(Castellano) (Euskara)
Up to 15 editions of Ekozinemaldia, the ecological film and debt festival, were organised since 2006. Yes, 2020 was the fateful year of its end. In fact, we were right on the doorstep of its beginning: from 23 to 30 March. I still remember talking with some of them, with others, that it seemed that they were going to prohibit access to theatres… something we had never experienced before and that 5 years later seemed incomprehensible.
But that’s how it was. And not only that, because as we now know, the measure would continue. The following year, in 2021, we organised the last one, the 15th, now only in Toulouse, at a very low level, with no attendance (because in addition to the measures, the consequences of the pandemic obviously also meant that people were very cautious and avoided contact). From then on, other components were added which meant that the Ekozinemaldia did not continue.
The festival was a collective effort on many levels because it was not only organised by several organisations and individuals, but instead of being organised in a single city, it then took place in up to 15 different places of the whole Euskal Herria (Basque Country), the result of networking and the participation of different activists from different localities.
In those 15 years something became clear. First of all, the main reason why the idea was born: the state of the planet is tragic and the need to react is urgent. But above all, it is so at the local level, both in terms of the impacts suffered and the resistance articulated. There is therefore a need to raise awareness, and to know and disseminate these realities. But at the same time, this is easy to do because there is a lot of material. Because affected communities and articulated groups tend to use video as the best way to disseminate their situations.
Therefore, this is another reason, the need to bring all this work together, to provide a platform where it can be shown together. This exhibition is nothing more than an extensive and complete reflection of the situation of the Planet and of so many attempts to preserve it. Our attempts. In itself, it is a pooling of a struggle that is planetary, that has many connections, and that must unite and be aware of other experiences.
For this reason, despite not being programmed in any physical location, we wanted once again to compile some of the numerous documentaries, which bear witness to the fact that material continues to be produced, and in most cases of great quality, and that the efforts to care for the Planet are global and many. Some of them are available. Others will need to contact their authors to arrange screenings.
To this end, one of the functions of Ekozinemaldia was to translate and subtitle videos, to make them understandable for the Basque public, and above all, to translate them into Basque. In this case, this has not been possible, but we have included some of them in this list despite this, even though they are only in their original language, as they can always be understood, if not through the language, at least through the images.
If you know of any other documentary or would like to send it, please contact us: info@aplaneta.org
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Poster PDF
DOCUMENTARIES
‘An Island and a Night’.
Production: The Pirates of Lentilleres
Length: 1:40
Language: Basque (original French)
Around a fire, travellers and pirates tell each other their memories, their dreams, their battles. From one language to another, from one story to another, they hear the roar of the storm and the rustle of the leaves, the threatening siren and the wild dance, the clash of sabres and the song of birds. Until dawn a thousand and one paths emerge on the imaginary island.
https://www.piratesdeslentilleres.net/es/#hide1
“HAM Historia del Agua de Mendoza” ( History of Mendoza’s Water)
A feature film that rescues and presents the struggle of the people of Mendoza in defense of water during the last days of 2019. The local government, in agreement with the opposition, repealed Law 7722, which prevented the use of toxic substances in mining. This unleashed a social explosion that forced the concentrated powers to retreat and reinstate the law in just ten days.»
‘IRRENEWABLE LIVES’ (Nature or Misery)
The replacement of fossil fuel-based energy sources with renewable energy sources is destroying the ecosystems, economies and societies of the rural world in Spain. The lack of planning and poor management by public administrations is seriously endangering the survival of the rural world. Something that was meant to save the environment and revive village life is paradoxically turning into the opposite. Faced with this alarming situation, many people refuse to see their territories die and are giving their lives to stop this situation.
«The lithium fever: shadows of the energy transition»
Producción: Observatorio Latinoamericano de Conflictos Ambientales (OLCA) + Resumen.cl
It delves into the complex dynamics surrounding the extraction of lithium, a crucial mineral for the promise of a renewable energy future. Representatives of indigenous Colla communities directly affected by lithium mining, as well as researchers, participate, seeking to generate a deep reflection on whether the energy transition represents a real solution to the climate crisis or a new form of exploitation of nature. Through a visual journey through the imposing beauty of the Chilean desert, its oases, high Andean wetlands, and the delicate ecosystems of the salt flats, the report contrasts the natural and cultural wealth with the growing expansion of mining activity, emphasizing the Maricunga salt flat in Copiapó, northern Chile.
