Türsteher Europas - Wie Afrika Flüchtlinge stoppen soll

The EU is investing billions to establish African states as its new border guards. It also supports dictatorships that close their borders in return.

Abschiebung Impossible

Deportation - a political demand that often fails in Germany. There are over 200,000 people in the country who are required to leave the country, but only a few are actually deported. Olaf Sundermeyer accompanied a repatriation team from the Central Aliens Office in Brandenburg for months and shows how the judiciary, police and authorities block each other.

2 oder 3 Dinge, die ich von ihm weiß

What would your family reminiscences about dad sound like if he had been an early supporter of Hitler’s, a leader of the notorious SA and the Third Reich’s minister in charge of Slovakia, including its Final Solution? Executed as a war criminal in 1947, Hanns Ludin left behind a grieving widow and six young children, the youngest of whom became a filmmaker. It's a fascinating, maddening, sometimes even humorous look at what the director calls "a typical German story." (Film Forum)

Fuocoammare

Capturing life on the Italian island of Lampedusa, a frontline in the European migrant crisis.

Hélène Berr, une jeune fille dans Paris occupé

Arada

The story of three Turkish men. They all grew up in Switzerland and all got deported after various criminal offenses.

Island Memories

In 1755, ten thousand French Canadian settlers were thrown off their land, loaded on ships, and exiled. Island Memories explores the past in a small Acadian community in Nova Scotia where the last survivor of this great deportation is reputedly buried. A lively film full of adventure, people, and history.

Oaxacalifornia: El Regreso

The Mejia family emigrated from Oaxaca to Fresno, California 40 years ago. Filmmaker Trisha ZIff filmed the family in 1996, and returns now to see the changes that have settled over them, and follows the family on their return to Mexico.

Comme une pluie de parfum

Five Afghan men try to reach Europe. The filmmakers followed them for over six months, filming their clandestine journey and chronicling a migration combining fantasy and stark reality, setbacks and achievements, in the midst of the dangers of such trips.

Nemesis

The film explores the destruction of a unique train station in Zurich and the construction of the new prison and police centre in its place. From the perspective of the filmmaker’s window, and with testimony from prisoners awaiting deportation, the film probes how we deal with the extinction of history and its replacement with total security.

Le Lien Acadien

National Film Board of Canada documentary of stories of Acadians (French Canadians from the eastern Maritime provinces). Hundreds of thousands of Acadians emigrated to Louisiana following deportation by the British during the Acadian Expulsion of the mid-18th century, hence the term 'Cajun.'

Death by Rescue: The Lethal Effects of Non-Assistance at Sea

In April 2015, two shipwrecks in the central Mediterranean resulted in over a thousand deaths. The first, on 12 April, occurred when an overcrowded boat was approached by a large commercial vessel. Less than a week later, on 18 April 2015, a similar incident led to over eight hundred deaths after an overcrowded vessel collided with a cargo ship that had approached to rescue its passengers. Both incidents are in part the result of changing EU policies toward at-sea rescue, particularly the retreat of state rescue operations and a resulting onus on commercial vessels to fill the ‘rescue gap’.

Vol spécial

Switzerland still carries out special flights, where passengers, dressed in diapers and helmets, are chained to their seats for 40 hours at worst. They are accompanied by police officers and immigration officials. The passengers are flown to their native countries, where they haven't set foot in in up to twenty years, and where their lives might be in danger. Children, wives and work are left behind in Switzerland. Near Geneva, in Frambois prison, live 25 illegal immigrants waiting for deportation. They are offered an opportunity to say goodbye to their families and return to their native countries on a regular flight, escorted by plain-clothes police officers. If they refuse this offer, the special flight is arranged fast and unexpectedly. The stories behind the locked cells are truly heartbreaking.

Кубанські козаки. А вже літ двісті…

A documentary about the history of Ukrainian Cossacks in the Kuban.

Cohen's War

An hour-long portrait of Canadian immigration lawyer, M. Lee Cohen, renowned for his work with refugees. The film follows his representation of Sonya Pecelj and Vladimir Zalipyatskikh. The first case follows a young woman, Sonya Pecelj from Kosovo, who seeks sanctuary for more than a year in a church; the second case follows a Russian sailor who dives off a ship in Halifax Harbour to escape virtual imprisonment by the Russian fish mafia.

The Wildebeest Migration: Nature's Greatest Journey

Every year, on the steppes of the Serengeti, the most spectacular migration of animals on our planet: Around two million wildebeest, Burchell's zebra and Thomson's gazelles begin their tour of nearly 2,000 miles across the almost treeless savannah. For the first time, a documentary captures stunning footage in the midst of this demanding journey. The documentary starts at the beginning of the year, when more than two million animals gather in the shadow of the volcanoes on the southern edge of the Serengeti in order to birth their offspring. In just two weeks, the animal herd's population has increased by one third, and after only two days, the calves can already run as fast as the adults The young wildebeest in this phase of their life are the most vulnerable to attacks by lions, cheetahs, leopards or hyenas. The film then follows the survivors of these attacks through the next three months on their incredible journey, a trip so long that 200,000 wildebeest will not reach the end.

Iragan gunea Berlin

The film follows five people from different origins as they move anonymously around the streets of Berlin. Each of them with another life somewhere else, trying to ascertain where to go.

Homebound

Through first person narration, Tari reveals personal stories related to her decision to work in Taiwan, her strained family relationships, the risks involved in working abroad and the traps she has fallen into.

The Wire

The inhabitants of the canyon of river Kupa, located on the border between Croatia and Slovenia, have historically been united due to their harsh living conditions, but this peaceful cohabitation between members of different cultures is threatened by the construction of iron fences to prevent the transit of refugees from Bosnia.

Viramundo

Viramundo shows the saga of the northeastern migrants that arrive in São Paulo, beginning with a train arriving and ending with a train leaving São Paulo in a cycle repeated every day. Viramundo's aim was to question why the military coup d'état in Brazil happened without any popular resistance or revolution or reaction of the society.