Forgotten Bird of Paradise, the award-winning undercover documentary directed by Dancing Turtle’s Dominic Brown, has won Best Short Documentary at the Davis International Film Festival in California. The award adds to the film’s growing list of international recognition, following its Best Documentary win at the Dam Short Film Festival in the USA in 2011.
Filmed undercover and without the knowledge or permission of the Indonesian authorities, the film provides a rare and moving insight into the struggle for independence that has gripped West Papua since Indonesia’s occupation of the territory in 1962. With international media and human rights groups largely banned from the region, Brown travelled in secret to document what he found — never-before-seen footage of Papuan freedom fighters at their jungle stronghold, interviews with victims of human rights abuses under the Indonesian regime, and a secret interview with high-profile political prisoner Yusak Pakage, jailed for ten years by the Indonesian regime after taking part in a peaceful flag-raising ceremony, and recognised by Amnesty International as a prisoner of conscience.
Forgotten Bird of Paradise has now screened at dozens of festivals across five continents and been the subject of extended features on BBC Newsnight and Australia Network TV. It has broadcast in full on NITV in Australia and Kundu 2 TV in Papua New Guinea.
The DVD is available now through the Dancing Turtle shop. Watch the trailer below.