‘La hija del No’ (The daughter of No)
Director: Silvina Hermosa
Twenty years have passed. In the streets of Esquel, Chubut, through permanent mobilisation, the women who began to raise awareness back in 2002 continue to confront the onslaught of transnational mega-mining companies against the Patagonian mountains. This film aims to tell the story of the Argentinean public university teachers who took on the task of investigating and denouncing the environmental impact, of disarming the lying extractivist discourse and generating the mobilisation for the popular vote in the 2003 plebiscite that resulted in the citizens of Esquel expressing a resounding ‘No to open-pit mining’.
. The neighbourhood assembly of Esquel and its experience of resistance is known all over the world and is an example to be followed in various fields.
With an intimate approach, the daughter of one of the protagonists tells this story through the eyes of the main protagonists of the story, this film aims to document the experience, to contribute to generate an exercise of memory and to reconsider that the personal is political.
https://cinenacional.com/pelicula/la-…
‘La montaña’ (The Mountain)
Director: Diego Enrique Osorno
In ‘The Mountain’, Diego Enrique Osorno lives for more than 50 days with seven Zapatista delegates who embark on a transatlantic journey, which emulates those in which the conquistadors reached the so-called New World. In addition. Osorno takes a look at the Zapatista movement, from the clandestine guerrilla group of the 1980s to the contemporary group that has managed to create autonomous communities from the Good Government.
‘Naharina’
Directed and edited by: Ferran Domènech
Production: La Directa and September, in collaboration with the Rojava Film Common.
Naharina is a new documentary that delves into the commons, cooperatives, women’s houses and the security model of Syrian Kurdistan.
Naharina can be seen from Friday 24 January, when it will premiere at the Zumzeig cooperative cinema in the Sants district of Barcelona. Afterwards, the team plans to present the project throughout the Catalan Countries and beyond.
Full story: https://directa.cat/
‘ILOBASCO SAYS NO TO MINING’
The communities of the district of Ilobasco oppose metallic mining and demand the repeal of the General Mining Law, approved by the Legislative Assembly on 23 December and ratified by President Nayib Bukele on the same date. Organised as the Committee for the Defence of Life and Water, their slogan is ‘No to Mining, Yes to Life’.
‘LLAVORS’
(Van voler voler soterrar-nos però no sabien que érem llavors)
Directed by: Alba Pascual Benlloch
In the 1990s, several urban development projects took place in Valencia that changed the physiognomy of the city. The city expanded, affecting large areas of its periurban huerta. Hundreds of hectares of productive huerta succumbed under the asphalt of new avenues and large residential buildings. Many families who inhabited historic farmhouses were forced to abandon their homes and a way of life rooted in the land that their ancestors had already cultivated. What happened to these people, how did they experience that moment and, above all, how has that moment influenced their lives 20 years later?
This documentary aims to answer these questions by focusing on two of its protagonists who lived through these events at a very young age. They show us stories of uprooting, but also of struggle, overcoming and resilience.
‘The land, to live on’
Subtitled (CAT/CASTO/*ENG/FRAY)
Observatory on Debt in Globalisation ODG
A new form of colonialism is driving the global race for rare earths, minerals critical to renewable energy, digitalisation and the military industry. The short documentary film looks at green extractivism on the island of Madagascar.
As the climate crisis accelerates, the ‘green’ transition has become something of a slogan. At the same time, polarisation is increasing along with the advance of digital capitalism, and security is back on the agenda of world powers. In this context, and in a world with finite resources, control of raw materials is key.
Rare earths are a critical but little-known group of elements. Currently, most extraction takes place in China, but Europe and the United States are looking for new deposits. Madagascar has become one of the territories of interest. But what are the consequences of opening new mines in the country? And what are the interests behind it?
The short film is the result of fieldwork carried out in Madagascar in the summer of 2024. Clàudia Custodio and Marta Pérez Fargas, ODG researchers and communicators, travelled to the island to learn first-hand about the impact of rare earth mining on the territory, accompanied by the local organisation CRAAD-*OI. Co-produced with the audiovisual cooperative Morena.
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You can read the publication ‘Neocolonialism in the name of green transition. Rare earth mining in Madagascar’ on our website: https://odg.cat/publicacio/neocolonia…
‘NO to REDD and carbon markets. Communities defending their territories’
Production: World Rainforest Movement (www.wrm.org.uy/es). Production, camera and editing: Joana Moncau.
Additional images: Ruy Sposati, Hili Leimgruber and Jens Woernle.
Running time: 19:56
An initiative of indigenous communities in the Amazon, this documentary brings together experiences, reflections and testimonies of Indigenous Peoples and traditional communities who decided to say NO to REDD and other carbon projects, which they identify as a threat to their territories and cultures. They also question the capitalist, racist and colonial logic of these projects, which seek to use forests historically protected by communities to wash the image of polluting companies and generate profits.
