During the first days after the 1973 Chilean coup d’état, the political leadership of the Popular Unity government was arrested and transferred to Dawson Island, Magallanes Region, extreme south of Chile and the mainland. The wives of the then political prisoners began an incessant effort to find out the whereabouts of their husbands and then try to return them alive. In these circumstances, they meet and spontaneously organize into a group they call the “Dawsonianas.”
Florian Hartung and Dirk Pohlmann have reconstructed a previously unknown dimension of the collaboration between Nazis and the CIA in the Cold War. Drawing upon recently released documents, the film exposes for the first time a perfidious, worldwide net that reaches deep into the power structures of the Federal Republic of Germany. Lending their authority to the fact-finders’ mission are high-ranking statesmen, journalists and historians.
Hugo Chavez was a colourful, unpredictable folk hero who was beloved by his nation’s working class. He was elected president of Venezuela in 1998, and proved to be a tough, quixotic opponent to the power structure that wanted to depose him. When he was forcibly removed from office on 11 April 2002, two independent filmmakers were inside the presidential palace.
In Portugal, during the night of April 24-25, 1974, a peaceful uprising put an end to the last government of the Estado Novo, the authoritarian regime established in 1933 by dictator António de Oliveira Salazar (1889-1970), paving the way for full democracy: a chronicle of the Carnation Revolution.
Operación Siglo XX
A documentary on the rise and fall of Project Cybersyn, an attempt at a computer-managed centralized economy undertaken in Chile during the presidency of Salvador Allende.
Images of Argentinian companies and factories in the first light of day, seen from the inside of a car, while the director reads out documents in voiceover that reveals the collusion of the same concerns in the military dictatorship’s terror.
It follows Chilean writer Antonio Skármeta as he celebrates the end of the autocrats. Cheerful farewell rituals accompany others facing political persecution on their way to fly home.
Swiss television documentary on the first years of the dictatorship, filmed (in color) in 1977 by a team led by director André Gazut and journalist Claude Smadja. Strongly critical of authoritarianism and the failures of the economic model that was beginning to be adopted, the report shows different aspects of the ideological and technical implementation of the military government. From the purge in universities to the precariousness of the Minimum Employment Program, from the revenge of employers in the countryside to the lamentable composition of the constitutional commission, the show is full of conversations with personalities close to the regime (Jaime Guzmán, Maximilianio Errázuriz, Manuel Valdés, Ruy Barbosa, Arturo Fontaine Aldunate, among others) which is interspersed with testimonies from residents and farmers, victims of violence and poverty.
Carlos Eugênio Paz recalls his participation in the armed struggle against the military dictatorship between the 1960s and 1980s. Using the code name “Clemente”, he participated in the National Liberation Alliance and in several urban actions. Through her own testimony and that of her fellow fighters, director Isa Albuquerque builds a portrait of a troubled moment in Brazilian history and of an entire generation that fought for their country's democracy.
Documentary about Field Marshal P. Phibunsongkram (Plaek Khittasangka), a story about dreams that influence the lives of Thai people in many aspects. Until the peak of power with things you may not have known before!
In this revealing program, noted author and economic activist Naomi Klein offers a lecture and a candid interview in which she expounds on the ideas at the heart of her best-selling book.
A documentary about the controversial businessman Henning Boilesen Jr. and his involvement with the military regime as one of its most enthusiastic supporters, financing it and participating in the tortures of political prisoners. Those actions later culminated in his assassination in 1971 by members of militant groups opposed to the regime.
Planned by Britain’s MI6 and then executed by America’s C.I.A., the coup d’état which follows will destroy Iran’s last democracy, and relations between Iran and the West until the present day. Most shocking of all, the truth about Her Majesty’s role will be hidden from the Queen herself, and even the all-powerful Shah who will be used by Britain and American to replace Iran’s last democratic Prime Minister. The coup will lead to political upheaval all over the Middle East for decades to come, eventually resulting in the Islamic Revolution of 1979 which will end the reign of the Shah, and British and American influence in Iran, inspiring countless other Islamist revolutions around the world.
There was a time in Argentina, not so long ago, when the army wasn't only one, official, but many and made up by civilians. In those times of courageous youths determined to fight to the death for that cause upheld around Peronism as wll as some left-wing postulates, revolutionary Cubas was a beacon of hope in the world scheme -a Montonero nation. "A House in Cuba" seeks to recover the curious adventure of a couple of Montonero parents and their small children, who were lovingly sent into exile in order for their parents to take up arms.
Poetic images emerge from everyday life, interweaving with narratives that recall traces of events from the last civic-ecclesiastical-military dictatorship in the city of La Plata.
And When the Magnolia Bloom
Tells the story of five people from the last generation of Soviet children who were brought up behind the Iron Curtain. Just coming of age when the USSR collapsed, they witnessed the world of their childhood crumble and change beyond recognition. Through the lives of these former schoolmates, this intimate film reveals how they have adjusted to their post-Soviet reality in today's Moscow.
At the end of the last civil-military dictatorship, a camouflage operation took place in the Information Service, an office of the former Rosario Police Headquarters that operated as a clandestine detention center in the heart of the city. This architectural intervention, not recorded in the plans, obscures the survivors' accounts and hides the traces of crimes against humanity. Drawing on images, previously unpublished archives, and survivor testimonies, the documentary explores the scars of political repression and highlights the importance of preserving memorial spaces to ensure the transmission of fundamental events in our contemporary history.
The little-known story of a deadly race massacre and carefully orchestrated insurrection in North Carolina’s largest city in 1898 — the only coup d’état in the history of the US. Stoking fears of 'Negro Rule', self-described white supremacists used intimidation and violence to destroy Black political and economic power and overthrow Wilmington’s democratically-elected, multi-racial government. Black residents were murdered and thousands were banished. The story of what happened in Wilmington was suppressed for decades until descendants and scholars began to investigate. Today, many of those descendants — Black and white — seek the truth about this intentionally buried history.