Created in 2009, the Rights! Camera! Action! film series features documentaries from the Full Frame Archive that focus on human rights related themes across the globe. The series provides an opportunity to connect the Rubenstein Library’s extensive holdings on human rights and social justice to the Duke and Durham community. Every year, there are four film screenings followed by panel discussions with Duke faculty or students, community activists and occasionally the film makers.

The Full Frame Archive, now part of the Archive of Documentary Arts at the Rubenstein Library, acquires and preserves all of the award-winning films from the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival going back to their first year in 1998 through 2011.  A complete list of the films maintained in the archive can be found in the collection guide: http://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/findingaids/fullframe/.

2023 - 2024 Film Series

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Through intimate stories of patients, families, and medical providers, BEDLAM is a feature-length documentary that immerses us in the national crisis surrounding care for people with severe mental illness. Filmed over five years, it brings us inside one of America’s busiest psychiatric emergency rooms, into jails where psychiatric patients are warehoused, and to the homes – and homeless encampments – of members of our communities with mental illness, where silence and shame often compound personal suffering. 

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Based on Francisco Goldman’s book and executive produced by Oscar-winner George Clooney and Grant Heslov, this film tells the story of the 1998 murder of Guatemalan human rights activist Bishop Juan Gerardi and the subsequent investigation by the church that uncovered a web of conspiracy and murder, entangling the upper echelons of the government.

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Love Lived on Death Row tells the story of the four Syriani siblings whose father was sentenced to die for the murder of their mother in 1990, and Meg Eggleston, who became their father’s friend and spiritual advisor through letters to him in prison. Orphaned and estranged, the Syriani children raised themselves while they lived with hate, anger and confusion as the man they could only refer to as “Him Him” lived on death row. But in 2004 they collectively decided to visit him in prison, seeking answers so they could move on with their adult lives. What transpired that day was a miracle of forgiveness followed by a journey of healing, restoring family memories and then a battle for his clemency. 

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To see a list of documentary films from past years, visit our Rights! Camera! Action! Film Series Archive.