Haitian filmmaker Raoul Peck, who was Oscar nominated for “I Am Not Your Negro,” will be the Guest of Honor at the 56th edition of documentary festival Visions du Réel, which runs April 4-13.
During the festival, Peck will deliver a masterclass and present a retrospective of his work, as well as a screening of his latest feature film, “Ernest Cole: Lost and Found.”
Emilie Bujès, the festival’s artistic director, said Peck’s work was of “exceptional political impact and cinematographic force.” She added, his films are “inextricably linked to an alternative and engaged way of thinking about the world and its history, embodied by key figures which he has invariably made part of inspiring, precisely articulated and highly literary forms.”
In a statement, the festival noted that his films “examine denials from official Western history, shining a light on aspects ignored by this account, often sketching a portrait of politicians or artists who have openly deconstructed it,” such as Congolese politician Patrice Lumumba in 1990’s “Lumumba, La Mort du prophète” and “Lumumba” in 2000, writer James Baldwin in “I Am Not Your Negro” in 2016, and, most recently, Ernest Cole with last year’s “Ernest Cole: Lost and Found.”
Peck’s work is “a reinvention of activist cinema, which he transforms using a cinematographic, poetic and highly subjective language, freely intermingling genres and formats,” the festival said.
“Exterminate All the Brutes,” a four-part hybrid series, produced by HBO – which will also be screened during the festival – is an example of this. “It is a journey back in time, a radical re-examination of the history of European colonialism, from America to Africa, using personal, visual and literary narration to starkly revisit the darkest hours in human history right up to the present day,” the festival said. The series won a Peabody Award in 2022.
Peck’s films include “The Man on the Shore” (Cannes Competition, 1993); “Lumumba” (Directors’ Fortnight, Cannes, 2000); “Sometimes in April” (Berlinale Competition, 2005); “Moloch Tropical” (Toronto, 2009, Berlinale, 2010) and “Murder in Pacot” (Toronto, 2014, Berlinale, 2015).
In 2017, his film about Baldwin, “I Am Not Your Negro,” was Oscar nominated for best documentary feature. It later took home the Toronto Film Festival People’s Choice Award and the Audience Award at the Berlinale. In 2018, it won a BAFTA and a César for the best documentary film. His most recent film, “Ernest Cole: Lost and Found,” premiered as a Special Screening at Cannes where it was awarded the L’Œil d’Or.
Peck has earned several other honors: in 2021, he received the Irene Diamond Lifetime Achievement Award for his human rights work. The same year, he was awarded the lifetime achievement award from DOC NYC and, in 2024, the outstanding achievement award at Hot Docs Festival in Toronto. He has also been a member of the jury at Cannes, the Berlinale and Sundance.
From 1995 to 1997, he served as Minister of Culture for the Republic of Haiti.
The full program for the 56th edition of Visions du Réel will be released on March 12.
