Documenting the demolition of Cabrini Green, Chicago's most infamous public housing development, through the stories of three public housing residents whose lives are turned upside down in the name of progress.
Social & External
The people behind it
At a 2012 pre-season high-school football party in Steubenville, Ohio, a young woman was raped by members of the beloved high school football team. The aftermath exposed an entire culture of complicity—and Roll Red Roll maps out the roles that peer pressure, denial, sports machismo, and social media each played in the tragedy.
Disaster Playground investigates future outer space catastrophes and the procedures to manage and assess the risks. The film follows the scientists planning the monitoring and deflection of hazardous Near Earth Objects and the real-life procedures in place in the event of an asteroid collision with the earth. Follow the chain of command that runs from the SETI Institute and NASA to the White House and United Nations and meet the people who are responsible from protecting us from a potentially devastating asteroid impact.
When the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, taking a photo was a crime. After the regime fell from power in 2001, a fledgling free press emerged and a photography revolution was born. Now, as foreign troops and media withdraw, Afghanistan is left to stand on its own and so are its journalists. Set in a modern Afghanistan bursting with color and character, FRAME BY FRAME follows four Afghan photojournalists navigating a dangerous media landscape as they reframe Afghanistan for the world, and for themselves. Through cinema vérité, powerful photojournalism, and never-before-seen footage shot in secret during the Taliban regime, the film connects an audience with four humans in the pursuit of the truth.
Sparked by a public display of sexual harassment in 2012, GTFO pries open the video game world to explore a 20 billion dollar industry riddled with discrimination and misogyny. Every year, the gaming community grows increasingly diverse. This has led to a clash of values and women are receiving the brunt of the consequences every day, with acts of harassment ranging from name calling to death threats. Through interviews with video game creators, journalists, and academics, GTFO paints a complex picture of the video game industry, while revealing the systemic and human motivations behind acts of harassment. GTFO begins the conversation that will shape the future of the video game world.
A WOMAN LIKE ME is a hybrid documentary that interweaves the real story of director Alex Sichel, diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in 2011, with the fictional story of Anna Seashell, who struggles to find the glass half full when faced with the same diagnosis. The film follows Alex as she uses her craft to explore what is foremost on her mind while confronting a terminal disease: parenting, marriage, faith, life, and death. When we are stuck between a rock and hard place, can our imagination get us out?
Deep in the rain forests of Grenada, anarchist chocolatier Mott Green seeks solutions to the problems of a ravaged global chocolate industry. Solar power, employee shareholding and small-scale antique equipment turn out delicious chocolate in the hamlet of Hermitage, Grenada. Finding hope in an an industry entrenched in enslaved child labor, irresponsible corporate greed, and tasteless, synthetic products, Nothing like Chocolate reveals the compelling story of the relentless Mott Green, founder of the Grenada Chocolate Company.
Sailing a Sinking Sea is a feature-length experimental documentary exploring the culture of the Moken people of Burma and Thailand. The Moken are seafaring people and one of the smallest ethnic minority groups in Asia. Wholly reliant upon the sea, their entire belief system, education, and economic and physical development revolve around water. Sailing a Sinking Sea illuminates the Moken lifestyle through recorded traditional music, folklore and conversations with the Moken people. Through intimate and dynamic cinematography and audio recordings, Sailing a Sinking Sea weaves a visual and aural tapestry of Moken mythologies and present-day practices.
"Soul In The Hole" is a documentary depicting the lives and struggles of a team of street-basket players aspiring to win the prestigous tournament which the movie's named after while at the same time balancing their personal issues and problems.
In the 100 miles between Baton Rouge and New Orleans there are over 150 petrochemical plants which are responsible for producing 25% of the nation's petrochemicals. This area reports the highest concentration of toxic emissions to the air, land and water in the country. The residents of this area, who are mainly African American and poor, suffer from astronomical rates of cancer, asthma and other medical ailments.
