Ökozid | Ecocide: dir Andres Veiel (2020)

It is the year 2034: drought and flooding are destroying the livelihoods of millions of people. The International Court of Justice has had to evacuate from The Hague to Berlin, where the climate catastrophe becomes the subject of legal proceedings. Two lawyers are representing 31 countries of the Global South, which are doomed without the support of the international community; they raise questions of responsibility, demanding compensation and a right to the integrity of nature in order to ensure their own survival. The court must decide whether German politicians will be held accountable for their failure to protect the climate and thus set a precedent …

Andres Veiel has designed a meticulously researched movie that is all too timely in its critique of European climate protection policy over the past two decades. The film is termed science fiction, but only the blinkered wiould deny the facts of climate change; the scenario it depicts is all too credible. A strong if unstarry cast is headed  Nina Kunzendorf, Friederike Becht, Edgar Selge and Ulrich Tukur.

The film screens in the NAAS programme under the umbrella title Green Reel: Films for a Sustainable Future, featuring independent films from around the world that focus on the environment and sustainability. NAAS is a collaboration between a number of cultural institutions in the UAE: the Goethe-Institut Gulf Region, the Embassies of France in the United Arab Emirates, the Embassy of Canada to the United Arab Emirates, the Italian Cultural Institute of Abu Dhabi, the Embassy of Switzerland to the United Arab Emirates and the Kingdom of Bahrain, and Alliance Française Dubai.

NAAS: Green Reel runs from 10 September to 26 November at Alliance Française Dubai. The screenings are all free and subtitled in English.

Upcoming: (click the title for the link)

8 October Siccità | Dry dir Paolo Virzì (2022)
22 October Animal dir Cyril Dion (2021)
5 November Taste the Waste dir Valentin Thurn (2011)
12 November More than Honey dir Markus Imhoof (2012)
19 November Hadwin’s Judgement dir Sasha Snow (2015)
26 November Dans la brume | Just a Breath Away dir Daniel Roby (2018)