* Dok.Fest Münich (Germany)
* AFI Docs (Silver Spring, USA)
* Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival (Greece)
* One World International Film Festival (Czech Republic)
* Ljubljana Doc Film Festival (Slovenia)
* BAFICI (Buenos Aires, Argentina)
* DocPoint – Helsinki Documentary Film Festival (Finland)
* Cinema Politica (Montreal, Canada)
* Doc Lounge Scandinavia (Malmö, Sweden)
* Full Frame Documentary Film Festival (Durham, USA)
* Inconvenient Films Documentary Festival (Vilnius, Lithuania)
* Ânûû-rû âboro (Koné, Nouvelle Calédonie)
* Verzio Film Festival (Budapest, Hungary)
* This Human World (Vienna, Austria)
* One World Romania (Bucharest, Romania)
* Human Rights Human Wrongs (Oslo, Norway)
* San Sebastián Human Rights Film Festival (Spain)
* Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival (Armenia)
* Crossing Europe Film Festival (Linz, Austria)
* Nuremberg International Human Rights Film Festival (Germany)
* Docs Against Gravity Film Festival (Poland)
* Izmir International Film Festival (Beyoglu / Istanbul, Turkey)
* Utopia (Luxembourg)
* Five Lakes Film Festival / Fünf Seen Filmfestival (Gilching, Germany)
* Panazorean Film Festival (Lisboa, Portugal)
* Humanistische Alliantiedag ‘Onuitzetbaren in beeld’ (Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
* Camden International Film Festival (USA)
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* Front Doc (Aosta, Italy)
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* Globale Mittelhessen (Kirchvers, Germany)
* Brasília International Film Festival (Brazil)
* One World Media Festival (London, UK)
* Cinéma sous les étoiles (Montréal, Canada)
* Freiluftkino im Körnerpark (Berlin, Germany)
* Human Rights International Film Festival Mexico (Mexico)

* Amnesty International Award - San Sebastian HRFF
* Solothurner Filmtage, Prix de Soleure
* Festival des Libertés, Mention spéciale du Jury
* Festival des Libertés, Mention spéciale Fédération internationale des droits de l'homme
* Festival del film Locarno, Premier Prix du Jury des Jeunes
* Festival del film Locarno, Prix du Jury Oecuménique
* Festival international du cinéma francophone en Acadie, Grand Prix du meilleur documentaire
* Watch Docs Human Rights International Film Festival, Grand Prix

Special Flight

Category |Human Rights, Justice, Migration, Social Issues
Year | 2011
Country | Switzerland
Running time | 103' - 52'
Format | HDCAM-35mm
Production | Climage
Director | Fernand Melgar

Nominated for Outstanding Investigative Journalism-Long Form
Documentary Emmy® Awards 2014

While awaiting deportation from Switzerland, men are jailed at the administrative detention centre Frambois. Some of them have spent several years in Switzerland, worked, paid taxes and started a family, but their requests for asylum have failed. Although incarceration may last up to 24 months, deportation is announced without warning and its enforcement is imminent. Behind the closed prison doors, tension builds day by day. On one side there are deeply human wardens, and on the other immigrants at the end of their journeys, defeated by fear and stress. Relations of friendship and hate, respect and revolt are formed until the deportation is announced, which is experienced like a stab. This relationship ends mostly in distress and humiliation. Those who refuse to leave are handcuffed, tied up and forcibly put on a plane. In this extreme situation, despair has a name: special flight.

PRESS IMAGES: (click to preview)