American Doctor opens the Movies that Matter Festival 2026

When three American doctors – Palestinian, Jewish and Zoroastrian – enter Gaza to save lives, they find themselves caught between medicine and politics, risking everything to make a difference. As the world watches a besieged and heavily bombed Gaza grapple with a humanitarian catastrophe, a collapsing healthcare syste...

A son of one of America’s wealthiest families creates a communist revolutionary base in rural Massachusetts. For him it’s a means of disrupting the capitalist system he grew up in, but has now come to despise. It’s the starting point of an astonishing journey.  Fergie Chambers is an heir to one of the wealthiest famili...

Kenyan journalist Bea Wangondu dives into the injustices and land disputes surrounding the tea plantations in her ancestral homeland Kikuyu. While her investigation slowly becomes deeply personal, she uncovers long-suppressed stories: tea fields hiding contested histories, families carrying untold wounds, and a communi...

In the town of Mariinka in Eastern Ukraine, the film traces several young Ukrainians whose lives have been forever shaped by over ten years of war and conflict in the Donbas. A story about belonging, national loyalty and the fault lines where political conflicts trump even the bonds of blood. Amidst the war a promisin...

In 1971, 27-year-old Newsweek reporter Alec Shimkin discovers a secret US-led military campaign in Vietnam. The story is about to reveal war crimes on an immense scale, undeniably Pullitzer-worthy material. But the Scoop never got the exposure it deserved: though published in Newsweek, Shimkin’s findings were tucked aw...

Psychological portrait telling the stories of six women who survived sexual violence and torture during Russia’s aggression in Ukraine. Led by Iryna Dovgan, they fight for justice and recognition. In the face of massive trauma, Iryna encourages them to rebuild their lives. Very inspiring. ‘This is my weapon with which...

An investigation into laboratory research on animals exposes a hidden world in which it’s not just the animals getting hurt. The story of Dr. Lisa Jones Engel, a primatologist turned animal welfare advocate, asks whether harming animals and ourselves in science’s name is justified. Animal testing, specifically on prim...

A powerful, emotional and urgent documentary exploring the legal backlash following the #MeToo movement. After #MeToo broke the cultural silence on gendered violence, survivors swiftly found themselves facing a new kind of silencing and fear: defamation laws being weaponized against women for speaking out.   Internatio...

As the first woman ever elected to the council of her small Iranian village, Sara Shahverdi aims to break long-held patriarchal traditions. She trains teenage girls to ride motorcycles, encourages them to pursue an education and tries to stop child marriages. But Sara’s resilience and combative style bring her many ene...

As Russia launches its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, primary schools across Russia’s hinterlands are transformed into recruitment sites for the war. Facing the ethical dilemma of working in a system defined by propaganda and violence, a brave teacher goes undercover to film what’s really happening in his school. Pav...

A stunning and revealing documentary about the inhumane conditions in state prisons in the United States. Prisoners risk everything to expose a cover-up in one of the most dangerous prison systems in the country: that of Alabama. A shocking story of brutality, corruption, and a system in collapse. In 2019, filmmakers ...