The "OKO" International Feature Film Competition features some of the best films from around the world. Eight new international feature films will compete for the winning prize of 28.000 UAH.
The international competition presents both feature-length films and short films. The list of the feature-length film is presented here.
Another Paradise
Director: Olivier Magis
Country: Belgium (about Chagos Archipelago)
Fifty years ago the entire Creole population of the Chagos Islands was expelled by the British authorities. This secret operation took place in order to lease the largest island to the US Navy so that it could build a military base. Now, with the lease about to expire, Chagossian exiles struggle to recover their homeland. The charismatic woman leading their fight in the UK is Sabrina Jean. Through her unrelenting activism, including participation in the World Football Cup for Stateless people, she strives to keep the flame of hope alive in her community: so that her people might finally return home.
Atlas of Memory
Director: Dorino Minigutti
Country: Italy
Lorenzo, 25 years old, discovers the researches of the linguist Ugo Pellis of early XX Century and the thousands of photographs he took. Fascinated by the great amount of faces, he decides to return in those places to look for those who are still alive. The journey becomes a carousel of encounters, turning points and surprises. His research brings successes and failures: landscapes have changed, people are dead, men or nature could have cancelled houses and communities for good. Through these experiences, Lorenzo reflects on memory, language, identity, diversity, love and death. Because Pellis’ linguistic atlas goes far beyond words and images. It is like an enormous map to be explored in several dimensions: it is an atlas of memory.
Bedu Beddna Naiesh
Director: Tekla Taidelli
Country: Italy (about Egypt)
"Bedu" is the manifesto of how a people can be violated in its human rights. Through the stories of the son of the Sinai who with the simple and direct poetics of a desert nomad makes himself the spokesperson of the Bedouin tribes of South Sinai, we retrace the whole history of these people: the Bedouins. From the days of the Six-Day War through the tourist revolution to the Arab Spring up to the coup of al-Sisi and today to Isis, this trip shows us with interviews, testimonies and in a fresh and engaging way how the Bedouins have been neglected violated and offended.
Silêncio - Voices of Lisbon
Director: Judit Kalmár, Céline Coste Carlisle
Country: Portugal
"Silêncio - Vozes de Lisboa" ('Silence - Voices of Lisbon') is a documentary set amongst the backdrop of a gentrified Lisbon. Following the footsteps of Céline - a local foreigner who has lived in Portugal for 20 years - we are introduced to Ivone DÃas and Marta Miranda, two female singers from different generations who fight for the survival of their art and their community. Their common language is Fado, a traditional style of music that talks about the daily struggle of living. With the lyrics of fado songs taking us through the story, the film explores the relationship between fado singers and the ever changing world around them.
Barcelona - A Welcoming City
Director: Christian Schuchardt
Country: Germany (about Spain)
The image of Barcelona is characterized with a cosmopolitan touristic life, long term gentrification processes and progressive political perspectives, as for example for the welcoming of refugees and migrants. In order to find out to what extent the self-drawn image of Barcelona as a "Refugee City" reaches the realities of the lives of the people affected by the European border regime, this ethnographic documentary focuses on the local political strategies which define and regulate the treatment of migrants.
Missing Girls
Director: Vadim Vitovtsev
Country: India
Sexual slavery today. India occupies the first place among countries with the highest rate of human trafficking. Several prostitutes — the heroines of this film — are living in the red-light district of Mumbai, sold there by their own parents. Meanwhile, there is a little girl living in one of the poorest villages in Northern India. In a couple of years, she can follow this path, too...
The Village Resists
Director: David Bert Joris Dhert
Country: Belgium (about Brazil)
What happens when your land is being claimed as event zone for the two biggest sport events of the planet? A question that applies to the Indigenous community of Aldeia Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as they face increased pressure ahead of the World Cup and the Olympic Games in Brazil. The Indigenous group lives right next to the sport stadium that stages the finals of both sport events. They wish to maintain their land as an Indigenous meeting place like it has been since the early 20th century, but that does not correspond with the plans of the Brazilian authorities and the multinational corporations coming with the sport events. From within the Indigenous settlement, the film explores how the arrival of the sport events is being experienced, how the pressure rises and how the community resists.
Yo'eme Labyrinth
Director: Sergi Pedro Ros
Country: Mexico
Ancient and warlike Yaqui Tribe defends its existence. Since 2010, Sonora’s government illegally diverts 75 million cubic meters of water from the Rio Yaqui each year, which has unleashed the tribe resistance. Meanwhile, Yaquis have seen their territory invaded by methamphetamine. Upon these acts of aggression, they seek for answers in the depths of their cultural identity.
We want to remind you that "OKO" is a festival of Ethnographic and Anthropological Cinema will take place on September 11-18, 2021 in Krynychne village, Odessa region