Watch the full documentary:
‘Becoming Visible’
Director: Janet Solomon
Length: 33mins
Production company: Vanishing Present Productions
Music: Gary Thomas
Editing: Johan Prinsloo / Viki Van Den Barselaar Smith
Becoming Visible is a short environmental documentary that explores the pressing issue of offshore oil and gas development off the coast of South Africa and its consequence for its marine life. It addresses the issue of nature as a political asset and questions the consumerist scripts of South Africa’s governmental approaches to environmental policy. The film focuses on a seismic survey off the east coast of South Africa that spanned the whale migration season in July 2016. There were a number of unusual strandings of deep-sea mammals during and after this survey. Becoming Visible investigates the risks posed by exposure to indiscriminate traumatic noise from marine seismic surveys to many marine species, and the vulnerability of fisheries-based livelihoods.
‘DIRECT ACTION’
Directed by: Guillaume Cailleau & Ben Russell
3:32
In January 2018, the abandonment of the construction of an airport in Notre-Dame-des-Landes put an end to the struggle waged for years by one of the largest activist communities in France. Immersed in the ZAD between 2022 and 2023, Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell give an account of a society that, after the struggle that united it, is now sketching the contours of another possible world. At the same time, in Sainte-Soline, Soulèvements de la Terre (Uprisings of the Earth) opposes a project to privatise the water supply, once again confronting the violence of the state.
The result of a long immersion in the footsteps of Wiseman and Akerman, DIRECT ACTION is a unique and hypnotic portrait of a unique community, far removed from the sensationalism of police confrontations. Through their meticulous observation, the filmmakers document a singular movement in which it is still possible to dream of a ‘sung tomorrow’.
K-AHT-EAK HAUTSI’ and other productions against the HST
Production: AHT Gelditu! Nafarroa and Ahotsa Info
Living conditions are progressively deteriorating. The HST only benefits the slavers who impose it: the construction companies, the banks and the corrupt political class. The so-called progress, whose maximum expression was the HST, has led to the current eco-social crisis that is leading humanity to the collapse of civilisation. Faced with this dramatic situation, AHT Gelditu! urges us to ‘break the chains of progress that enslaves and destroys us’.
Two years have already passed since it became known that in Goierri, Itza and Sakana there were plans to carry out boreholes for the HST. Three drilling attempts have been made on this stretch. ‘All three without the necessary authorisation and in clear violation of the law’, denounced the opposition. Although the citizens’ and municipal initiative has stopped “these illegal boreholes”, they anticipate that from now on they will try to do so in compliance with the law “and we will have to confront them firmly if we want to stop these boreholes, which are the beginning of the HST works”.
The main political parties and the media have been engaged in the debate on the connection between Pamplona and Vitoria-Gasteiz or Ezkio in recent times, but Stop TAV Sondeos has denounced that ‘this connection already exists’ through the usual train and that its services ‘are being degraded and deteriorated day by day’.
Lurpea Garbi
The karstic environment of Tolosaldea has traditionally been used as a rubbish dump, and is currently highly polluted. Lurpea Garbi was created as a result of initiatives to clean and restore caves and chasms, with the aim of avoiding the contamination of underground water and conserving or maintaining the diversity of fauna in the caves. So that present and future generations can continue to enjoy these natural resources. The idea is not to find culprits, but to analyse the situation, identify needs and establish a work plan with clear objectives, always with the main aim of protecting the subsoil. The aim of the project is to extend the framework of action to the whole of Gipuzkoa as the objectives are achieved.
Free Rivers for Life’
‘Ríos Libres para la Vida – Memoria de los Pueblos en Defensa de los Ríos en Panamá’ (Free Rivers for Life – Memory of the Peoples in Defence of the Rivers in Panama) is a documentary that brings together the memory, struggles, resistance and experiences of peasant and indigenous communities in Panama, who have denounced the destruction of the rivers, the product of a development model that does not show or exercise respect for the natural resources essential for the life of all species on planet Earth.
Water is Love’ (Water is Love)
Are you interested in refreshing, hopeful and beautiful climate content for your classroom or for a programme you want to organise on water? Water is Love is a one-hour documentary accompanied by a 12-minute animation that addresses issues such as climate change, youth activism, droughts, floods and what to do about them in the long term: Water-retaining landscaping and community-driven decentralised water management.
