Festival Programme

Films by Genre

Indigenous

Agent of Happiness

Arun Bhattarai, Dorottya Zurbó

“Agent of happiness” Amber sets out on a cross-country road trip surveying the satisfaction of the Bhutanese public, as this crowd-pleasing doco questions whether the Himalayan country really is the happiest place on Earth.

Alien Weaponry: Kua Tupu Te Ara

Kent Belcher

Even if you’re not a fan of heavy metal, you can’t help but admire Alien Weaponry. If not for their rise to fame on an international scale, then for being the first band of the genre to sing in te reo Māori.

Marimari

Paul Wolffram

Paul Wolffram’s urgent documentary takes us into the remote highlands of Papua New Guinea and one indigenous woman’s fight against the insidious influence of sanguma – sorcery violence.

The Monk and the Gun

Pawo Choyning Dorji

Is “political freedom” worth the cost of familial or social discord? When Bhutan’s king abdicates in favour of democratic reform, a strange series of events unfolds, where the old and the new collide in wondrous fashion.

No Other Land

Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor

Filmed in Palestine between 2019 and 2023, No Other Land is a documentary film performing its calling. An urgent and irresistible reminder as to why we choose to understand the world, and others, through cinema.

We Were Dangerous

Josephine Stewart-Te Whiu

Earning director Josephine Stewart-Te Whiu the Special Jury Prize for Filmmaking at SXSW this year, this electric debut launches our festival with a fiery trio of delinquent schoolgirls railing against the colonial system in 1950s New Zealand.