"The Wash is a portrait of the river wash that runs behind the older part of Newhall, California, where Lee and I used to live. We shot the wash on Super8 film and then finished it on video. It is a collaboration between us, describing the ways the wash is used, and the people who use it, ourselves included. It charts the way this land has changed since they began developing Newhall and the surrounding community of Valencia for housing, a development that is expected to bring over 250,000 more people into the area by the year 2015."
This documentary addresses the legacy of the military dictatorship in Chile by sharing the story of young fighters killed by the Pinochet regime as a backdrop to the history of the military dictatorship and the ongoing social conflict in that area. The larger story unfolds in three shorter parts, which explore the student movement, the history of the towns that became centers of armed resistance against the dictatorship, and the indigenous Mapuche conflict.
A film on feminine legacy of rebellion, language and transgressions. Using the composition of Mahadevi Akka, a 13th century saint-poet, the film explores the multiplicity of contemporary women and their own points of transgressions.
Ghost Rockets centers on human desire to explore and explain the unknown. The film weaves together an ambitious UFO investigation with a personal story that gives a rare insight into the hearts and minds of a UFO-investigator. Every year, the organization UFO‐Sweden receives numerous reports about inexplicable occurrences ‐ usually dismissed as having to do with the moon, airplanes, satellites or mental instability on the part of the witness. Sometimes, though, they get a report that they are unable to explain, one of them being the story of the ghost rocket.
STATE OF FEAR takes place in Peru, yet serves as a cautionary tale for a world engaged in a "global war on terror." It dramatizes the human and societal costs a democracy faces when it embarks on a "war" against terror, a "war" potentially without end, all too easily exploited by unscrupulous leaders seeking personal political gain.
Three young people living in South Dakota's Pine Ridge Reservation are faced with difficult challenges.
Whatever Comes Next is a documentary about the curious and dynamic life of Annemarie Mahler-Ettinger. The film portrays the painter and scholar, Annemarie Mahler. Born in Vienna in 1926, Mahler fled by herself as a twelve-year child to the United States and has since 1955 has lived in Bloomington, IN, and in the summers in Woods Hole, MA. The documentary portrays the artist's outer and inner lives, which bridge two centuries and two continents.
In the Netherlands, the final year of elementary school means turmoil for the pupils and their parents. There is no escape from the pressure on children to score as high as possible on tests to get into the best secondary schools. Parents who can afford it pay for as many private lessons as possible; other parents put pressure on the teachers. This documentary shows pupils and parents from very different backgrounds going through this process. They struggle anxiously for the same goal: the best possible start in life.
Maya Deren's Sink, a 30 minute experimental film, is an evocative tribute to the mother of avantgarde American film. The film calls forth the spirit of one who was larger than life as recounted by those who knew her. Teiji Ito's family, Carolee Schneemann and Judith Malvina, float through the homes recalling in tiny bits and pieces words of Deren's architectural and personal interior space. Clips from Maya Deren's films are projected back into the spaces where they were originally filmed appearing on the floorboard, furniture, and in the bowl of her former sink. Fluid light projections of intimate space provide an elusive agency for a filmmaker most of us will never know as film with its imaginary nature evokes a former time and space.
In okay bye-bye, so named for what Cambodian children shouted to the U.S. ambassador in 1975 as he took the last helicopter out of Phnom Phenh in advance of the Khmer Rouge, Rebecca Baron explores the relationship of history to memory. She questions whether, "image and memory can occupy the same space." Building on excerpts from letters, found super-8 footage of an unidentified Cambodian man, iconographic photographs from the Vietnam War and other partial images, Baron combines epistolary narrative, memoir, journalism, and official histories to question whether something as monumental as the genocidal slaughter of Cambodians during the Pol Pot regime can be examined effectively with traditional methodologies.
Penthesilea, the first of six films made by Laura Mulvey and Peter Wollen, traverses thousands of years to look at the image of the Amazonian woman in myth. It asks, among other questions, is the Amazonian woman a rare strong female image or is she a figure derived from male phantasy? The film explores the complexities of such questions, but does not seek any concrete answers.
