The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) has announced the four films which have been nominated for the 2024 ICCL Human Rights Film Award at the Dublin International Film Festival (DIFF).
The winning film will be decided by a four-strong jury comprised of writer, Una Mullally; Associate Professor in Law at UCD and Academic Director of the UCD Centre for Human Rights, Dr Marie-Luce Paris; Executive Director of ShoutOut, Ruadhán Ó Críodáin; and visual artist and journalist, Ala Buisir.
The four nominated films are:
Bye Bye Tiberias
Hiam Abbass (Succession, Ramy) followed her dream of becoming an actor and left behind her native Palestinian village, her mother, grandmother and seven sisters. Thirty years later, she returns to her past with her filmmaker daughter Lina, piecing together a personal archive of her history. This record of exile and womanhood premiered at Venice and won Best Documentary at the 2023 BFI London Film Festival.
(Showing Friday 1 March, 11am @ Lighthouse Cinema, Dublin)
Dear Jassi
After an eight-year hiatus, the Indian auteur Tarsem Singh is here with a Romeo-and-Juliet tale inspired by true events. In 1996 Punjab, Canadian-born Indian girl Jassi falls in love with Mithu, a rickshaw driver who is beneath her social status. Is their love strong enough to fight the dictates imposed by Punjabi society? Owing to its shocking and impactful ending, Singh’s film was awarded the Platform Prize at Toronto International Film Festival.
(Showing Thursday 29 February, 8pm @ Lighthouse Cinema, Dublin)
Green Border
This sombre black-and-white drama follows a family of Syrian refugees, an English teacher from Afghanistan and a border guard, who cross each other’s paths on the Polish-Belarusian border, the eponymous green border. Veteran Polish filmmaker Agnieszka Holland’s brutal and angry film shows that when people are dragged back and forth across geopolitical lines, their humanity begins to erode. This winner of Venice’s Special Jury Prize plays witness to a grim humanitarian crisis.
(Showing Friday 1 March, 5pm @ Lighthouse Cinema, Dublin)
Shayda
Nowruz, the Persian New Year, announces the advent of Australia spring and beginnings. For Shayda (Zar Amir Ebrahimi), an Iranian living in Australia, the holiday marks the start of a new life away from her abusive husband. Inspired by Noora Niasari’s own experiences, this impressive debut is an unusual coming of age, celebrating the indomitable spirit and resilience of Iranian women. This screening will have HOH captions.
(Showing Monday 26 February, 4pm @ Lighthouse Cinema, Dublin)
The winning film will be announced at the Dublin International Film Festival Awards on Sunday 25 February. Tickets to all the screenings are available from www.diff.ie.
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For media queries: taragrace.connolly@iccl.ie / 087 415 7162
Jury member bios
Ala Buisir (visual artist and journalist)
Ala Buisir is an award-winning visual artist & journalist. Born in Ireland with Libyan roots, Ala is a graduate BA in Photography from TU Dublin and MA in Journalism from DCU. She is currently undertaking a PhD by practice at the University of Limerick, in which she investigates the ‘othering’ of Muslim women in the Western world by societal Islamaphobia and Western tropes of Islam. Ala’s work documents the social and political tension around us today. The aim is to raise awareness by presenting events through different perspectives in hopes that it may also bring about change. She is the co-founder of Gorm Media.
Una Mullally (writer)
Una Mullally is a writer from Dublin, Ireland, working across journalism, non-fiction, screenwriting and poetry. She writes a weekly column for The Irish Times on society and politics, and her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Granta, The Stinging Fly, and elsewhere. She is the author of an oral history on the marriage equality movement in Ireland, In The Name Of Love, edited the Repeal the 8th anthology (Unbound, 2018), and is an Associate Artist with THISISPOPBABY.
Dr Marie-Luce Paris (Associate Professor in Law at UCD and Academic Director of the UCD Centre for Human Rights)
Dr. Marie-Luce Paris is Associate Professor in Law at UCD Sutherland School of Law. She is the Academic Director of the UCD Centre for Human Rights. She held research visiting positions at the University of California, Davis School of Law (USA), and at the Australian National University Centre for European Studies (Canberra, Australia). She holds international recognition and was awarded The Ordre des Palmes Académiques (Chevalier rank), the oldest most prestigious non-military decoration awarded to civilians in France, by the French Government for her outstanding work on promoting legal research and education between Ireland and France.
Ruadhán Ó Críodáin (Executive Director, ShoutOut)
Ruadhán Ó Críodáin is the Executive Director of ShoutOut. Since 2012, ShoutOut has been working to promote inclusion for LGBTQI+ communities through storytelling, dialogue, and instilling empathy in young people. Ruadhán oversees the charity’s educational programmes which work to end homophobic and transphobic bullying in schools. Outside of ShoutOut, Ruadhán is a member of the Board of Directors of GAZE International LGBTQIA+ Film Festival.
