HOPE | documentary | 90 min
The Isensee Film (Germany) / Talkingfilm (Uganda) co-production is a personal story of a forgotten conflict, forgotten people and strategies to overcome.
Talkingfilm is based in Kampala and Ugandas premier independent film and television production company best known for long format films like Marvel Studios’ Black Panther and Disney’s Queen of Katwe. Talking Film is a leader in production servicing, co- productions for local and international films in Uganda and across Africa.
HOPE was produced in association with the NGO THE SENTRY, founded by George Clooney. Brian Adeba, the Sentry’s expert on South Sudan, examines the background of the war in South Sudan and even provides possible solutions for a long term peace in the region. Brian Adeba is a former investigative journalist and a former South Sudanese refugee himself, who has emigrated to Canada and joined THE SENTRY in order to investigate the injustices in the country his family still lives in.
Today an entire generation is growing up in a world filled with negative headlines. Disasters, climate change, and wars threaten our very existence. The understandable result - pessimism and despair.
Young Gloria has already lost everything. Her home, her family, her possession and her friends have been forever taken. Alone and penniless in a foreign country, she does not despair over her fate, but courageously follows her seemingly destined path. Despite her circumstances, her path leads step by step from despair. To the pathway of hope.
HOPE is the courageous response to the challenges of our time.
South Sudanese refugee and Co-director Gloria is telling her own story and this story sets the frame to the entire untold story of the refugee movement in Northern Uganda. Her inspiring tale can make a difference in the thinking of a whole generation. This meaningful message takes place in East Africa, but the story is international, evergreen and will inspire the entire world!
As a woman in Africa, a career as a lawyer seems unimaginable due to the absolute poverty and her status as an underage refugee. Gloria, on the other hand, seizes every opportunity to improve her education. That is why 17-year-old Gloria is currently attending a boarding school in Arua, not far from Rhino Camp. She wants to gain her university entrance qualification there and then study law.
Gloria lived with many other children in Anthony Felix's orphanage. A pastor of a local church in the camp, who himself has a moving story. Anthony was abducted from his home village in Sudan at the age of 9 and trained as a child soldier. He lived as a child soldier for several years and was eventually even assigned to the personal bodyguard of John Garang, who later became the provisional president of South Sudan. However, the discrepancy between his personal moral standards and his work as a child soldier gave rise to doubts.
When he met a Christian missionary, he accepted the Christian faith despite his hopeless life and was given the opportunity to change his life from the ground up. After John Garang was killed in a helicopter crash, he was lucky enough to leave his post and reunite with his family after decades. He was the only one of his friends to survive the odyssey. When he fled Sudan, he decided to dedicate his life to the childhood he never had, building an orphanage and taking in many children and young people who would otherwise have been hopelessly lost.
But even when children like Gloria are given sufficient education, attention and even hope, the expectations of their role as women in East Africa force them into certain traditional stereotypes. Traditionally, it is always the man who provides the family's income. But the circumstances of flight have now left many women widowed and many children orphaned. The husbands, fathers and grandfathers are either no longer alive, have disappeared or have left their families due to lack of income. Susan Grace Duku, a former radio presenter from South Sudan, adopted several orphans as her own when she fled. She was forced to break this traditional role model to avoid starvation and has set up a business in the camp exclusively for women. While one woman collects dry grass to cover the houses, others grow tomatoes, root vegetables or keep chickens. These goods are then traded among themselves, and surplus goods are sold at the market.
Women have suddenly become self-confident. There is now a way to feed their own children, their own family. A novelty as a woman in East Africa anyway. A breakthrough as a refugee. This venture led to Susan becoming known far beyond the borders of the camp.
Today, she is the spokesperson for 1.1 million refugees in Uganda and a sought-after speaker at the World Refugee Forum.She is the female voice of hope for a region that has been forgotten by the rest of the world.
Among others, an American NGO has taken on the problems of this region, which has only experienced brief periods of peace. THE SENTRY is part of the Clooney Foundation For Justice and investigates the background to the conflict in South Sudan. Almost forgotten, or at least ignored by the rest of the world, corrupt politicians are fighting each other. Unscrupulous warlords spread terror among the civilian population, raping and murdering indiscriminately.
Certain people in power are personally enriching themselves through the suffering of families, young people and small children. Dirty money, corruption, power politics and economic interests keep the conflict alive.
One of THE SENTRY's and the Clooney Foundation's heartfelt concerns is that war crimes should never be allowed to pay. There is only hope if the world community finds lasting solutions to the civil war in South Sudan. THE SENTRY's South Sudan experts JR Mailey and Brian Adeba discuss what those solutions might look like.
The story of hope is thus abstracted from a personal dream, a personal quest for happiness, to an inspiration for an entire movement, to a vision of the future for an entire country. The fate that unites people from different places, languages and cultures has already written a common story of hope. Hope extends beyond them, and it will always have the potential to influence traditions, people and even governments to create sustainable peace and prosperity.
