Fiona Stourton

Inside the Iranian Uprising

In September 2022, a 22-year-old Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini, died in police custody. She had been arrested by Iran’s religious police, accused of not wearing her hijab properly. The authorities said she had died of a heart attack, but rumors spread that she had been beaten on arrest. Citizens took to the streets in their thousands in fury. This is an extraordinary and shocking insight into what has been happening across Iran, revealing a regime under huge pressure and resorting to extreme cruelty to control its citizens.

Beneath the Surface

In 2014, following a tip-off, a group of journalists exposed a troubled history for indigenous Sámi women, men and children. It revealed generations of negligence, abuse and suffering, supported by a mass of evidence and previously unseen archival footage. As the case goes to court, the community remains defiant against a judicial system whose attitudes highlight fissures in the purported equal treatment of all citizens. The community’s battle aims to break a vicious cycle of racism and to achieve meaningful lasting change for future generations.

The Accused: Damned or Devoted?

Against the backdrop of Pakistan's elections, this film follows the rise of powerful cleric Khadim Hussain Rizvi, on a mission to preserve the country's blasphemy laws, which prescribe a mandatory death sentence for disrespecting The Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H) and life imprisonment for desecrating the Holy Quran. With millions sympathetic to his goal, Rizvi silences anyone attempting to change the law by condemning them to death. As he pushes for more power, Rizvi decides to run for office in the upcoming general elections, and those accused of blasphemy or those who oppose the blasphemy laws- whether targeted minorities, liberals, and opposing Muslim voices - become the pawns of his ambition.

Saudi Women's Driving School

An unprecedented access to a number of Saudi women in the capital city of Riyadh as they embrace the freedom that comes from being behind the wheel.The Saudi Women’s Driving School is said to be the world's largest driving school, which caters exclusively to women since the ban on female drivers was lifted in 2017.

Stolen Daughters: Kidnapped By Boko Haram

The story of the freed female hostages of Boko Haram, detailing their lives in captivity and since their release.

How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin

In August 1962, director Leslie Woodhead made a two-minute film in Liverpool's Cavern Club with a raw and unrecorded group of rockers called the Beatles. He arranged their first live TV appearances on a local show in Manchester and watched as the Fab Four phenomenon swept the world. Twenty-five years later while making films in Russia, Woodhead became aware of how, even though they were never able to play in the Soviet Union, the Beatles' legend had soaked into the lives of a generation of kids. This film meets the Soviet Beatles generation and hears their stories about how the Fab Four changed their lives, including Putin's deputy premier Sergei Ivanov, who explains how the Beatles helped him learn English and showed him another life. (Storyville)

The New Al-Qaeda

A look at the spread of Al-Qaeda in the UK

Trust Me - I'm a Politician

Last December's "Cheriegate" affair did little to abate the rampant public cynicism reserved for politicians - a mistrust evidenced in the turnout at the 2001 general election, which was the lowest for more than 80 years. In this documentary, Michael Cockerell talks to figures including Edwina Currie, Max Clifford, Geoffrey Robinson and Neil Hamilton in an effort to see if spin, sleaze and ministerial failure is to blame, or whether the media's sneering political coverage is most at fault.