Dispossession

DOC | 01:21 | CANADA-SWITZERLAND
DIRECTOR MATHIEU ROY | SCREENPLAY RICHARD BROUILLETTE, BENOIT AQUIN & MATHIEU ROY
A COPRODUCTION MIRA FILM  AND LOWIK MEDIA MONTREAL IN ASSOCIATION WITH GOLDENEGGPRODUCTION
Synopsis

Small farmers worldwide are being deprived of their land and pushed on the verge of social, economic, and cultural extinction. Corporate agribusinesses, backed by neoliberal policies and so-called free trade, grab land wherever they can. The protective controls that used to support small-holding farmers are helpless against the new economic strategies. Dispossession analyses the impact of the different economic policies that have completely transformed for the worse what were once already impossible living conditions to begin. The chain of poverty made worse by debt and violation of human rights enables ultimately a new form of slavery. People unable to pay off their debts becomes cogs in a machine that eventually kills them. Farmers that once enjoyed decent incomes are the disposable pawns of ruthless financial schemes. A frightening rise of suicide rates, cancer and migration is the appalling toll of politics and strategies that need to be addressed and stopped. A film that rings a much-needed alarm bell.

Bio | Filmography

Biography

Mathieu Roy, Director

Mathieu Roy is a Montreal-based filmmaker, working in both documentary and fiction. In 2003, after acquiring his degree in Political Science and graduating from two film schools, the Montreal’s National Film Institute (INIS) and the New York Film Academy (NYFA), Mathieu was hired as Martin Scorsese’s personal assistant for the filming of The Aviator. He received international prizes for his documentaries. Involved filmmaker, he’s following the tradition of « truth cinema ». By addressing heavy and contemporary issues, he transports the viewer into a universe of disturbing truths.

Filmography

The Dispossessed, documentary, 2017
Another House, fiction, 2013
Surviving Progress, documentary, 2011
Death in Venice, documentary, 2009
La peau de léopard, documentary, 2006
François Girard’s three-act journey, documentary, 2005

Images

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Distribution

Festivals

2018: Visions du Réel (Switzerland)

News

Let Me Go hits theaters in French-speaking Switzerland

• From October 25 in theaters

Flores del otro Patio is a candidate for the EFA

• Eligible for the European Film Awards (Best Short)

Let Me Go's World Premiere in Cannes

• Selection in Cannes' ACID

Flores del otro Patio & As Sacrificadas selected in Solothurn

• Panorama Section & Eligible for the Swiss Film Award

Flores del otro Patio awarded in Winterthur

• Best Swiss Short

Chute (Strangers) awarded in Locarno

• Pardino d'Oro | Pardi di Domani

Spectrum

• is selected for the Alliance 4 Development program of the Locarno Festival 2021

Menschenskind ! (Our Child)

• Official Selection at Visions du Réel & DOK.fest Munich

Spectrum

• Selection to the Torino Script Lab 2020

Laissez-moi

• Selections to the Coproduction Village of Les Arcs 2019 & Atelier Grand Nord 2020

Putin's Witnesses

• Nomination to the European Film Awards

Silent Storm awarded in Locarno

• Pardino d'Argento | Pardi di Domani

The Jarariju Sisters awarded at the Berlinale

• Special Mention of the International Jury

Putin's Witnesses

• Official Selection at TIFF 2018
• Grand Prix for Best Documentary at Karlovy Vary IFF

Dressed for Pleasure awarded at the Berlinale

• Special Mention of the Youth Jury