Films

Films

Watch award-winning films curated from 140 countries around the globe. SIMA Academy offers you unprecedented access on any device to authentic global perspectives and visually engaging current affairs media. Plus a constantly refreshed selection of international productions from independent distributors.

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Films
  • Barrio De Paz

    Set in Guayaquil Ecuador, Barrio de Paz tells the story of peace worker Nelsa Libertad Curbelo and the city's gang youth, who have left behind a life of crime to come together and provide services to their struggling community. Loved like a mother, Nelsa has helped the gangs channel their need fo...

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  • Isle De Jean Charles

    This short film offers a portrait of the Isle de Jean Charles, a tiny island deep in the bayou’s of Southern Louisiana. The film explores the changes taking place on the island through the lives of two residents whose families are facing a future where rising seas, coastal erosion and storms are ...

  • Marie's Dictionary

    This short documentary tells the story of Marie Wilcox, the last fluent speaker of the Wukchumni language and the dictionary she created in an effort to keep her language alive.

    Director: Emmanuel Vaughn-Lee
    2014 | 10 min
    Canada

  • Yukon Kings

    Set in the remote Alaskan Yukon Delta, Yukon Kings follows Yup'ik fisherman Ray Waska as he teaches his grandkids how to fish during the summer salmon run. With environmental and cultural forces threatening their subsistence way of life, Ray holds onto the hope that his grandsons will one day pas...

  • The Walls

    Students from Washington State University visit the prison at Coyote Ridge in order to participate in a debate about gun control. The rest of the participants are the debate club members from the prison – a group of inmates that have been transformed and inspired by their new contact with educati...

  • Supporting Entrepreneurship: Youth To Youth Fund | Kenya

    The Youth to Youth Fund (Y2YF) component of the International Labor Organization- Youth Entrepreneurship Facility (ILO-YEF) gives youth a voice to design and implement innovative solutions to employment challenges. It is a competitive grant scheme, which offers local youth-led organizations the m...

  • Enemies To Allies

    Sometimes, innovative solutions to social challenges are born in the most unlikely places. In Kisumu, Kenya a surprising approach to HIV prevention relies on building bonds two unlikely groups: police officers and sex workers. In Kisumu, extortion and abuse were commonplace, and sex workers’ righ...

  • Barefoot

    Descalzos (Barefoot) is a documentary about a group of indigenous children from Mexico who have been gaining popularity because of their skills on the basketball court. The region that the children come from faces extreme poverty and political turmoil and the kids have found hope through their sp...

  • Cast in India

    Iconic and ubiquitous, thousands of manhole covers dot the streets of New York City. Enlivening the everyday objects around us, this short film is a glimpse of the working lives of the men behind the manhole covers in New York City.

    Director: Natasha Raheja
    2014 | 26 min
    USA | India

  • Not Anymore: A Story of Revolution *Viewer Discretion Advised*

    [Trigger Warning] The story of the Syrian revolution as told through the experiences of two young Syrians, a male rebel fighter and a female journalist, as they fight an oppressive regime for the freedom of their people.

    Director & Producer: Matthew VanDyke

    2013 | 14 min
    USA | Syria
    Language:...

  • Desmeem

    This film captures the three months of the DESMEEM project that took place in Lebanon in 2012. Designers and activists from Europe and the US traveled to Lebanon to work with local designers and activists to co-create user-centered solutions to social and environmental challenges. Each team took ...

  • Gold of Agriculture

    Gold of Agriculture is a documentary shot in the suburbs of Mozambique´s capital city Maputo. In the film, several beneficiaries of WaterAid´s project Kubabasisa Muganga share their experiences. Covering all aspects of this experiences, the film starts off with stories of how their first perceive...

  • Governance for Sustainability in Hyderabad, India

    What does urban growth in times of climate change mean to a city and its people in an emerging country? This film concentrates on one of India’s most rapid urban growth centers – Hyderabad – and gives mentionable insights on how the inhabitants cope with food security, agricultural problems, urba...

  • Rebuilding Life In Haiti

    How do we provide effective aid to Haiti and the Haitian population? By supporting urban and rural development- its culture and, for the first time in Haiti, small entrepreneurs. This film documents the journey through these fours areas of development in Haiti by means of an innovative approach i...

  • Noise Runs

    In the aftermath of the 2010 Haiti earthquake, failed reconstruction has pushed social unrest to the breaking point. Protests erupt in the streets, and armed UN soldiers stalk the angry crowds. But a group of young Haitians, driven by their passion for a new Haiti, is sparking social change. To d...

  • Second Cycles

    Bicimaximo is a social enterprise with a heart of a non-profit organization. With a passion for bicycles, Baker Nicholaou – the director and co-founder of Bicicmaximo – traveled from the United States to Nicaragua to open up a business in hopes of providing better quality bikes while training loc...

  • Can't Hide Me

    Women and girls are often put down, silently, subtly. Bound by invisible chains in their homes, on the streets, in schools and public spaces. Always maintaining a low profile, always crushing their dreams. Is it possible for them to fight back? And what happens when they find the courage to do so...

  • The Story of Stuff

    The Story of Stuff is a fast paced, fact-filled look at the often hidden underside of today’s globalized systems of production and consumption. It calls on viewers to help build a more sustainable, healthy and fair system.

    Director: Louis Fox
    2013 | 21 min
    USA

  • The Silicon Valley of Africa

    Rwanda experienced a violent civil war between its two main ethnic groups, the Hutu and the Tutsi, that killed around 1 million citizens in 1994. Militant Hutu left the country in a state of poverty after using machetes to maim, rape, and murder civilians. Twenty years later, survivors of the gen...

  • Permanent Culture

    Permanent Culture documents the journey of Joseph, a man who once worked in exploitative sugarcane fields but then found work at Palos Farm. At this permaculture farm, Joseph has not only found more fulfilling work, but also acquired leadership and ecological knowledge that allows him to now be a...

  • Exposed: The Rise of A Superbug

    In The Rise of a Superbug, Dr. Jayant Banavaliker, a leading TB doctor in Delhi, chronicles his daily struggle to save patients using today’s antiquated tools. The film also follows the harrowing story of Phumeza Tisile’s near-death experience with extensively drug-resistant TB, which takes place...

  • Undermined: An Epidemic In South Africa's Gold Mines

    There’s a crisis underground. From the mines of Southern Africa, a river of one of humanity’s oldest diseases is flowing out across the world. Mine workers in sub-Saharan Africa have the highest rates of tuberculosis in the world, with more than 760,000 new cases per year connected to the mining ...

  • Dignity

    The DIGNITY film is a key component to a human rights campaign, which includes the photography exhibition, DIGNITY: Tribes in Transition, by Dana Gluckstein. DIGNITY helped create the “tipping point” for President Obama to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (...

  • Scaling The Mountain: Protecting Forests For Families In Nepal

    In the foothills of Nepal, extreme deforestation has pushed many rural communities onto marginal lands. In “Scaling the Mountain,” villagers in Jogimara and Naubise find that combining conservation efforts with reproductive health services helps them support their families and their communities m...

  • Wolf Dog Workshop

    This film highlights the social impact that the Wolf Dog Workshop educational curriculum – through its innovative use of storytelling and media, such as animation, film, music, and art – is having among at-risk elementary students across the U.S, bringing them hope while connecting them to themse...