Unspooling between 7 and 16 March, the International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights (FIFDH) looks to be a place for coming together to reflect upon the world around us, a place to dream about shared utopias based on collective approaches. The themes of this year’s edition are, on the one hand, the worrying rise of extremism and, on the other, the global threat to our fundamental freedoms.

Amongst the various titles tackling these themes is Steve Pink’s The Last Republican, which is screening in a world premiere and which denounces Donald Trump’s involvement in the 2021 Capitol attack. To accompany the debate, the festival is organising a forum entitled "Where are the United States headed?", attended by writer Douglas Kennedy. Meanwhile, Hacking Hate [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Simon Klose and British movie Undercover: Exposing the Far Right by Havana Marking examine the relationship between social media and the rise in hate speech both within and outside of the virtual world. War and the humanitarian tragedies which ensue are at the centre of To Close Your Eyes and See Fire [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Nicola von Leffern and Jakob Carl Sauer, and Khartoum [+lee también:
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entrevista: Ibrahim “Snoopy” Ahmad, Ti…
ficha de la película], which was directed by a collective of Sudanese and British filmmakers (Anas Saeed, Rawia Alhag, Ibrahim Snoopy Ahmad, Timeea Mohamed Ahmed and Philip Cox) and was selected in Sundance and the Berlinale.

Feminist struggles are another of the more dominant themes in this year’s edition, running through films such as Manas [+lee también:
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entrevista: Marianna Brennand
ficha de la película] by Marianna Brennand (the winner of Venice’s Giornate degli Autori line-up), Sugar Island [+lee también:
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entrevista: Johanné Gómez Terrero
ficha de la película] by Johanné Gómez Terrero and Norah by Tawfik Alzaidi, which take us to Amazonia, the Dominican Republic and Saudi Arabia, respectively. Three forums will kick off the debate on this topic: the first entitled "Sexist violence: enough with silence and shame", the second focusing on Afghan women, and the last tackling gender discrimination in sports competitions.

Light will also be shone on the devastating conflicts in the Near-East, thanks to the movies A State of Passion by Carol Mansour and Manu Khalidi, and The Bibi Files by Alexis Bloom. The connection between Switzerland and human rights issues, meanwhile, will be analysed and explained through UNRWA, 75 ans d’une histoire provisoire [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Lyana Saleh and Nicolas Wadimoff, set for presentation in a world premiere.

Last but not least, as stressed in the press release, "the 23rd edition foregrounds a powerful idea: the transformation of indignation and anger into solidarity and kindness in the face of political, environmental and institutional upheaval". Films such as Germany’s The Tender Revolution [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Annelie Boros and Queer Camp by Chris Westendorp and Lucas van der Rhee follow directly along these lines.

In addition to the afore-mentioned movies, a number of European productions and co-productions are also selected in this year’s competitions. The fiction films competition will notably welcome Johanné Gómez Terrero’s co-production between the Dominican Republic and Spain, Sugar Island, as well as Santosh [+lee también:
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entrevista: Sandhya Suri
ficha de la película] by Anglo-Indian director Sandhya Suri, In the Land of Brothers [+lee también:
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entrevista: Raha Amirfazli y Alireza G…
ficha de la película] by Raha Amirfazli and Alireza Ghasemi, To a Land Unknown [+lee también:
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entrevista: Mahdi Fleifel
ficha de la película] by Mahdi Fleifel, April [+lee también:
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entrevista: Dea Kulumbegashvili
ficha de la película] by the Georgian director of Ossetian origin Dea Kulumbegashvili and Cosmos by French-Swiss director Germinal Roaux.

On the documentary side, the competition will be welcoming the Swiss-Iraqi co-production Immortals [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Maja Tschumi, which is a feminist film following extraordinary characters, alongside Trains [+lee también:
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entrevista: Maciej J. Drygas
ficha de la película] by Maciej J. Drygas, The Brink of Dreams [+lee también:
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entrevista: Nada Riyadh, Ayman El Amir
ficha de la película] by Nada Riyadh and Ayman El Amir, Soundtrack to a Coup d’État [+lee también:
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entrevista: Johan Grimonprez
ficha de la película] by Belgian artist and filmmaker Johan Grimonprez, and Writing Hawa [+lee también:
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entrevista: Najiba Noori y Rasul Noori
ficha de la película] by Najiba and Rasul Noori.

Last but not least, gracing the Focus Competition we’ll find Made in Ethiopia by Xinyan Yu and Max Duncan, Flowers of Ukraine [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Adelina Borets, and Scars of Growth [+lee también:
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ficha de la película] by Monika Grassl and Linda Osusky.