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.

4K badge Audio 5.1 badge
Films
  • Home/Aamir (VR/360)

    “Home: Aamir” is the first of a series of Surround Vision 360 degree films exploring the meaning of home through the stories of refugees in the Calais “Jungle”. This first film, a collaboration between the National Theatre, Surround Vision and Room One, follows a 22-year-old man escaping the thre...

Extras

  • Songs of The Vine (VR/360)

    Shot over the span of two months in the Peruvian Amazon rainforest, ‘Songs of the Vine’ is a virtual reality documentary focusing on the healing modalities, cosmovision and culture of the Shipibo, an indigenous group best known for their mastery of ayahuasca and sacred plant medicine. By immersin...

  • Lives On Hold In Lebanon (VR/360)

    Beirut's Shatila camp was built in 1949 for 3,000 Palestinian refugees, but now hosts up to 40,000 people, including many Syrians displaced by war. Appalling conditions and bleak prospects for the future leave families longing for their lost homes. Three generations of a Palestinian family descri...

  • Refugees (VR/360)

    Refugees is a 360 documentary about the ongoing humanitarian crisis. Thousands have left their homes in search for a better future, and in their search they encounter dangerous obstacles. We went to Lesbos, Greece, where migrants take the leap from Turkey, putting their lives at risk, and capture...

  • We Are Rohingya (VR/360)

    Mohammed and his family awoke one morning to the sound of gunfire in their village in Myanmar. The father of three describes how his son Ismail went from having a relatively normal life playing soccer with his friends, to trekking through rain-drenched forests to escape Myanmar, and falling sick ...

  • Authentically Us: She Flies By Her Own Wings (VR/360)

    Shannon Scott driven by the military tenet of “Leave No One Behind,” pulls the levers of democracy urging freedom and justice for all be secured from the marbled halls of Washington D.C. to the hallowed ground of those who championed LGBTQ and transgender equality before her.

    Directors: Jesse (J...

  • Traces (VR/360)

    Traces is a cinematic virtual reality film exploring the memories of one woman living with Alzheimer’s disease. In the film, the main character Willie White, an 88-year old woman living with dementia, recounts her time as a young girl living in the fields near Mason, Tennessee. As her words trans...

  • Growing A World Wonder (VR/360)

    The Great Green Wall is an incredible, generation-defining project, yet the wider world seems to know very little about it. This film was created to change that, sharing its story in a way that feels spectacular, but also tangible on a human level. The Great Green Wall won’t be completed for a ge...

  • Fighting For Independence *Viewer Discretion Advised*

    [Trigger Warning] A roadside bomb in Iraq left Jerral Hancock paralyzed and without his left arm. But rather than letting his injuries define him, Jerral is fighting back. He’s working with a team of researchers from Johns Hopkins to test the most advanced prosthetic arm in the world that could h...

  • Why B Corps Matter

    There’s a lot of negative feelings about capitalism right now,” says Kris Lin-Bronner who is the Strategic Advisor of Dr. Bronner’s. Her words are indicative of the wide-scale erosion of trust between companies and consumers. It seems that, time and again, we unearth ugly truths behind the produc...

  • Siroun (VR/360)

    Siroun is a virtual reality film that tells the story of a friendship between an Armenian boy and a Turkish boy, Artak and Temin, set against the backdrop of the Armenian Genocide. Filmed on the set of The Promise, the film gives viewers an opportunity to immerse themselves in a rural Ottoman vil...

  • One Leg In, One Leg Out

    After a decade as a sex worker, Iman attempts to pursue her dream of becoming a social worker to help her fellow transgender community members. As she explores the option of going back to college, One Leg In, One Leg Out questions whether tenacity, ambition and a life long dream are enough to ove...

  • Art For Peace

    The world’s youngest county, South Sudan, plunged into civil war just two years after being formed. Can it actually be poetry, film and music that will end the cyclical violence in this part of east Africa? Meet the brave young people turning their backs on hatred – are they the ones to truly for...

  • Transit

    Powerful intimate stories of young refugees who risked their lives crossing the Aegean Sea to Europe, only to get trapped on the Greek Island of Lesvos with no future and closed borders. It was supposed to be only their "transit" stop, but it turned out where they ended.

    Director: Mariam El Mara...

  • Out of Plastic

    Out of Plastic is a documentary film that sets out to explore the obscure depths of plastics in the Mediterranean. The film is set in the Balearic Islands, and offers viewers a moment to reflect on the profound presence of plastic in our lives and in our natural environment. The film also offers ...

  • The Future of Iraq

    One in six children today are living in war zones, in this film we meet three of them. The Future of Iraq is a poetic documentary about the future generation of Iraq facing their future while trying to cope with their war experiences.

    Directors: Thee Yezen Al-Obaide, Mats Muri
    Producer: Ingvil G...

  • Megolonyo: With a Mother You Are Rich

    Set in a rural village in Northern Uganda, this short-doc tells the story of a Women's Empowerment Group started by female survivors of the Northern Ugandan War in search of rehabilitation, economic stability, and emotional support.

    Director & Producer: Justice Nnanna
    15 min | Uganda, USA
    Langua...

  • Heal Paradise

    Pristine nature, widespread school campuses, Institute for visually challenged, a health center, an artificial limb center, a neatly built food mess, spacious dorms, open playground and more - well this is how HEAL PARADISE looks like. No one would believe this to be an orphanage when they enter ...

  • The Mess

    As Ellice gets low, her room gets messy - she never sees it coming, but it always happens. There seems to be no way to break out of the endless highs or lows that make up bipolar, or even to pick up her clothes up off the floor.

    Director: Dorothy Allen-Pickard
    Producers: Lauren Pringle
    4 min | U...

  • Breaking The Silence On Child Sexual Abuse *Viewer Discretion Advised*

    [Trigger Warning] Fighter, mother and a survivor of child sexual abuse, Nusrat is determined to ensure no other child experiences the physical or emotional trauma of such horrendous acts. Together with husband, she founded Cactus Foundation to teach children in schools in India, how to recognise ...

  • A Turn For The Better

    Food is so fundamental to make a population a lot stronger and healthier. It is an axis that should not be neglected.” In Bolivia, people eat poorly and more of the same. Local old grains as canuhua are about to be forgotten. Three women take a turn for the better…

    This video was commissioned by...

  • R.V *Viewer Discretion Advised*

    Stripped of her rights, a woman's life changes when she ventures with her husband to remedy an impossible situation.

    Directors: Will Hawkes, Melissa Center
    Producers: Will Hawkes, Melissa Center
    11 min | USA
    Languages: English

    FILMMAKER Q&A:
    https://simaacademy.com/filmmaker-qa/rv/

  • Dignity With Flowers

    HelpUsGreen is a unique social enterprise based in Kanpur, India. It collects four tonnes of waste flowers everyday from temples and turns it into sustainable products such as organic fertiliser and incense sticks. In doing so they prevent pesticide laden flowers from entering the river Ganges th...

  • Save Seko

    Despite their customary land being recognised by the Indonesian Government in 2012, the Seko community have been defending their land against large-scale energy development for the last 3 years. In 2016, 14 community leaders were criminalized, including 1 woman. They were sentenced for at least 7...

  • Pygmy People of the DRC

    Marginalised for decades, Pygmy peoples are fighting for recognition and land rights. Even the term ‘pygmy’ is laced with historical racism and prejudice, they are not treated as equal citizens in their home country. At the heart of pygmy culture is their forest, central to their spiritual belief...