Water is fundamental to life. It is also the regulator of our climate. As floods and droughts ravage the world, there is an urgent need to understand water dynamics and cycles. To restore ecological integrity and grow food, we must restore hydrological cycles and revitalise rivers to nourish the land. By putting water at the centre of restoration and teaching young people to work with the land, communities can look forward to a better future even as the climate crisis worsens. A post-capitalist infrastructure is being created in autonomous bioregions like Tamera, where a shift in consciousness is taking place that reconnects humans to the land and to each other.
http://www.waterislovefilm.org
Affected people in struggle: 2 years after the tragedy of São Sebastião’.
Production and planning: MAB Brasil (Arthur Macfadem, Pedro Salvador, Vitori Jumapili Gama)
Two years later, São Sebastião is still facing the impacts of the climate tragedy. In February 2023, heavy rains hit São Sebastião, causing landslides, landslides and leaving thousands of people homeless. Two years later, the traces of this disaster are still visible: the people affected are still struggling to find decent housing, face a lack of infrastructure and live under the threat of further tragedy.
In this documentary, we hear from those who live this reality and follow the struggle for justice and reparations. What steps have been taken? What remains to be done?
Tropical Romagna
Director: Pascal Bernhardt / OpenDDB – Distribuzioni dal basso
Origin: Italy
Between 16 and 17 May 2023, a catastrophic event occurred in a large part of Romagna: a flood of more than 36 hours that poured 250 million cubic metres of water over the territory, causing 23 rivers and streams to burst their banks and thousands of landslides in 100 different municipalities of Romagna.
This film is a journey through lands, villages, neighbourhoods and lives affected, muddied and detached, as well as a path that leads to encounters with Wu Ming writers, with activists who populate an ecosystem of struggles in Romagna, and with inhabitants who, from the Apennines of Romagna to Lower Romagna, try to make counter-readings and analyses of the catastrophic event and of the territory that received it.
Free and irreverent words denounce the failures of the institutions to make the rivers and the territories safe, before and after the flood. They point the finger at the gears of a capitalist development model incapable of taking a step backwards in terms of cementing fragile territories, planning major road works and building commercial and residential complexes in areas at high or medium risk of flooding.
All this in a historical period in which an environmental paradigm shift should be imposed at all levels, from politics to the economy, society and culture as a whole.
La valle ferita (The wounded valley)
Produced by: Comitato per la Salvaguardia del Torrente Enza
Director: Alessandro Scillitani
Text and narration: Wu Ming 2
The documentary La valle ferita (between hydrogeological instability and climate crisis) tells the story of the Enza torrent, where numerous interventions are pending, including the Vetto dam, requested by farmers and livestock breeders to solve the water crisis, which is becoming more and more acute. However, this and other large-scale works, with their enormous economic impact and their quantities of cement and aggregates, risk compromising the Enza ecosystem forever.
‘The South Resists!’
Documentary on the days of resistance in south-southeast Mexico, where dispossession and destruction of indigenous territories are intensifying under the false discourse of ‘progress’ and ‘development’. Communities, villages and neighbourhoods face a new internal colonisation. With the imposition of industrial parks in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and the Tren Maya megaproject, they are sacrificing their sacred land for the interests of big capital. These megaprojects not only threaten their homes, but also destroy the rich biodiversity that these peoples have protected for generations. Militarisation and the exploitation of resources such as fossil gas extracted at the cost of our health and wellbeing increase the risks to our communities. Violence and displacement are daily realities, while the government pursues its destructive agenda. #ElSurResiste, EXISTS BECAUSE IT RESISTS!
‘Churning The Earth’
Direction and production: Srishti Films & Kalpavriksh
In the face of widespread ecological destruction, social injustice, economic deprivation, there are powerful countercurrents. ‘Ordinary’ people in several parts of India are resisting the disruption of their lives, as also constructing alternatives in the form of sustainable farming, community-led ecotourism and conservation, revival of crafts, activity-based learning, decentralised water harvesting, local governance and direct democracy. They illustrate various petals in a ‘Flower of Transformation’, with a core of ethical values like solidarity, diversity, freedom, self-reliance, and respect of the commons.
‘Blue Burning’
Director: Janet Solomon
Editing: Viki van den Barselaar
This documentary focuses on a significant and sinister aspect of South Africa’s economic development imaginary: the South African government’s creation of its own national oil company. It is pushing for the construction of 30 new offshore oil and gas wells by 2030. This is the story of the growing social opposition to these plans, uniting fisherfolk and traditional healers, coastal communities, indigenous groups, scientists, environmental NGOs, academics and the general public in defence of the ocean commons and the future of the climate in what has been described as the biggest environmental campaign in South Africa’s history. It is a visually stunning, well-paced film with a superb soundtrack.
