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Each year, the United Nations Association Film Festival gives local audiences the chance to hear true stories from all over the world, via the sharing of documentaries that relate to the association’s dedication to human rights. This year marks the 28th annual festival, with screenings of 60 films in Palo Alto, Stanford, East Palo Alto and San Francisco between Oct. 16 and 26. This year’s theme is “Messages For the Future” and includes documentaries from countries including Afghanistan, Cambodia, China, Congo, Ethiopia, Georgia, Guinea, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malawi, Mali, Mexico, Mongolia, Palestine, Rwanda, Sudan, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, Zimbabwe and many more, according to a press release from the organization.
Among the selections are four world premieres: “The Burning,” about Africa’s refugee crisis; “Exodus,” about a college student and a village elder helping evacuate thousands back to their homeland during Sudan’s civil war; “An Ordinary Insanity,” a conversation with the late activist Daniel Ellsberg about the dire threat of nuclear weapons; and “Soaking the Ground,” about the efforts by a community in the Amazon rainforest region to utilize rainwater in a land suffering from human-caused environmental damage and climate change.
‘An Ordinary Insanity’
“An Ordinary Insanity” kicks off the festival, with a screening at 6:30 p.m. at Palo Alto’s Mitchell Park Community Center Oct. 16 (Palo Alto Mayor Ed Lauing will also offer remarks at the opening festivities). The film was directed by Berkeley filmmaker Judith Ehrlich, who was nominated for an Academy Award for a previous documentary about Ellsberg, “The Most Dangerous Man in America.” She also interviewed him for the film “The Boys Who Said No! Draft Resistance and the Vietnam War.” Ellsberg, who died in 2023, is best known as the whistleblower of the “Pentagon Papers,” and was also a former nuclear war planner who later spoke out against the incredible dangers of nuclear war and weaponry. The film came about as a collaboration with author and activist Norman Solomon, Ehrlich told this news organization in an email interview. In “An Ordinary Insanity,” Ellsberg speaks frankly and clearly about the planetary threat posed by nuclear weapons and war, and also discusses how to reduce that grave threat. Though the film is terrifying, there is hope, too, that viewers will come away better informed and ready to take a stand.
“I think, as Dan did, that we need to face the reality of a possible annihilation of humanity due to our … investment of valuable resources on these weapons of mass destruction,” Ehrlich said. “After taking that in we need to make as much noise as possible to avoid that, support … organizations that are doing something about that and join the good folks raising their voice in the name of sanity.” She noted that in the 1980s, the Nuclear Freeze campaign was an example of a successful mass movement. “We did it then and we need to renew that commitment to end the threat of nuclear annihilation,” she said.
‘Soaking the Ground’
“Soaking the Ground,” directed by Brazilian filmmaker Fred Rahal, is part of The Solutions Storytelling Project, an initiative of the Video Consortium in collaboration with Skoll Foundation. The program supports filmmakers around the world, matched with nonprofit organizations, in making films that showcase solution-oriented responses to global challenges. “Soaking the Ground” is part of the series’ second season, focused on Latin American stories. The film features a farmer and a
a person who harvests products from juçara palm trees in Maranhão, Brazil, and explores how local communities are utilizing barraginhas – rainwater catchment systems – to help mitigate the impact of climate change on the ecosystem and practice sustainable land management.
“We were amazed by how a seemingly small project can create such significant change, and we strongly believe these stories deserve wider visibility to inspire more people and give hope for a better future,” Andrea Arauz, project coordinator of the Solutions Storytelling Project: LatAm, told this news organization in an email interview. Throughout the film, Rahal, who did extensive research on the barraginhas, captures the natural sights and sounds of the landscape, alongside an evocative score. He handled all the cinematography, music and sound design himself.
“All these elements, woven together, make the message deeply impactful and resonate with Mother Nature,” Arauz noted. “Fred wanted to immerse us in this resilient community, helping us understand the urgency of supporting the barraginhas project and amplifying the message of an Amazon in crisis.”
The film screens Oct. 19 at 1:15 p.m. at Mitchell Park Community Center.
‘Nice Girls Don’t Ask’
Palo Alto filmmaker Jan Krawitz is a professor emerita in Stanford’s documentary film MFA program. Her documentary “Nice Girls Don’t Ask,” which is having its U.S. premiere Oct. 17 at 6:15 p.m., also at the Mitchell Park Community Center, makes subversive use of archival footage from vintage “social guidance” films from the 1950s, which helped shape and enforce adherence to gender norms. It’s the third film in a trilogy she’s made about women’s issues, following “Mirror, Mirror,” which focuses on women and body image, and “In Harm’s Way,” a personal memoir about her own experience as a survivor of sexual violence and the myths about safety she learned in childhood. She felt compelled to make “Nice Girls Don’t Ask” in part due to the erosion of women’s rights she’s witnessed in recent years, she told this news organization in an email interview. She was also inspired by thoughts of her late mother, who raised her in the 1950s according to the norms of the time. For this film, Krawitz meticulously edited elements from the 120-or-so vintage films she studied for the project.
“My goal was to make a seamless narrative despite the disparate sources used to tell the story,” she said. Krawitz said she hopes that audiences will ponder the cost of this “behavioral straitjacket” for a generation of women, as well as see it as an ominous parallel to today’s idealizing of a “tradwife” lifestyle on social media and by people in power. “I hope that audiences (find) the film to be provocative, infuriating, and entertaining — laughter is definitely permissible!”
The United Nations Association Film Festival runs Oct. 16-26 at venues in Palo Alto, Stanford, East Palo Alto and San Francisco. General admission tickets are $18 per session, with festival passes available for $280 ($80 for seniors 60 and up). Admission to the opening and closing receptions, which also include a session of films each, is $60. There are also several free events over the course of the festival, and free tickets for students. For complete schedule, tickets and more information, go to unaff.org/2025/special.html.
Editor’s note: This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Jan Krawitz’s name. Additionally, the subject line of the Oct. 9 edition of the Weekend Express newsletter incorrectly referred to the festival’s 2025 theme as “Messages From the Future.” The correct name is “Messages For the Future.”
