1804: The Hidden History of Haiti

In 1791, in Haiti, Dutty Boukman presided over a Vodou ritual in Bois-Caïman that led to the creation of the first Black republic. Since then, rituals of transformation and artistic expression have been at the core of a thriving culture as the country faces oppression, poverty, and natural disasters. "Kite Zo A” (Leave the Bones) is a sensorial film about rituals in Haiti, from ancient to modern, made in collaboration with poets, dancers, musicians, fishermen, daredevil rollerbladers, and Vodou priests, set to poetry by Haitian author Wood-Jerry Gabriel.

Haitian history is presented through an explosion of colour, dance and music, as the country prepares for its legendary carnival.

Zombies are part of pop culture, but what are they? Where do they come from? To find real zombies we visit Haiti where Zombies are an integral part of the island's cultural and religious roots.

This short film from the Perspective series highlights social and economic development in Haiti circa 1957. It depicts customs and traditions used to pass along the history of a people, and offers a look into their daily lives — lives that looks very different from their experiences today.

This black-and-white film is a loving portrait of Santiago de Cuba and its people. It provides a view of Cuba as a picturesque country, the product of an earthy mix of black and criollo cultures. The film uses historical images which portray the end of the eighteenth century when Haitian slave owners fled with their slaves to Cuba after the Haitian Revolution.

Reflecting on the legacy of Haitian revolutionary Toussaint L’Ouverture, "Ouvertures" follows a collective’s process of translating Édouard Glissant’s play Monsieur Toussaint from French to Creole.

The Soul of Bossales is an immersion in the heart of popular Haitian culture whose spirituality and creativity have been forged by a surge of freedom and identity affirmation. Foukifoura, Édris, Charlotte or Ramoncite, “Bossales” characters with committed artistic and political acts, give us the gripping story of a very harsh reality: material and health precariousness, political violence, neo-colonialism.

Shot in early 2004 during the commemoration of the bicentennial of Haiti, this film offers a unique light on the last days to the presidency of Aristide, former priest of the poor became apprentice dictator. It is a reflection on the history of the first black republic in the world, a nation shared between the memory of its glorious revolution and the tragic litany of despots that have overwhelmed it since its independence.

Every New Year, and in celebration of their Independence, Haitian families gather together to feast in honor of a line of ancestors that fought for their freedom. The centerpiece of the festivity is the joumou soup—a traditional soup dating back centuries ago. The joumou soup is a concretization of war and victory, oppression and emancipation, and the deeply rooted celebratory traditions of the Haitian culture.

In the 1980s, a swine flu crossed the Haitian-Dominican border and started to affect the Creole pig, an important commodity in Haiti. The flu also threatened livestock in the United States. As a preemptive measure, the USAID in conjunction with the Haitian government proceeded to exterminate all Creole pigs from the island, leading to a crushing economic blow for an already impoverished country.

Set mainly in present day Dallas, Texas and Port-au-Prince, Haiti, this film features three main characters at three different stages of the same process. Supported by a nonprofit, these extremely tall teenagers come to the United States from Haiti using basketball as means to get an education and help their own country change.

In the slum of Cité Soleil, President Aristide's most loyal supporters were ruling as kings. The five major gang leaders were controlling heavily armed young men; the Chiméres. The Secret army of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. "Ghosts of Cité Soleil" is a film about Billy and Haitian 2pac. Two brothers. Gang Leaders of the Chiméres.

This film chronicles the turbulent gang war and the spiraling violence happening on the ground in Haiti and attempts to cut through the hype surrounding Chérizier, the former police officer-turned-gang chieftain at the center of Haiti’s of it all. It offers a sobering look at the man behind the myths.

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In 1937, tens of thousands of Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian descent were exterminated by the Dominican army, on the basis of anti-black racism. Fast-forward to 2013, the Dominican Republic's Supreme Court stripped the citizenship of anyone with Haitian parents, retroactive to 1929, rendering more than 200,000 people stateless. Elena, the young protagonist of the film, and her family stand to lose their legal residency in the Dominican Republic if they don't manage to get their documents in time. Negotiating a mountain of opaque bureaucratic processes and a racist, hostile society around, Elena becomes the face of the struggle to remain in a country built on the labor of her father and forefathers.

The Pierced Heart & The Machete is a vivid, unflinching exploration of two annual Vodou pilgrimages in Haiti. The first is for Èzili Danto, goddess of love, art and passion; worshipers from all over the world descend on the southwestern town of Ville-Bonheur to bathe in the sacred waterfall where Dantò resides. The second pilgrimage is for Dantòs' husband Ogoun, god of war, iron and healing. It takes place at the end of July in the northern town of Plaine du Nord, where practitioners bathe in a mud pool and make flamboyant sacrifices. This beautifully shot film offers disorienting yet illuminating glimpses of the contradictory and complementary aspects of these two lwa, the electrifying rites that honor them, and the intense music that accompanies these ecstatic and bloody ceremonies.

From the flickering screens of Hollywood horror, to the haunted cane fields of colonial Haiti, Black Zombie unearths the buried origins of the zombie, reclaiming it as a symbol of survival and spiritual resistance.

In 1925, during the occupation of Haiti, a U.S. Marine Corps sergeant was stationed in charge of the small island of La Gonave. He befriended the natives and was so popular that they named him King Faustin I and installed him as their ruler. He ruled the island for three years, then left and returned to make this documentary.

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A 16mm visual and auditory exploration of the Haitian carnival. A hallucinatory and unparalleled carnival. Made in collaboration with students from the Cinema Institute in Jacmel, Haiti, and based on a poem by the young Haitian poet Gabriel Wood Jerry.