The year that I went to The Flaherty Seminar, it was programmed by John Gianvito. The theme was “Witnessing the World” and Gianvito was described to me as a programmer interested in social documentary and political action. Indeed, with filmmaker guests like Avi Mograbi (Israel), Franny Armstrong (UK), Paul Chan (USA), Peter Wintonick (Canada) and Tsuchimoto Noriaki (Japan), the line-up was heavy on human rights, politics and the environment. What I remember most about the experience was at some point through the week of intense screenings and discussions, seriously reconsidering if film could make any change in the world. After all Tsuchimoto was documenting the Minimata mercury disaster in the 60s and to watch Armstrong’s Drowned Out about dam construction in India, it was clear that governments still hold economic and corporate interests over the lives and health of citizens. If those images of suffering children in Japan couldn’t make change, what could? It was depressing.

But, good programming means taking your flock on a journey. So, as difficult as the issues we were confronting were and are, Gianvito had some hope to share with us. We watched some WITNESS films that included the work of Joey R.B. Lozano. He was a journalist and WITNESS partner (and board member) in the Philippines, where he covered indigenous rights and the environment, which nearly cost him his life on many occasions. In the film we watched, we see Joey training villagers how to use their video cameras to document when the overlords came to brutalize them to silence their land rights claims. While training them, an attack happens and while Joey survived, a villager was not so lucky. He died right in front of the camera. It was a profoundly sad story.