- The festival, organized by Fundación por la Justicia, will be held from May 30 to June 8 and will include screenings, talks in theaters and neighborhoods, as well as a photographic exhibition
- This year's honorary award will be presented to the Red Carpet Human Rights Film Festival, Palestine's first human rights and film festival
- In support of the Palestinian people, a series will be organized at La Filmoteca that will include three films by Palestinian filmmakers
The Valencia International Film and Human Rights Festival, Humans Fest, organized by Fundación por la Justicia since 2009, has presented the official programming for its XV edition, which will have more than 40 movies fiction and documentaries to show citizens how to fight against climate change from different parts of the world, as well as multiple initiatives in defense of territory from the local to the international level.
“This year we present an edition focused on the defense of socio-environmental rights, because we understand that protecting the environment and our land is the basis for ensuring that we can exercise the rest of our rights. We would like Humans Fest to be a reflection space about our responsibility to the planet and a forum of alternatives to the neoliberal maelstrom that has plunged us into this climate emergency,” he explained. Majo Siscar, director of Humans Fest, at the event that was held this morning at MUVIMAS, the MuVIM cafeteria.
José María Tomás y Tío, president of Fundación por la Justicia, also participated in this presentation; Aitana Gisbert Nieto, project director of this entity; and Álvaro Perín García, designer in charge of this year's poster. “With this edition we want to add our grain of sand so that València is the European Green Capital that we want in 2024: committed, sustainable and innovative,” stated José María Tomás y Tío.
For his part, Álvaro Perín explained that in the poster he has tried to reflect the fight against climate change and the defense of the territory as “a very complex and very diverse scenario in terms of its actors”, hence he has opted for a proposal colorful with a clear presence of human figures and spaces in danger, such as l'Horta or the coast. “We needed an identity that represented all the movements and all the sensitivities, making them part of the poster as they will also be part of the Humans Fest”, he concluded.
PALESTINA WILL BE THE PROTAGONIST WITH AN HONORARY PRIZE AND OWN CYCLE
The Humans Fest team wanted to show in this edition its support for the struggle of the Palestinian people and a public condemnation of the genocide they are suffering at the hands of Israel. Therefore, the honorary prize Peace and Justice that the festival grants every year will be given to the Red Carpet Human Rights Festival, the first film and human rights festival in Palestine. “A clear example of how cinema serves to defend the identity of a people and move towards peace,” said Majo Siscar.
Likewise, Humans Fest will celebrate its film series Peace and Justice under the title Against invasions, peace and justice, projecting three palestinian films on Friday, May 31, Saturday, June 1 and Sunday, June 2; when there will also be the presence of the Palestinians Mohammed Shat (producer) and Ramzi Maqdisi (actor) for subsequent discussions.
Specifically, you can see the documentary Ghost Hunting (2017), Award for Best Documentary at the Berlinale, which shows how cinema can heal wounds. This idea of culture as a builder of peace in armed contexts is added to the decision to award the Red Carpet festival, which is governed by the same philosophy.
It will also be programmed The Tower (2018), an award-winning animated film that has not been released commercially in Spain and that explains the crisis in which its country has been immersed for years in a family proposal suitable for all audiences from 7 years old. The film is a journey to Palestine through the eyes of Wardi, an 11-year-old girl who has lived in the refugee camp in Lebanon, since her family had to leave their land in the face of the Israeli offensive.
On Sunday, June 2, it will be screened Omar (2013), a fiction feature film that received the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Festival and was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars. This cinematographic work tells the love story in occupied Palestine between Nadia and Omar, who is captured by a resistance action and, from then on, must face painful life or death decisions.
THE OFFICIAL SECTION OF 2024 IN DETAIL
One more year, Humans Fest will bring productions from countries from four continents, such as Spain, France, Norway, Finland, Kenya, China and the United States, among other countries, which will premiere for the first time in Valencia. As best fiction feature film Five films will compete: Camping du lac, Let the river flow, How to blow up a pipeline, snow leopard y Red rooster. All of them will be screened at Cines Babel and the last one (Red rooster) will have an audio description service for the film and interpretation in sign language for the colloquium.
