The Tribunal

After the feature, enjoy a FREE bonus recording of the special LIVE panel on Sovereign Cinema with filmmaker Joan Lander of Nā Maka O Ka ‘Āina, Leanne Ferrer from Pacific Islanders in Communication, and Anthony Banua-Simon of CANE FIRE (recorded 5/1/21).

In August 1993, the Peoples’ International Tribunal Hawai’i put the United States and the State of Hawai’i on trial for crimes against the native population. The judges: a panel of international legal scholars and attorneys representing a dozen nations. The witnesses: the people of Hawai’i. A fascinating legal study of justice under occupation, the trial was a court room, community meeting, and academic conference in one, an experimental in extrajudicial self-governance that asks with striking confidence: why should the colonized rely on a legal system designed to disenfranchise them?

The foremost chroniclers of the sovereignty movement in Hawai’i, Puhipau and Joan Lander of Nā Maka o ka ‘Āina are more than a fly on the wall of this extraordinary event. They are as passionate a voice as any witness, as clear in their perspective as any scholar. THE TRIBUNAL doesn’t treat the event as a historical oddity, but rather a declaration of independence, systematically and surgically dissecting the illegality of annexation and its foundations in racism and colonialism. The collective voices –witnesses, prosecutors, judges, filmmakers – contextualize Hawai’i not simply as a territory of the United States, but as a member of a league of nations, demanding recognition for crimes gone unpunished.
–Brian Hu

Purchase tickets to all three films in SOVEREIGN CINEMA for the special price of $25 general / $20 members