A Distant Mirror

A Distant Mirror

Like last year's selection, the contemporary documentaries in Verzio 2 lead the audience into worlds which are await the explorer. The range on offer is a wide one: 40 films from 22 different countries. Pieces of a mosaic: seen from a little distance, they make up the image of today's world. Close-ups of people abused, deprived of their rights, living in war zones or under political repression, driven by religious fanaticism, subsisting in hopeless poverty, imprisoned for life, closed into themselves, sick; those who are ready to stand up for their rights and those who cannot, or who have tried and given up, form the sum total of our world. These are powerful 'reality films', intimate portraits. They do not merely carry us away into distant, unknown lands: they evoke sympathy and bring us closer to human suffering. Will the power of images enable us to act? Can their persuasive force lead to change, and if so, where and how? Verzio does not have the answers.

The films in Verzio 2 do not simply testify that rule of law and human rights are threatened by dictatorships, one-party systems and para-military regimes. Verzio films prove that human rights are offered only by constitutional democracies - and even then, they are not guaranteed.

Zsuzsa Zádori
festival director