When children give birth to children. An average of 400 children are born in Nicaragua every day, 100 of those have adolescent mothers. This documentary gives an insight into the lives of three adolescents, aged 14 to 16, who had not planned to be mothers at such an early age. Kenia, Blanca and Viviana couldn’t believe what was happening to them when they became pregnant. They had no idea of the consequences this would have on their young lives and are now completely overwhelmed by the situation.

Florence Jaugey follows the lives of these young mothers for several months - during the last months of their pregnancies, and afterwards, when everything has irreversibly changed. We learn about their families, their doubts, their hopes and the tough environment in which they live and will have to raise their children. Jaugey builds up a very intimate relationship with her protagonists, detecting their moods and showing how their outward coolness is only a facade behind which they conceal their intricate fears. When she manages to break through their protective shell, they are thankful that someone shows an interest in them. Despite criticising the alarming rise of adolescent mothers in Nicaragua, the film also raises fundamental questions about women’s identity and the meaning of maternity.

Award: Best Documentary Film, Belize International Film Festival 2005

In the mountains near the Iranian border with Azerbaijan lies the area known as Gharabagh. Ten years ago, after a ferocious land-battle for the territory lying between the black and Caspian seas, the Muslim Azerbaijani forces and the Christian Armenian troops agreed on the autonomy of the zone. Most of the Azerbaijani people were expelled and as a result a million of them have been wandering homeless and destitute, living in unbearable conditions. Some have made their homes in tents, underground caves and deserted train carriages scraping whatever living they can while the western world remains ignorant of their plight.

The director Babak Shirinsefat, himself from Iranian Azerbaijan, takes on the mantle of representative of his people. The haunting images of the life they endure are made unforgettable on screen, he explains:" Even if I lived in paradise, I could not forget Gharabagh." The borders and boundaries that his people are faced with are not merely geographical. These are the victims of an ethnic war and the arbitrary divisions of territory. The responsibility for their desperate circumstances lies with a world that has forgotten them.