One year before the Fukushima reactor exploded, the International Uranium Film Festival (IUFF) was founded in 2010 in Santa Teresa, the famous artist quarter in the heart of Rio de Janeiro.
It is the first festival of its kind that addresses all nuclear and radioactive issues. The aim is to inform about nuclear power, uranium mining, nuclear weapons and the risks of radioactivity.
Independent documentaries and movies are the best tool to bring that information to a diverse international public.
Uranium mining, nuclear accidents, atomic bomb factories, nuclear waste, and depleted uranium weapons: No matter if you are in favour or against the use of nuclear power or uranium: all people should be informed about the risks. The International Uranium Film Festivals creates a neutral space to throw light on all nuclear issues.
After premiering in Rio, the International Uranium Film Festival traveled to other cities and countries. In the past years it has been in São Paulo, Lisbon, Berlin, and Munich, among others, as well as in ten major cities in India including New Delhi and Hyderabad. In 2014 the festival travelled from Rio de Janeiro to Washington DC, New York City, and Berlin. Now it is in Amman.
The Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung’s Palestine & Jordan office, in cooperation with the Royal Film Commission – Jordan and the Goethe Institut Jordan, is inviting for the International Uranium Film Festival’s premiere in Amman, Jordan. The three day event is backed by a number of Jordanian environmental organizations, namely the Jordanian Friends of the Environment, the Society for Energy Conservation and Sustainable Environment (E-Case), and Greenpeace Jordan.
The International Uranium Film Festival is a partner of the Brazilian Film Commission of Rio de Janeiro and, through the Institute for Science and Technology, a partner of FAETEC, the Ministry for Science and Education of the state of Rio de Janeiro.
TAILINGS
USA, 2012, 12 min, Director: Sam Price-Waldman, Documentary, English.
Just outside Grants, New Mexico, is a 200-acre heap of toxic uranium waste, known as tailings. After 30 years of failed cleanup, the waste has deeply contaminated the air and water near the former uranium capital of the world.
The International Uranium Film Festival was founded in 2010 in Santa Teresa, the famous artist quarter in the heart of Rio de Janeiro. It is the first festival of its kind that addresses all nuclear and radioactive issues. The aim is to inform about nuclear power, uranium mining, nuclear weapons and the health effects of radioactivity. Now the Uranium Film Festivals has reached its 4th year and from its start on a hill in the centre of Rio de Janeiro it became the world’s most well-known film festival about nuclear power. After premiering in Rio, the festival travels to other cities and countries. In the past years it has been in São Paulo, Lisbon, Berlin, and Munich, among others, as well as in ten major cities in India including New Delhi and Hyderabad. In 2014 the festival travelled from Rio de Janeiro to Washington DC, New York City, and Berlin. Now it is in Amman.
The film is a cinematic investigation into the pile that is gravely shaping the lives of those who are stuck living in its shadow. TAILINGS won the Best New Mexico Short Award of the Santa Fe Independent Film Festival.
YELLOW CAKE. THE DIRT BEHIND URANIUM – New Short Version
Germany, 2014, 35 min, Director: Joachim Tschirner, Documentary, English.
Uranium mining, the first link in the chain of nuclear development, has managed again and again to keep itself out of the public eye. A web of propaganda, disinformation and lies covers its sixty-five-year history. The third largest uranium mine in the world was located in the East German provinces of Saxony and Thuringia. Operating until the Reunification, it had the code name WISMUT – German for bismuth, though it supplied the Soviet Union exclusively with the much sought-after strategic resource Yellow Cake. Until 1990 WISMUT supplied the Soviet Union with 220,000 tons of uranium. In absolute terms this quantity was enough for the production of 32,000 Hiroshima bombs. The film accompanies for several years the biggest clean-up operation in the history of uranium mining.
DIRECTOR‘S STATEMENT: “YELLOW CAKE is the result of a project, which began in 2002. The World Uranium Hearing took place more than a decade ago. The declaration of this hearing became the essential meaning of my film: “Radioactivity knows nothing of cultural differences or political boundaries. And in a mutated world poisoned by deadly radioactivity, it will no longer be of importance whether we separate our garbage, drive fewer cars, use phosphate free detergent, or plant a tree. Nor will it matter if we spend our time trying to save the elephants. Whatever action we would take at that point would be superfluous and devoid of meaning. That’s why the end of the atomic age must begin with the first link in the chain of nuclear production – The Uranium Mining.” During my research I have experienced that despite its explosive nature, uranium mining seldom makes it into public awareness. The film “Yellow Cake” is my reaction to this unacceptable situation. For me it was quite clear that unbiased, well researched information about uranium mining is absolutely necessary.”Joachim Tschirner
BUDDHA WEEPS IN JADUGODA
India, 1999, 52 mins, Director: Shri Prakash, Documentary,English.
The film is an attempt to record the tragedy that has played havoc with the lives of the people of Jadugoda. Jadugoda is an area in the state of Bihar populated by the native Adivasi. And there is India’s only underground uranium mine. For the last thirty years, the radioactive wastes have been just dumped into the rice fields of the Adivasis. The unsafe mining of uranium has resulted in excessive radiation which has led to genetic mutations and slow deaths. Medical reports reveal that the impact of radiation on the health of tribal peoples has already been devastating. In 2010 Jharkhand documentary filmmaker Shri Prakash received India’s National Film Award.
Q&A with Shriprakash + RAOUF DABBAS