For their part, five other proposals will aspire to best documentary feature film: desert phosphate; An inhabited volcano, which will have an audio description service, Between the rains; Breathe, mom, whose colloquium will have interpretation in sign language; and The white guard, which will be premiered in Spain. These will also be screened at Cines Babel.
In the section Curt i Barrejat, which will be held at the SGAE Center Cultural Hall, there are 21 works that are also premiering for the first time in the city of Valencia, competing for the awards for best documentary short, best fiction short, best Valencian short film and best short film script Valencian, awarded by the Association of Valencian Audiovisual Writers, EDAV.
The accessibility for all audiences It is, therefore, once again a priority for Humans Fest, which in its 15th edition has renewed its collaboration with Fundación ONCE to offer the audio description service and with FESORD for interpretation in sign language.
HUMANS MEDIA IS BORN, AN OWN FILM ON DEMAND PLATFORM
One of the main novelties of Humans Fest this year is the launch of Humans Media, its own online video platform that, in this case, will allow you to enjoy the festival from anywhere. Here you will find the works produced by the festival over the years and, in addition, a selection of the films participating in its 15th edition, which will be available under subscription for 10 days after the festival.
A PARALLEL PROGRAMMING THAT MULTIPLIES IN CONTENT AND SPACES
On the other hand, Humans Fest has reinforced its parallel programming. On the one hand, it will celebrate the Debates Humans: a total of seven talks, some with projections included, in which there will be experts to address climate change and the defense of the territory from multiple perspectives. For example, in the meeting Climate talks will participate Andreu Escriva (environmentalist, writer and popularizer) and Magda Bandera (director of La Marea and editor of Climática).
Other meetings will address the fast fashion industry, addressing from the conditions of Valencian workers such as the shopkeepers of Elche to those of the maquilas in Central America; or the environmental impact of film productions and how to develop more sustainable shoots. Likewise, it will analyze the international jurisprudence to defend the environment and human rights from the hand of Antonio Vercher Noguera, Prosecutor of the Supreme Court Chamber, Coordinator of Environment and Urban Planning and lawyer of the European Court of Justice.
The sample of the participatory short films born in the audiovisual workshop that Humans Fest organizes together with the production company La Cosecha, which this year will premiere in a meeting titled Cameras and (climatic) action!. Calls will also be held Vermouths Humans: two meetings with activists that will take place on Saturday mornings, June 1 and 8, to talk about the defense of the territory in the Valencian Country (There is a future if we build it together) and through culture (Art for the climate: creators for a world in danger).
Finally, the festival will maintain its commitment to taking cinema to the streets with its “fresh projections” so that citizens have access free and close to your home to the contents of the festival. This year it will be in two locations within the city itself, the patio of the Nuestra Señora de los Desamparados School in the neighborhood of Nazareth and in the Plaza Jardín de la Ermita in the neighborhood of Orriols, as well as another in The Saler. Specifically, in the Mayor's Garden of this district.
The parallel programming of the 15th edition of Humans Fest will be completed with a photo exhibition which will be inaugurated in the Tabacalera Building (C/ Amadeo de Saboya, 11) on May 28: African activism against climate change, an exhibition about first-person stories of activists and the environmental impact that changes the view usually given by the East African media. Free and open access, it will remain open until June 16 and we will have its author Pablo Garrigós, a Valencian photographer residing in Brussels.
Humans Fest is part of the international Human Rights Film Network. Its 15th edition is celebrated thanks to the collaboration of the Second Vice Presidency and Department of Social Services, Equality and Housing, Diputació de València, Ajuntament de València, Institut Valencià de Cultura, Caixa Popular and Teika. For its part, the Valencian regional radio and television station, À Punt, is the official media of the festival.