Encounters 2025 – and in the 27 years of Encounters South African International Documentary Festival, the world has never been this desperate to be documented.
Filmmakers take on tyrants like Putin, Al-Bashir, Musk, Bezos, and AI itself. They champion disruptors who fight femicide, defend indigenous land, or challenge corporate giants, and celebrate artists who push culture and move the world to a better place.
“In 2024, Encounters presented three of the five documentaries later nominated for Oscars, including the winner No Other Land,” explains Mandisa Zitha, Director of Encounters. “This year we’re raising the bar even higher with an excellent selection of films that speak to the role of the documentary and impact filmmaker in 2025.”
- The festival showcases documentaries from over 40 countries at cinemas in Cape Town and Johannesburg from 19 to 29 June.
Encounters 2025 opens with How to Build a Library which premiered at Sundance earlier this year. Two Kenyan women transform a dilapidated library in downtown Nairobi into a vibrant centre for residents and creatives. Directors Maia Lekow and Christopher King’s previous film The Letter screened at Encounters in 2020. See photos above and below.
Audiences are invited to navigate the Encounters 2025 Programme through five thematic collections.
The Frightening Reality
The theme The Frightening Reality of Now captures a world in flux, besieged by war, climate collapse and leaps in technology not fully understood. Rather than spiral into alarmism and dread, these films confront the philosophical gravity of changes happening too rapidly for most of us to process.
Shifting Baselines, The Thinking Game, Intercepted and The Tree of Authenticity
Ways of Learning
The second theme – Ways of Learning focuses on wonderfully distinct aspects of education. The Shadow Scholars (UK), Brief Tender Light (USA), Fitting in (South Africa), and Mothers of Chibok (USA, Australia, Nigeria), deal respectively with the empowerment, commodification, cultural relativism, elitism, and gatekeeping of knowledge. They reveal access to information as a pivotal engine that drives societal structure.
The Shadow Scholars Still and Brief Tender Light, Fitting in, Mothers of Chibok
Agency – Standing up to Power
The biggest collection of documentaries falls in the theme Agency – Standing up to Power for good reason. Here subversives met with persecution in daily life may be celebrated onscreen, as these impact-driven documentaries present defiance, resilience and quiet courage.
Mr Nobody Against Putin, Blue Road, Union, Capturing Water and The Brink of Dreams Posters, and Womxn: Working Still
Khartoum, Normal To Me, 6 Kings & 6 Queens, Yintah, Where Zebus Speak French Posters and Yumi Still
Memory, Trauma and Identity
The theme Memory, Trauma and Identity gathers personal and political reckonings of the residue of the past that lingers in the present, within the minds, within the family, within the nation. Healing inherited trauma, confronting loss, or reclaiming erased histories, memory is both burden and balm in these threads of heritage.
Albie: A Strange Alchemy Still and Matabeleland, And She Didn’t Die, Kabul Chaos, Didy, Yalla Parkour and Abo Zaabal 89
Art and Impact
The Art and Impact frames the inherent ability of the arts to document injustice, shift culture, and move people to action.
The Walk, Sam Nzima: A Journey Through His Lens, Anselm and Misty: The Erroll Garner Story
For the full schedule of Encounters 20 films visit. Tickets will be on sale from end-May. Look forward to seeing you there!
WHAT: Encounters South African International Documentary Festival
WHERE: Cape Town – Labia & V&A Ster Kinekor and Johannesburg
WHEN: 19 – 29 June 2025
BOOKING & TICKETS: Webtickets on sale from end-May
INFO: Encounters 2025 programme |
