Director: Evie Ashton

Sonagacchi is the largest, most infamous sex district in Calcutta. Many women have been stolen from their homes, some tricked, others sold into prostitution by friends and family. In the class system of India, they languish at the bottom of the heap. A woman in Sonagacchi can live her entire life within a one-kilometer radius of where she sells her body. She could literally work, sleep and die all in the same bed.

The Hiltons, a family from New Zealand, set about creating a viable business, Freeset, teaching the women to read and write as well as training them to become skilled workers and business women. Freeset is a Fair Trade certified business that manufactures jute bags in Calcutta, India.

23 min.

Director: Jeremy Earp

Consuming Kids throws desperately needed light on the practices of a relentless multi-billion dollar marketing machine that now sells kids and their parents everything from junk food and violent video games to bogus educational products and the family car. Drawing on the insights of health care professionals, children's advocates, and industry insiders, the film focuses on the explosive growth of child marketing in the wake of deregulation, showing how youth marketers have used the latest advances in psychology, anthropology, and neuroscience to transform American children into one of the most powerful and profitable consumer demographics in the world. Consuming Kids pushes back against the wholesale commercialization of childhood, raising urgent questions about the ethics of children's marketing and its impact on the health and well-being of kids. Check out: consumingkidsthemovie.com

67 min.

• Official Selection - 2009 Freedom Week Film Festival, New Zealand
• Official Selection - 2009 Fiuggi Family Festival, Italy

Director: Vimlendu Jha

Delhi generates about 8000 metric tonnes of solid waste every day. The work of more than 100,000 “Ragpikers” saves the Delhi Municipal District $6,000,000 Cdn annually. The workers and their creative industries deserve our gratitude. “Disposable” is the story of waste and the stories of those who live off it. Both get disposed in the process but they play a crucial role in the environmental and social cycle.

22 min.

Director: Josée Boulanger

“An institution is not just a place, it is the way people think.” Pat Worth

“The Freedom Tour” records compelling stories told by survivors of institutions who are now living in communities across the Prairies. Past residents of the Manitoba Developmental Centre, Valley View Centre, Saskatchewan and Michener Centre in Alberta share their stories. The film challenges Canadians to think about how we treat our citizens with intellectual disabilities. It suggests that all persons with a disability belong in the community and not in an institution.

“The Freedom Tour” was very unique as it involved people labeled with an intellectual disability behind the camera from development to the big screen. Like other forms of participatory documentary-making, digital video cameras give marginalized people the tools to insert their perspective into the public sphere.

53 min.

Director: C. Karim Chrobog

Left home at the age of seven, one year later I’m carryin’ an Ak-47.” For hip hop artist Emmanuel Jal, a former child soldier in Sudan’s brutal civil war, these lyrics are hardly empty posturing. Today, Emmanuel Jal fights a new battle: bringing peace to his beloved Sudan and building schools in Africa. This time, his weapon is a microphone. Audiences from New York to Berlin to London rave about the award-winning film, War Child, and have embraced the hip-hop artist with a terrifying past and a gentle soul. Interspersing original interviews, live concerts, and rare footage of Emmanuel Jal as a seven year-old boy, War Child will make viewers cry, laugh, dance, and celebrate the power of hope.
warchildmovie.com

94 min.