FIFDH 2025

Impact Days has a stated mission to channel the power of documentary film as a tool for concrete social and policy change, underlines section head Ana Castañosa to Business Doc Europe as doors open on the event’s seventh roll-out in Geneva. Core to the event is the pitch of 12 Impact campaigns for 12 new docs - some completed, others yet to premiere. “We believe these films have the power to help motivate structural and behavioural change,” Castañosa underlines of the pitches.

There can be something very grim and unseemly about the use of the “veto” at the UN. The five permanent members of the Security Council (France, the UK, China, Russia and the US) can block any resolution that comes before them. Sometimes, when they do so, war crimes and genocide may follow. “I have enormous respect for the diplomats at the United Nations because they are doing a very difficult thing. Unfortunately, the UN has an Achilles’ heel [the veto] built in at the very beginning,” director Tim Slade tells BDE.

From 7th to 16th March, the 23rd edition of the FIFDH calls for a re-examination of “our political systems and to forge community in the face of the rise of far-right movements as well as the threat they pose to fundamental rights.” Guests of the festival include Nobel Peace Prize laureate Oleksandra Matviichuk, activist Paul Watson, author Douglas Kennedy, journalist Salomé Saqué, surgeon Ghassan Abu Sittah and actress Ángela Molina (Cosmos, by Germinal Roaux).

Core to the Geneva-based industry programme is the pitch of 12 international film projects developed during the Impact Lab training programme, and 4 further impact projects in Swiss Focus 2025. Designed for filmmakers, NGOs & international organisations, philanthropists, impact practitioners and distributors, and offering case studies, networking events and examples of best practices from around the world, FIFDH Impact Days will run 9-11 March 2025.

FIFDH Impact Days 2025 kicks off January 16 with the festival’s annual webinar on Impact Filmmaking for Social Justice. The event will explore the power and the challenges of promoting hopeful human rights narratives in documentaries and impact campaigns, via a case study of Mayye Zayed’s Lift Like a Girl and a panel discussion on “communicating hope in human rights.” The FIFDH Human Rights FF runs March 7-16 2025 in Geneva.

The Geneva-based human rights festival unveiled this week the 12 projects selected from around the world for its Impact Lab 2025. Each project representative will receive expert training to craft an impact strategy ahead of presentation to dozens of NGOs, international organisations and philanthropists, both in Geneva and beyond. The next edition of FIFDH Impact Days runs March 9 to 12 2025.