49 Up is the seventh film in a series of landmark documentaries that began 42 years ago when UK-based Granada's World in Action team, inspired by the Jesuit maxim "Give me the child until he is seven and I will give you the man," interviewed a diverse group of seven-year-old children from all over England, asking them about their lives and their dreams for the future. Michael Apted, a researcher for the original film, has returned to interview the "children" every seven years since, at ages 14, 21, 28, 35, 42 and now again at age 49.In this latest chapter, more life-changing decisions are revealed, more shocking announcements made and more of the original group take part than ever before, speaking out on a variety of subjects including love, marriage, career, class and prejudice.
A documentary on the expletive's origin, why it offends some people so deeply, and what can be gained from its use.
In 1977, a book of photographs captured an awakening - women shedding the cultural restrictions of their childhoods and embracing their full humanity. This documentary revisits those photos, those women and those times and takes aim at our culture today that alarmingly shows the need for continued change.
In an intimate and joyful story of love in the face of loss, celebrated poets Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley find strength—and unexpected hilarity—in what might be their final year together.
Alexander McQueen's rags-to-riches story is a modern-day fairy tale, laced with the gothic. Mirroring the savage beauty, boldness and vivacity of his design, this documentary is an intimate revelation of McQueen's own world, both tortured and inspired, which celebrates a radical and mesmerizing genius of profound influence.
A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.
Unravel the case of Utah therapist Jodi Hildebrandt, whose child abuse arrest with parenting YouTuber Ruby Franke exposed a twisted tale of manipulation.
Join former first lady Michelle Obama in an intimate documentary looking at her life, hopes and connection with others.
An unprecedented and intimate look at the life, work and enduring legacy of British actress Audrey Hepburn (1929-1993).
Unprecedented access to Muhammad Ali's personal archive of "audio journals" as well as interviews and testimonials from his inner circle of family and friends are used to tell the legend's life story.
A string of threatening emails escalates into a revenge plot involving a newly married US marshal and his ex-girlfriend.
Just two years away from turning 30, participants in Michael Apted's documentary series are facing serious questions of identity and purpose, wondering whether they've found their place in the world.
14-year-old Laura Dekker sets out on a two-year voyage in pursuit of her dream to become the youngest person ever to sail around the world alone.
When a feminist filmmaker sets out to document the mysterious and polarizing world of the Men’s Rights Movement, she begins to question her own beliefs. Chronicling Cassie Jaye’s journey exploring an alternate perspective on gender equality, power and privilege.
Over seven decades, actor and activist George Takei journeyed from a World War II internment camp to the helm of the Starship Enterprise, and then to the daily news feeds of five million Facebook fans. Join George and his husband, Brad, on a wacky and profound trek for life, liberty, and love.
After years in the limelight, Selena Gomez achieves unimaginable stardom. But just as she reaches a new peak, an unexpected turn pulls her into darkness. This uniquely raw and intimate documentary spans her six-year journey into a new light.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg now 84, and still inspired by the lawyers who defended free speech during the Red Scare, Ginsburg refuses to relinquish her passionate duty, steadily fighting for equal rights for all citizens under the law. Through intimate interviews and unprecedented access to Ginsburg’s life outside the court, RBG tells the electric story of Ginsburg’s consuming love affairs with both the Constitution and her beloved husband Marty—and of a life’s work that led her to become an icon of justice in the highest court in the land.
Over 35 years after Bob Lazar's revelations, this documentary exposes secrets of a facility the government still denies. Featuring Lazar's testimony, recreations, and new evidence, it reopens a case that continues to spark global curiosity
An IMAX 3D camera chronicles the effort of 7 astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis to repair the Hubble Space Telescope.
Lyrical and powerfully personal essay film that reflects on the deaths of her husband Lou Reed, her mother, her beloved dog, and such diverse subjects as family memories, surveillance, and Buddhist teachings.