City of Joy

CITY OF JOY tells the story of the first class of girls at a remarkable center in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Directed by first time director, Madeleine Gavin, it tells of the visionaries who imagined a revolutionary place where women who have suffered horrific rape and abuse, learn to lead amidst a war driven by greed, economics and colonialism. The film shares the unlikely friendship that develops when a devout Congolese doctor, Dr. Denis Mukwege, (2016 Nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize), radical playwright and activist, Eve Ensler, (Tony Award winning playwright of The Vagina Monologue) and a charismatic Congolese human rights activist, Christine Schuler-Deschryver, (Director of the City of Joy) join forces to create this safe haven in the middle of violence-torn Eastern Congo, a place they call The City of Joy. And it is the story of the incomprehensible power of the human spirit as we witness our characters' discovery of hope, even when so much of what was meaningful to them has long been stripped away.