Social & External
The people behind it
In the new film "Undercity: Las Vegas," urban historian Steve Duncan and director Andrew Wonder head below Sin City to see what lurks beneath the surface of one of America's most bustling cities.
As the months pass through her, Mai gives us a glimpse into old age that explores between being abandoned and being belonged, passing the time and living the time.
Do humans have the right to judge and kill other humans? This program includes a history of capital punishment around the world through documentary footage and commentary. The electric chair, firing squad, hanging, poison gas, beating to death, slow execution, crotch-splitting, iron maiden, guillotine, execution by running, and beheading... It features a military execution in a South American country, obtained from a former prison officer. It also includes footage of the reality of life in Japanese prisons, death row inmates facing death, the parents of death row inmates, the families of their victims, and the gallows.
Composed of songs and memories, this powerful musical film traces the traumatic experience of young survivors from different parts of Africa. In the village of Conques in France, they found a therapeutic space where they learn to overcome their past and, through song, to imagine a new future.
The film focuses on three male and one female soldier. They represent the challenges that the German army is currently facing: the Bundeswehr has too few personnel, too little equipment and for many years was not prepared for the type of war that it must now prepare for in the future. The film reflects the dramatic change from the perspective of those who have to shoulder the task of "national and alliance defense" in a very concrete and personal way in their everyday lives, at their location, in their unit.
A visit with a master of the Oldest Art In The World: tattooing. Disabled by arthritis since the age of four, confined to a wheelchair, his growth stunted, Stoney St. Clair joined the circus at 15 as a sword swallower. A year later he took up tattooing, and traveled with circuses and carnivals for fifty years practicing his craft. As we watch him at work, we see the determination which led Stoney to use his crippled hands in an art where mistakes are permanent, and we realize Stoney has overcome his handicap to heal himself and others with the magic of symbols. The film ends with a visit by New Age tattoo master Don Ed Hardy, who receives a permanent souvenir by Old School tattoo master Stoney.
The misty forests above North Vancouver, British Columbia are hallowed ground for mountain biking, a place so harrowing it’s influenced every aspect of the sport for over 30 years. It’s also where Betty Birrell, at age 45, picked up mountain biking after a career as a mountaineer and professional windsurfer. Three decades later, the single mother is a role model for her son, her friends and anyone she’s met along the way – and proof that you’re never too old to send.
Celebrating Pasifika rugby players and their communities. A story about small islands, big dreams and the sacrifices made by many to produce some of the world’s greatest players.
Award-winning French writer Christine Angot goes on a business trip to Strasbourg where her father lived before dying several years ago. It is the city where she met him for the first time at the age of 13, and where he sexually abused her over the following years. His wife and children still live there. Angot takes a camera and knocks on the doors of her family to push them to clarify their attitudes to her father’s crime that stretched over so many years. A cinematographic journey that challenges social norms and family perspectives in dealing with incest.
1972 in Haute-Savoie (France) : the Bertrand's farm, with a hundred dairy cows owned by three bachelor brothers, is filmed for the first time. In 1997, they were the subject of Gilles Perret's first movie, as they let their farm to their nephew Patrick and his wife Hélène. Nowadays, 25 years later, Gilles Perret take another look at this farm, managed by Hélène who will step down. Through their words, an intimate, social and economic history of the rural world.
MAURICE reveals the famous #9 of the Montreal Canadiens like never before. Through never-before-seen archival footage shot over 35 years, this documentary offers exclusive access to the man behind the Rocket myth. Designed by Serge Giguère and Robert Tremblay, who died before completing this project, MAURICE paints an intimate and authentic portrait of Maurice Richard, well beyond his exploits on the ice rink. More than a hockey player, he embodies the perseverance and hope of a people, forever marking Quebec culture.
Soon after New York state passed a 2015 law that health insurance should cover transgender-related care and services, director Tania Cypriano and producer Michelle Hayashi began bringing their cameras behind the scenes at New York’s Mount Sinai Hospital, where this remarkable documentary captures the emotional and physical journey of surgical transitioning. Lending equal narrative weight to the experiences of the center’s groundbreaking surgeon Dr. Jess Ting and those of his diverse group of patients, BORN TO BE perfectly balances compassionate personal storytelling and fly-on-the-wall vérité. It’s a film of astonishing access—most importantly into the lives, joys, and fears of the people at its center.
Since the year 2000, there have been several waves of suicides among the indigenous population of the Colombian Amazon. I discovered that the men commit suicide because of love sorrow. Their wives leave them for white men. The latter think that the Indian feels nothing because they do not express themselves in the same way and, in their language, there are no words to describe feelings. Is it possible that a whole people, the Cácuas Indians, do not feel anything?
