This weekend, March 6-7, Mac for Palestine hosted the Film Festival for Global Justice in Mairs Concert Hall, showing five films across two days. The festival was conceived to raise money for Macalester’s “Relief in Areas of Violent Conflict” fundraiser, matched 1:1 by the Board of Trustees (BoT). 52 percent went towards aid in Palestine through the Ghassan Abu Sittah Children’s Fund and CARE’s Middle East Crisis Fund, 16 percent towards the Sudan Relief Fund, 16 percent toward Nova Ukraine and 16 percent toward Action Kivu in the Eastern Congo.
The films, representing the same regions the organization fundraises for, were each traumatic and evocative tellings of life in the midst of violence, injustice, extractionism and colonization. They invited the audience to sit with their privilege and understand their responsibility for and impact on global events, violence and justice.
Lead organizers Duncan McNear ’28 and Chris-Zephyr Mango ’27 took on the brunt of the planning and execution, inspired by their experience at Mizna’s Twin Cities Arab Film Festival.
“We wanted to do something big, and we decided a film festival would be a big and ambitious avenue,” McNear said. “Being [at the Arab Film Festival] and being in a room full of like-minded people, all there in solidarity, was a really moving experience, and I wanted to recreate that.”
Mac for Palestine assembled a committee to support McNear and Mango, and departments across campus chipped in to fund the festival, securing distribution rights and providing a location. Leo Judeh, owner of Shish, supplied complimentary food for the duration of the festival.
“To see so many people show up and care about the work we put in, and also want to see these films and learn and educate and entertain themselves, to see how much solidarity has happened on this campus, both from people coming to see these films, [as well as] helping us through this process and believing in the two of us, [is] so deeply moving,” Mango said.
“Sudan, Remember Us” (2024) opened the festival, following young protestors in the aftermath of the 2019 Sudanese Revolution, through the 2021 military coup, and up to the outbreak of civil war in 2023. “The Teacher” (2023), by Palestinian British writer, director, and producer Farah Nabulsi, is a drama depicting Palestinian life and resistance, chosen by McNear after feeling moved by the film at the Arab Film Festival.
The second day featured three films. “Virunga” (2014) was chosen for its coverage of both extractionism and the March 23 Movement, a militant rebel group in Kivu. The Russian department selected and funded the showing of “Soldiers of Song” (2024), a documentary that highlights music as a form of resistance. The festival closed with Oscar-winning “No Other Land” (2024), showing the fight for a home and life in the border villages of Masafer Yatta in the West Bank.
A specially recorded video appearance from the director of “Virunga,” Orlando von Einsiedel, followed the screening. After the showing of “No Other Land,” Mac for Palestine member Oriane S. B. ’26 spoke on their time in Masafer Yatta, and Layla, a member of the Palestinian Feminist Collective shared the importance of critical engagement and a holistic approach to conflict and justice.
“I found [Layla’s] words about resistance through a feminist lens to be extremely powerful alongside the documentary,” Mango said. “Having someone support our event with their own words and time, as Layla did, meant a lot to us.”
Prior to the film festival, the relief fund raised over $11,000, a number that will be doubled by the BoT. This means that, including funds from this weekend, Mac for Palestine is over halfway to its goal of $50,000.
“[The donations] are going to help people across the world with humanitarian aid, education, medical supplies, food and shelter,” Mango said. “I’m so happy that we can do something for people beyond us.”
The organizers make clear, however, that their efforts stem from the BoT decision not to divest in the first place.
“While we’re happy we are able to host this on campus and have so much support from staff and faculty … and we’re glad that all the donations are being matched from it, it’s $50,000 while the college still has millions invested in companies complicit in the same crimes that are we are seeing in these films and that we’re trying to fundraise against,”
McNear said. McNear and Mango are already in talks to make this event annual, and the organization aims to reach the $50,000 fundraising mark by the end of the academic year.
