EMMY AWARD WINNER
Outstanding Social Issue Documentary, 2021
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ABOUT
In a hidden safehouse in the Ghanaian forest, social workers help two children recover from a childhood enslaved to fishermen on Lake Volta, the largest manmade lake on Earth. But their story takes an unexpected turn when their rescuer embarks on another rescue mission and asks the children for help.
Directed by Alyssa Fedele and Zachary Fink, The Rescue List had its national broadcast debut on the PBS documentary series POV on March 23, 2020 and won the Emmy® Award for Outstanding Social Issue Documentary on September 29th, 2021.
Haunted by the memory of his friend who disappeared on the lake, twelve year old Edem is reluctant to talk about his experience. Despite being rescued from slavery months earlier, Edem is overcome with grief. Social workers believe that Edem’s shyness and lack of focus in school are signs that he is wrestling deeply with the disappearance of his friend. As they coax him to reveal the truth of his friend’s fate, they also search for a way for Edem to come to terms with this trauma in order to heal and move forward—which he must do in order to be reunited with his mother.
Meanwhile, Peter, 17, is burdened by a sense of responsibility to help find his best friend, who is still enslaved to their master on the lake. “I want the rescuers to go back and bring him here,” Peter says. When Kwame, their rescuer, announces that his team is setting off on another rescue mission and needs the children’s help, Peter seizes the opportunity, setting in motion a journey that will change the boys’ lives forever. Kwame is part of a local team dedicated to rescuing and rehabilitating children who have been trafficked and enslaved to fishermen on Lake Volta. As the story progresses from rescue operation to rehabilitation shelter, he reveals his deeply personal connection to this work.
Intimately following Kwame, Peter, and Edem as they work to recover from their trauma, THE RESCUE LIST provides these protagonists with a forum to tell their own stories through their words and actions, allowing universally resonant themes to emerge. The filmmakers, guided by their backgrounds in anthropology and commitment to collaboration with their subjects, spent many months in the field building relationships with the rescue team, social workers and the children. “We chose to viscerally portray the under-represented personal experience of slavery through our protagonists’ day-to-day lives, rather than through the reductive lens of an issue-based advocacy film, which tends to focus solely on victimhood.”
““The Rescue List portrays an artful balance of ethnography and visual poetry while it brings to light the overlooked reality of child labor and slavery in Ghana.””
TAKE ACTION
Here are four actions you can take right now to join the fight to end modern slavery
1 - DONATE TO THE CHILDREN’S SCHOLARSHIP FUND
We’ve setup a GoFundMe campaign to provide scholarships for the three boys featured in The Rescue List. The scholarship will cover the cost of apprenticeships, plus additional annual necessities such as books and clothing.
2 - DONATE TO CHALLENGING HEIGHTS
It costs about $1,000 to rescue each child and approximately $2,500 for their 6-9 month rehabilitation & reunification. Challenging Heights’ goal is to rescue 150 children per year until they end child slavery in Ghana by 2030. Can you help them reach this goal?
3 - BRING THE FILM TO YOUR COMMUNITY
Host a community screening (when it’s safe to do so again). Each screening host will receive a discussion guide to facilitate dialogue, learning and action.
4 - TAKE THE SLAVERY FOOTPRINT QUIZ
Discover your personal connection to slavery with this in-depth quiz. Then, challenge your friends and family to do the same. Share your results on social media with the hashtag #RescueListPBS to raise awareness around the pervasiveness of modern slavery. What can you do to lower your slavery footprint?
For more information about modern slavery, visit our resources page.
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