Hallstätter Ballade refers to a celebrated 1961 Austrian documentary short film directed by István Szőts. The film is best known for poetically capturing the unique, centuries-old Alpine tradition of skull painting (Totenkult) in the village of Hallstatt.
A burlesque tribute to Troma Entertainment featuring new performances based on previous Troma releases.
Asta and Søren are not a couple. They're not friends with benefits either, and they’re definitely not pen pals with benefits. So, at the end of the day, what are they? With a single camera setup, the viewer is given access to a private space.
Rooster Teeth’s Geoff Ramsey explores the subculture of tattoos and takes a crash course from a master tattoo artist.
Rory Blank is a cartoonist based out of Austin, Texas. He also sells t-shirts.
A documentary on the expletive's origin, why it offends some people so deeply, and what can be gained from its use.
The world's greatest pin-up model and cult icon, Bettie Page, recounts the true story of how her free expression overcame government witch-hunts to help launch America's sexual revolution. When she saw the film The Notorious Bettie Page, produced by HBO in 2006, the main person concerned reacted unequivocally: “Lies! Lies!” In a long interview recorded shortly before her death, the woman who entered the collective unconscious as the ultimate pin-up gave her version of events to director Mark Mori. In a gravelly voice, Bettie Page tells her own story and lifts the veil on areas often hidden by images that have made so many men and women fantasize since the 1950s: her abused childhood, an eclipse that lasted forty years, her mental illness. Through testimonies and unpublished archives, this documentary brings back to life a body and a face endlessly declined before our eyes, just as Bettie wanted: “I would like people to remember me as I was in the photos.”
The life of internationally renowned artist and activist Nan Goldin is told through her slideshows, intimate interviews, ground-breaking photography, and rare footage of her personal fight to hold the Sackler family accountable for the overdose crisis.
A woman narrates the thoughts of a world traveler, meditations on time and memory expressed in words and images from places as far-flung as Japan, Guinea-Bissau, Iceland, and San Francisco.
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.
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.
A startling expose of rape crimes on US campuses, their institutional cover-ups, and the devastating toll they take on students and their families. The film follows the lives of several undergraduate assault survivors as they attempt to pursue—despite incredible push back, harassment and traumatic aftermath—both their education and justice.
Unravel the case of Utah therapist Jodi Hildebrandt, whose child abuse arrest with parenting YouTuber Ruby Franke exposed a twisted tale of manipulation.
The film is based on interviews with 2,000 women from 50 countries, and covers the status of women all over the world. The topics covered include forced marriages, sexual assault, female genital mutilation, acid attacks, motherhood, sexuality, menstruation, education and the professional success of women.
A collection of stories about and images of our world, offering an immersion to the core of what it means to be human. Through these stories full of love and happiness, as well as hatred and violence, it brings us face to face with the Other, making us reflect on our lives. From stories of everyday experiences to accounts of the most unbelievable lives, these poignant encounters share a rare sincerity and underline who we are – our darker side, but also what is most noble in us, and what is universal. Our Earth is shown at its most sublime through never-before-seen aerial images accompanied by soaring music, resulting in an ode to the beauty of the world, providing a moment to draw breath and for introspection. This film is a politically engaged work which allows us to embrace the human condition and to reflect on the meaning of our existence.
An experimental documentary that explores Saudi Arabia's relationship with the U.S. and the role this has played in the war in Afghanistan.
Matt Walsh's controversial doc challenges radical gender ideology through provocative interviews and humor.
As a visually radical memoir, CAMERAPERSON draws on the remarkable footage that filmmaker Kirsten Johnson has shot and reframes it in ways that illuminate moments and situations that have personally affected her. What emerges is an elegant meditation on the relationship between truth and the camera frame, as Johnson transforms scenes that have been presented on Festival screens as one kind of truth into another kind of story—one about personal journey, craft, and direct human connection.
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.
Lupita Nyong'o narrates a documentary about Peanuts and its creator, Charles M. Schulz. Famous fans—including Drew Barrymore, Kevin Smith, and Al Roker—share its influence on them, and a new animated story finds Charlie Brown on a quest.
Women are lucky, they get to have the only organ in the human body dedicated exclusively for pleasure: the clitoris! In this humorous and instructive animated documentary, find out its unrecognized anatomy and its unknown herstory.
From a prolific career in film and television, Anton Yelchin left an indelible legacy as an actor. Through his journals and other writings, his photography, the original music he wrote, and interviews with his family, friends, and colleagues, this film looks not just at Anton's impressive career, but at a broader portrait of the man.
Using hidden cameras and never-before-seen footage, Earthlings chronicles the day-to-day practices of the largest industries in the world, all of which rely entirely on animals for profit.
He's devoted his career to uncovering stories the powerful want buried. From My Lai to Abu Ghraib, dig into the life's work of journalist Seymour Hersh.
A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.