Gangstresses(2000)

Buy Bye Beauty(en)

Buy Bye Beauty is a 2001 documentary film by Swedish director and performance artist Pål Hollender. The film is about the way Latvian sex industry and its being fueled by businessmen and sex tourists from Sweden visiting Riga. The film was shot in Riga in July 2000. The narration of the film is in English, with interviews conducted in Russian and Latvian.

Sieben Mulden und eine Leiche(de)

Thomas Haemmerli is about to celebrate his fortieth birthday when he learns of his mother's death. A further shock follows when he and his brother Erik discover her apartment, which is filthy and full to bursting with junk. It takes the brothers an entire month to clean out the place. Among the chaos, they find films going back to the 1930s, photos and other memorabilia.

Sexwork & Me(en)

21st century legal prostitution through the frank stories of Amsterdam red-light district sex workers at a time when tighter regulation threatens their livelihood.

Nas: Time Is Illmatic(en)

Time Is Illmatic is a feature length documentary film that delves deep into the making of Nas' 1994 debut album, Illmatic, and the social conditions that influenced its creation.

Elogio a la Sonrisa(es)

West End Jungle(en)

1961 documentary about the history and seedy reality of the sex industry in London's Soho.

Dreaming Nicaragua(en)

DREAMING NICARAGUA is a film about HOPE. It's about love for the dignity and courage of the human spirit that, even immersed in uttermost tragic conditions, fights for a better life, and in this case, with a friendly SMILE. DREAMING is a sensitive and lyrical portrayal of four children living in extreme poverty in Nicaragua. The film takes us beyond their hardships and gives voice to the youngsters, who are surprisingly funny, hopeful, and optimistic. A traveling art teacher provides a safe arena for our four unlikely protagonists to express their innermost thoughts. When painting, the kids momentarily escape the stresses of their reality into a world of dreams and ideas, a stark contrast to their lives outside: a vicious cycle of hunger, child labor, and violence. Despite the extreme circumstances, the children and their families face their lives with an inspiring unity, strength and humor.

Mabel(es)

Mabel tells us through her experiences how it is that at such a young age she starts in a world of prostitution, leading her to a process of evolution and transformation throughout her life.

Pariah Dog(bn)

Shot over three years, Pariah Dog paints a kaleidoscopic picture of the city of Kolkata, seen through the prism of four outsiders and the dogs they love. These men and women have found meaning and purpose in their shared mission to care for neglected street dogs, who have existed in the towns and villages of India for thousands of years. For some this mission is enough, for others, dreams of a better life are always near.

Augusta(en)

This short documentary is the portrait of an 88-year-old woman who lives alone in a log cabin without running water or electricity in the Williams Lake area of British Columbia. The daughter of a Shuswap chief, Augusta lost her Indian status as the result of a marriage to a white man. She recalls past times, but lives very much in the present. Self-sufficient, dedicated to her people, she spreads warmth wherever she moves, with her songs and her harmonica.

The Police Tapes(en)

Filmmakers Alan and Susan Raymond spent three months in 1976 riding along with patrol officers in the 44th Precinct of the South Bronx, which had the highest crime rate in New York City at that time.

Money, Power, Respect: Hip Hop Billion Dollar Industry(en)

Who of the icons Jay-Z, Diddy, 50 Cent and Dr. Dre becomes the first dollar billionaire?

Coach Zoran and His African Tigers(en)

Documentary following Serbian football coach Zoran Đorđević as he helps form South Sudan's first national football team.

Sex, Drugs, and Student Loans(en)

This documentary exposes just how much it really costs to enter the Ivy League gates. In the past decade, the cost of higher education has skyrocketed. The financial burden being placed on the new generation of scholars has forced students to make difficult decisions to pay the bills. Accrue enormous financial debt, don’t attend university, or enter the underground world of sex, drugs, and student loans. This documentary chronicles the lives of three female university students who decided to enter the illicit world of drug dealing and sex work in order to pay for their education.

Dinner(en)

What are one week films? They're an assignment we do our first week back at CalArts, designed to dust off cobwebs by throwing us straight into the deep end. Our class theme was "square," and we had a lot of fun playing around with compositions inspired by East Asian graphic design.

Mother was a CEO(sv)

The story about how Britt-Marie took back the brush factory from her husband’s cruel brother at the end of the fifties was one of Malin’s childhood fairy tales. Britt-Marie is now 95 years old and trying to set the story straight with the help of her daughter behind the camera. Together they outline a powerful life story that is slowly fading away.

Hotel Gondolín(en)

The hotel Gondolín is home to some 30 transvestites who practice prostitution as the only option to survive in a society that excludes them.

Innocence(th)

In the mountains of Northern Thailand lies a boarding school. The students come from different tribes in the area and live together with their Thai teacher, grow their own crops and cook their own meals while continuing their education. The biggest question on their mind, having spent all their lives in the mountainside, is where the rivers running down the hills end. If they pass the final exams their reward is a trip to the end of the river, to the ocean itself. The children are poor, some orphans, and most of them only speak their tribe's language, but all try their best to pass the exams to be able to take the long-awaited trip. This trip is not only a journey from the children's villages to the ocean but also a journey that symbolizes the change from childhood to adulthood.

Land Without Bread(es)

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time. (Silent short, voiced in 1937 and 1996.)

Megacities(en)

Megacities is a documentary about the slums of five different metropolitan cities.