DOXA 2016: The Justice Forum
Vancouver, BC / Wed., April 20, 2016: From reproductive rights to food security, police militarization to end of life decisions – the 2016 Justice Forum films examine some of the most difficult and challenging issues in the world today. Each Justice Forum film is paired with a panel of speakers including filmmakers, experts in the field, academics, and community activists. The intent is to facilitate active and critical engagement, create space for dialogue, and sow the seeds for social change.
John Zaritsky’s new film No Limits follows a group of people who were among the first to be affected by Thalidomide. As thousands of people try to escape war and oppression by fleeing across the Mediterranean, the result is an epidemic of death by drowning. Jakob Brossman’s film Lampedusa in Winter examines the human cost of the African refugee crisis. Adam Larsen’s film Undersung follows four different families who are caring for a child with disabilities and asks what we really value as a society. In the 1960s, Mayer Vishner was part of the counterculture movement and was actively involved with Abbie Hoffman and the Yippies. Justin Schein and David Mehlman’s Left on Purpose documents Mayer’s final political act – choosing to end his own life. In Texas, the doctors and nurses who provide family planning services, everything from pregnancy tests to STI information and access to abortion, face a daily fight, not only from anti-choice protestors, but more critically, from their own government in Dawn Porter’s Trapped.
Director Min Sook Lee’s investigative documentary Migrant Dreams examines the struggle of Ontario farm workers for their rights. Ferguson was a watershed moment for both race and class relations in America. Craig Atkinson’s Do Not Resist documents the increasingly violent struggle between a militarized police force and the people they are charged with protecting. George Kurian’s film The Crossing follows a group of Syrian refugees whose lives are thrown into turmoil as they attempt to flee across the sea from Egypt to Europe. Jon Betz and Taggart Siegel’s incendiary film SEED: The Untold Story examines the fight for seed diversity and food security on a global scale. William Binney, an ex-NSA intelligence official turned whistleblower offers us a unique window into the shadowy world of government security systems in Friedrich Moser’s film A Good American.
DOXA Documentary Film Festival runs May 5 –15, 2016. Tickets are available online HERE.
