The Positive Ladies Soccer Club (Le Club de football des femmes positives est un documentaire sur des femmes séropositives dans la populeuse Epworth : banlieuse d’Hararé. Elles se battent en s’adonnant au football.

de Holand Joanna Stavropoulou

Zimbabwé/Gréce | | DVD |

The Positive Ladies Soccer Club is a docu-drama about HIV-positive women in the populous Harare suburb of Epworth who fight stigma by taking up soccer. Médecins Sans Frontiers started working in Zimbabwe in 2000 and currently runs HIV focused projects in many areas where it provides anti-retroviral therapy for at least 16,000 people and 3,700 of them in Epworth. While working in Epworth as a field communications officer with Medicines Sans Frontiers, Holand Joanna Stavropoulou met a group of HIV-positive women whose life stories touched her. She was so inspired that she decided to make a short film about them. Stavropoulou followed the team, the ARV Swallows, from their first training session where a volunteer coach teaches them how to kick a ball. Having to deal not only with the stigma surrounding their HIV conditions, but also the prejudice of their community and their coach about women not being able to play soccer, the team eventually prove everyone wrong as they win the support and acceptance of their community. Positive in more ways than one, the women overcome stigmas and hardship with inspirational optimism.


By Holand Joanna Stavropoulou

Zimbabwe/Greece | | DVD | | Rating | Short doc