THE UNCONDEMNED
Directed by: Michele Mitchell & Nick Louvel
Editor: Nick Louvel Additional Editor: Christopher Passig
Official Selection: 2016 Human Rights Watch Film Festival
THE UNCONDEMNED tells the story of a group of young international lawyers and three courageous Rwandan women who helped establish rape as a prosecutable act of genocide. In the aftermath of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, their landmark case against local mayor Jean-Paul Akayesu forced an international tribunal to confront sexual violence as a weapon of war, creating a legal precedent that would reshape international human-rights law.
“Most extraordinary are interviews with the women who came forward to provide evidence in court. Their integrity and tenacity, and their loyalty to one another, are enough to bring you to tears.”
The New York Times
“An exceptionally well-executed and emotionally heart-wrenching documentary… In many ways, The Uncondemned is a sister documentary to Joshua Oppenheimer’s haunting masterpieces The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence. Like those docs, The Uncondemned manages to create a viscerally devastating portrait of the horrors of war simply through talking-head interviews that present firsthand accounts of the atrocities in question.”
The Playlist
“A riveting feat of editing.”
Village Voice