This immersive, illuminating documentary uses archival footage to reconstruct the events of the November 1999 gathering of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in which over 40,000 people took to the streets of Seattle to protest the organization’s impact on human rights, labor, and the future effects of continued globalization. Employing a wealth of news reports and home video recordings, the filmmakers reconstruct the four-day affair in which boardrooms of an unelected body of international business leaders, power brokers, and corporate representatives are contrasted with and contested by a massing crowd of protesters encompassing a spectrum of generations, political affiliations, and agendas. While WTO/99 harkens back to a pre-millennial era recorded in Standard Definition and featuring few cell phones, it also stands as perhaps an opening salvo of our current reality, in which corporate largess stands in greater and greater contrast to the struggles of the populace.
WTO/99
Tuesday, Feb 10
7:00Showtimes updated on Tuesday evenings
Legend
OCOpen Captioned
Special Content
35mm
SFSensory Friendly
This film is part of the Docs Without Borders series.
WTO/99
Q&A with producer Alex Megaro
2025. 102 m. Ian Bell. Independent. US. English. Rated NR.
Tickets: $18 (members), $23 (nonmembers), $18 (students)
"WTO/99 is nothing short of a galvanizing historical document that tells us exactly how we arrived on the crumbling ground we’re presently standing on."
"The incredible documentary WTO/99 is here not only to change your perspective on the WTO protests, but also to make you consider how we think about and cover protests and citizen-led political action."
SPECIAL EVENTS
Q&A with producer Alex Megaro
Tuesday, Feb. 10 2026, 7:00
- Alex Megaro is a filmmaker best known for producing/editing WTO/99, winner of the IDA Award for Best Editing, and Driftwood, winner of the Slamdance Grand Jury Prize for Narrative Feature. He directed the multi-award winning documentary short Krush the Wrestler, produced/edited two seasons of the VICE documentary series Source Material, and produced the Sheffield Doc Fest and AFI Docs official selection 8:08 How We Respond. Alex edited episodes of the VICE on Showtime documentary series and co-produced the series In The Cards, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival.
Tickets: $18 (members), $23 (nonmembers), $18 (students)
This film is part of the Docs Without Borders series.
The Jacob Burns Film Center is proud to receive generous support from:
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