

La Babel des enfants perdus(fr)

The White Diamond(en)

This 2004 documentary by Werner Herzog diaries the struggle of a passionate English inventor to design and test a unique airship during its maiden flight above the jungle canopy.

Mining Review 15th Year No. 5(en)

A visit to Peterlee, Co. Durham.

Orangutan Rescue - Back to The Wild(en)

Gringo Trails(en)

Are tourists destroying the planet-or saving it? How do travelers change the remote places they visit, and how are they changed? From the Bolivian jungle to the party beaches of Thailand, and from the deserts of Timbuktu, Mali to the breathtaking beauty of Bhutan, GRINGO TRAILS traces stories over 30 years to show the dramatic long-term impact of tourism on cultures, economies, and the environment.

The Devil's Island: Journey Into Jungle Alcatraz(en)

Imagine the prison of Alcatraz, only 10 times worse, built on tropical, hellish and deadly islands, lost to the rest of the world. Three tiny castaway islands rise away from the coast of French Guyana, in South America: The Devil's Islands. Now buried under an impenetrable jungle, lay the lost remains of what had been for a hundred years the most storied convict prison in history. There, while most of the prisoners faded into oblivion, a few became legends. Some because they were innocent, as in the scandalous Dreyfus Affair, some because they somehow escaped the islands of nightmare, as did the "butterfly", Henry Charrière, immortalized by Steve McQueen in Papillon. Now 50 years after the prison doors slammed shut for the last time, we explore what's left of the Devil's Islands' unbelievably dark and oppressive realm.

Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness(en)

Elephants disrupt the lives of a family deep in the jungles of Northern Siam, and an entire village.

An Ongoing Dispute(en)

An experimental film revisiting the entangled histories of borders, ancient sites, nationhood, and politics—emerging from the Thai-Cambodian border conflict under the shadow of colonial cartography, modern nation-states, and Thai political tensions.

Christus im Urwald(de)

Documentary film about life in a mission station in the jungle of Cameroon with insights into the animal and plant world and the life of the natives.

Urwaldsymphonie(de)

The Children of Leningradsky(pl)

Since the fall of the Iron Curtain an estimated four million children have found themselves living on the streets in the former countries of the Soviet Union. In the streets of Moscow alone there are over 30,000 surviving in this manner at the present time. The makers of the documentary film concentrated on a community of homeless children living hand to mouth in the Moscow train station Leningradsky. Eight-year-old Sasha, eleven-year-old Kristina, thirteen-year-old Misha and ten-year-old Andrej all dream of living in a communal home. They spend winter nights trying to stay warm by huddling together on hot water pipes and most of their days are spent begging. Andrej has found himself here because of disagreements with his family. Kristina was driven into this way of life by the hatred of her stepmother and twelve-year-old Roma by the regular beatings he received from his constantly drunk father. "When it is worst, we try to make money for food by prostitution," admits ...

Kinshasa, générations Matuidi(fr)

Yai Nin(th)

Ninlawan Pinyo is the matriarch of a Thai American family, who hustled for her fortune by founding a naem pork sausage factory in Chiang Mai, Thailand.