Filmed in the war-zone of northern Uganda over a period of three years, Children of War follows a group of former child soldiers as they escape the battlefield, enter a rehabilitation center, and undergo a process of trauma therapy and emotional healing.
Having been abducted from their homes and schools and forced to become fighters by the Lord’s Resistance Army – a quasi-religious militia led by self-proclaimed prophet and war criminal Joseph Kony – the children struggle to confront and break through years of captivity, extreme religious indoctrination, and participation in war crimes with the help of a team of trauma counselors.
As the children are guided forward into new lives by these fearless allies, Children of War illuminates a powerful and cathartic story of forgiveness and renewal in the aftermath of war.
"As the UN Special Representative on Children and Armed Conflict I've seen many films about child soldiers. Children of War truly captures the agony, but what is wonderful about the film is that is also captures the joy of rebirth."
“A Journey of Homecoming and Hope."
"The world must see this film. Every school, every student, every leader."
"I cannot remember a documentary so wrenching and hopeful, so guileless and authentic. Equally rare is a documentary that can be called art. Children of War is an aesthetic masterpiece and I do not use that word lightly—if ever. Boys and girls who became the blunt instruments of war return within the watchfulness of Bryan's skillful filmmaking to the remembrance of goodness, an alchemical act of spirituality captured as if the filmmaker was invisible."
"This riveting documentary hits you on so many levels -- visceral, cognitive, psychological, social, and political... It leads to provocative and thoughtful classroom discussion, deeper understanding about child soldiers and the life-long impact it has on them, and to questions of why this type of behavior can go on."
“A remarkable film."
"Children of War left me speechless. It is one of the more important films of recent times."
"A masterpiece of healing and storytelling. Children of War moved me in ways I was not expecting. Like a book one tentatively opens and then can not put down until the final sentence of the final page is read was how I felt about this jewel. It is a work of such humanity and intelligent compassion that holds a poetic and timeless call to healing, forgiveness and returning home."
     
        
        
           
          
SCREENINGS (partial listing)
American Cinematheque
Hollywood, California
Agape International Spiritual Center
Los Angeles, California
Ventura Film Society
Los Angeles, California
Garifuna Indigenous Film Festival
Belize & Los Angeles
Punahou School
Honolulu, Hawaii
Vancouver International Film Festival
Vancouver, Canada
University of Victoria
British Columbia, Canada
Human Rights Film Series
Kathmandu, Nepal
Intn’l School Psychology Conference
Montreal, Canada
Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival
Estonia
UNHCR Refugee Film Festival
Hong Kong
St. Alban’s Episcopal Church
Westwood, California
Festival de Libertes
Brussels, Belgium
Amnesty International Film Festival
Canada
HumanDoc International Film Festival
Warsaw, Poland
Philips de Pury
London, UK
Doris Duke Theater
Honolulu, Hawaii
Arpa International Film Festival
Hollywood, California
Filmhuis Den Haag
The Hague, Netherlands
The Embassy of Ireland
The Hague, Netherlands
Movies that Matter Film Festival
The Hague, Netherlands
Konzerthaus Opera House
Berlin, Germany
Cinema Paradise Theaters
Reykjavik, Iceland
Bozar Center for Fine Arts
Brussels, Belgium
Ashland Center for Nonviolence
Ohio
American Academy of Child Psychiatry
New York City, NY
United Nations International School
New York City
United Nations General Assembly Hall
New York City
UNHCR Refugee Film Festival
Tokyo, Japan
Belcourt Theater
Nashville, Tennessee
American Red Cross
Seattle, Washington
Netroots Nation
Las Vegas, Nevada
International Criminal Court
(Review Conference) Kampala, Uganda
Intn’l Conflict Resolution Education Conference
Ohio
Festival du Film Sur Les Droits Humains
Geneva, Switzerland
Artivist International Film Festival
Los Angeles, California
London, UK
United States Institute of Peace
Washington D.C
From 2010 to 2012, the United Nations Office of the Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict and their global advocacy campaign “Zero Under 18” screened and distributed Children of War as an educational tool to galvanize Nation-States to sign and ratify the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict.
The Protocol was adopted by the General Assembly on 25 May 2000 and entered into force on 12 February 2002. It aims to protect children from recruitment and use in hostilities, and is a commitment that:
States will not recruit children under the age of 18 to send them to the battlefield.
States will not conscript soldiers below the age of 18.
States should take all possible measures to prevent such recruitment –including legislation to prohibit and criminalize the recruitment of children under 18 and involve them in hostilities.
States will demobilize anyone under 18 conscripted or used in hostilities and will provide physical, psychological recovery services and help their social reintegration.
Armed groups distinct from the armed forces of a country should not, under any circumstances, recruit or use in hostilities anyone under 18.
The Zero Under 18 campaign ended in 2012 and, along with outreach achieved through the Global Campaign, generated 21 new ratifications for the Optional Protocol.  At present, 172 countries have ratified the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict. There are 17 countries that have neither signed nor ratified the protocol and 8 countries that have signed but are yet to ratify. Work continues to reach the objective of universal ratification.
PRESS ARTICLE:Â https://www.usip.org/publications/2010/10/children-war-screening-united-nations-spotlights-efforts-aid-child-soldiers
Children of War has also been instrumental in catalyzing global awareness and conversation around the issues of international justice, war crimes, and crimes against humanity through its collaboration with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague.
The ICC, formed in 2002 through the Rome Statue, a multilateral treaty among 123 Nation-States, has tried and convicted two individuals, Thomas Lubanga Dyilo and Dominic Ogwen, for conscripting and enlisting children under the age of fifteen years and using them to participate actively in hostilities. Dominic Ogwen was directly involved in the abduction and forced conscription of many of the children featured in Children of War, but was also himself abducted as a child along with an estimated 35,000 additional children by Joseph Kony, leader of the anti-government militia known as the Lord’s Resistance Army. Kony has been indicted by the ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity, but remains at large.
Jane Ekayu, Child trauma counselor.  Bryan Single, Director, Children of War
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