Browse previous selections from the Human Rights Watch Film Festival
![Three people sit around a low table with a large sheet of paper looking intently, while the central figure, a woman, looks down at her Mac Laptop](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2023-02/The%20Grab%20Key%20Image%201.jpeg?itok=Imn8TZg5)
The Grab
The Grab reveals a new world order in which global power will be held by those who control not oil, but food.
![Photo of Krispus Arena, Lead council of the defense investigating the case in Uganda. Photo of Black man leaning back in chair in blue shirt sitting in a field with greenery. Photo taken over the shoulder of a young man with back to camera.](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2023-02/3.%20TOV_Krispus%20Ayena_Lead%20Councel%20of%20the%20Defence%20investigating%20the%20case%20in%20Uganda_Kacper%20Czubak.jpg?itok=DI6l2EDZ)
Theatre of Violence
Dominic Ongwen is the first former child soldier prosecuted by the International Criminal Court (ICC). Theatre of Violence follows Ongwen’s lawyer and his team as they investigate, build a defence strategy, and try to answer the central question: how do we define “justice” when the perpetrator is also a victim?
![Image of non-binary person with white pink and yellow face makeup, blue lips and long eyelashes. Wearing a head wrap and holding a staff made of wood.](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2022-12/UYRA%20The%20Rising%20Forest_01.png?itok=7YjulZib)
Uýra: The Rising Forest
Uýra, a trans Indigenous artist, travels through the Amazon on a journey of self-discovery using performance art to teach Indigenous youth that they are the guardians of ancestral messages of the Amazon Forest. In a country that kills the highest number of trans, Indigenous, and environmentalist youth worldwide, Uýra leads a rising movement while fostering unity and providing inspiration for the LGBTQIA+ and environmental movements in the heart of the Amazon Forest.
![Image of white girl with blonde hair pulled back into braids. She sits at a table outdoors with her cat. Red tablecloth on table and teacups.](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2023-02/BuchaFilm_08_MarcusLenz.jpg?itok=852Z2d0p)
When Spring Came to Bucha
In March 2022, Russian troops withdraw from a small town in the Kyiv region, and Ukrainian citizens emerge from their homes to clean their streets, rebuild, and face a new day while grieving all that’s been lost. This film poignantly captures how a small community continues with life amid trauma and loss, while war rages on close by.
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Bangla Surf Girls
Shobe, Aisha and Suma from are poised to make history as Bangladesh’s first women surfers in an international surf competition. But society and poverty pose major hurdles.
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Belly of the Beast
When a courageous young woman and a radical lawyer discover a pattern of illegal involuntary sterilizations in California’s women’s prison system, they take to the courtroom to wage a near-impossible battle against the Department of Corrections.
![Photo of a crowd and a press conference, with a woman in front speaking with a Hijab.](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2022-02/LEAD%20Image_%20Credit_%20Jonah%20Candelario%20%283%29%20%281%29.jpg?itok=cFX60t8T)
Boycott
In a country where voting rights are under attack, the ability to boycott, or “vote with your dollar,” has been an important and impactful way for citizens of the United States to bring about change.
![Daughter of a Lost Bird film poster.](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/Daughter%20of%20a%20Lost%20Bird%20-%20Still%202.jpg?itok=qRYLAoGw)
Daughter of a Lost Bird
Kendra Mylnechuk Potter was adopted into a white family and raised with no knowledge of her Native American parentage.
![](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2022-02/ETERNAL%20SPRING%20-%20Still%20%234%20%28copyright%20Lofty%20Sky%20Pictures%29_0.png?itok=wcbgqWNo)
Eternal Spring (長春)
When members of Falun Gong hack China's state TV to expose brutal repression - lives are changed forever. Award winning filmmaker Jason Loftus and celebrated comic book artist Daxiong tell the resilient story of those fighting for religious freedom.
![Teenage girl wears a bandana over her face and a hooded sweatshirt as she stands in a California Strawberry Field](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2021-12/Film%20Still%202.jpeg?itok=rk1hyAT5)
Fruits of Labor
A Mexican-American teenage farmworker dreams of graduating high school, when ICE raids in her community threaten to separate her family and force her to become her family's breadwinner. Fruits of Labor is a lyrical, coming-of-age documentary feature about adolescence, nature and the ancestors.
![](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2022-02/Judges%20under%20pressure%20%287%29_%E2%92%B8Lollipop%20Films.jpeg?itok=B9zqWNlX)
Judges Under Pressure
Democracy in Poland hanging by a fragile thread, as the government begins arresting judges whose rulings are not to their liking. In Judges Under Pressure the public and judges take to the streets.
![Photo of Elder by sign saying "They stole the children from the land, they steal the land from the children"](/sites/default/files/styles/large_teaser_380x240/public/2022-04/Photo_CarrieCervantes_Caption_KlabonaKeeperElderRitaLouieStandingOnBlockade.jpg?itok=MzPDtQq4)
Klabona Keepers
The Klabona Keepers is an intimate portrait of the dynamic Indigenous community that succeeded in protecting the remote Sacred Headwaters, known as the Klabona, in northwest British Columbia from industrial activities.