Himself
Perfect Life, the second feature by Emily Tang (Tang Xiaobai), at first revolves around Li Yueying, a young woman in the cold north-east of China. In a world where no one is waiting for an untrained, inexperienced woman, she knows that in order to fulfil her dreams she will have to resort to her own stubbornness and selfishness. Her father deserted her mother and the money saved by the family is destined for her younger brother's studies. When she stops working for a shop making artificial limbs in order to take a job as a chambermaid, she attracts the attention of a mysterious criminal, Mongol. Then in the editing, the documentary story of Jenny from Hong Kong starts to emerge. She thought she had her life perfectly worked out, but when her marriage breaks down, she also finds herself in financial problems and has to fight for the custody of her children.
According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, one veteran dies by suicide in America every 80 minutes. While only 1% of Americans has served in the military, former service members account for 20% of all suicides in the U.S. Based in Canandaigua, NY and open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the Veterans Crisis Line receives more than 22,000 calls each month from veterans of all conflicts who are struggling or contemplating suicide. This timely documentary spotlights the traumas endured by America’s veterans, as seen through the work of the hotline’s trained responders. CRISIS HOTLINE captures extremely private moments, where the professionals, many of whom are themselves veterans or veterans’ spouses, can often interrupt the thoughts and plans of suicidal callers to steer them out of crisis.
Somewhere in a subtropical country white visitors crowd around dark-skinned plantation workers emptying their harvest baskets. They look curious, as if wanting to test the quality of the tea leaves. Everywhere tourists take out their cameras whether in front of large animals in the wild or camel riders, whether in the face of decorated human bodies or daily work routines. Now and again they look into the camera themselves. For later, for when they will proudly show their 'exotic' finds at home. This posing contains a model of western travels and picture making which is over a century old. The fascinated gaze on the foreigners fixes them in pre-formed frames. Lisl Ponger follows the trail of that gaze by taking amateur found footage material and linking it together in new ways.
Behind-the-scenes documentary focusing on Marcus Luttrell, the lone survivor of a four-man Navy Seal team ambushed by the Taliban in 2005.
Another early experiment in portraiture from Tait. In filming her mother she asks the wider question of how much the camera can reveal of the person.
In a slum in Chennai, India, a young mother of two, wants to sell her kidney so she can pay off the crippling debts of her family. If she sells Hema will be the fifth member of her family to sell a kidney for an amount that represents several years' wages. Across the world in Nanaimo, Canada, forty year old single mom Sandra's kidneys are failing and she has been on a waiting list for 5 years now. Two different people. Two journeys.
A portrait of the American director Jim J. at work on the set of his latest film, Only Lovers Left Alive.
Documentary about red-bereted Jimmy Mirikitani, a feisty painter working and living on the street, near the World Trade Center, when 9/11 devastates the neighborhood. A nearby film editor, Linda Hattendorf, persuades elderly Jimmy to move in with her, while seeking a permanent home for him. The young woman delves into the California-born, Japan-raised artist's unique life which developed his resilient personality, and fuel his 2 main subjects, cats and internment camps. The editor films Jimmy's remarkable journey.
Martin Scorsese and the Rolling Stones unite in "Shine A Light," a look at The Rolling Stones." Scorsese filmed the Stones over a two-day period at the intimate Beacon Theater in New York City in fall 2006. Cinematographers capture the raw energy of the legendary band.
China's top drama academy stages the American musical "Fame," China's first official collaboration with Broadway, as the graduation showcase for its senior class. During the eight-month rehearsal, five students compete for roles, struggle with pressure from family and authority, and prepare to graduate into China's corrupt entertainment industry.
A descent into Eastern Europe's haunted woodlands uncovers the secrets, fairy tales, and bloody histories that shape our understanding of man's place in nature.
A documentary on the once promising American rock bands The Brian Jonestown Massacre and The Dandy Warhols. The friendship between respective founders, Anton Newcombe and Courtney Taylor, escalated into bitter rivalry as the Dandy Warhols garnered major international success while the Brian Jonestown Massacre imploded in a haze of drugs.
In the Realms of the Unreal is a documentary about the reclusive Chicago-based artist Henry Darger. Henry Darger was so reclusive that when he died his neighbors were surprised to find a 15,145-page manuscript along with hundreds of paintings depicting The Story of the Vivian Girls, in What is Known as the Realms of the Unreal, of the Glodeco-Angelinnian War Storm, Cased by the Child Slave Rebellion.
The lives of Stan Laurel (1890-1965) and Oliver Hardy (1892-1957), on the screen and behind the curtain. The joy and the sadness, the success and the failure. The story of one of the best comic duos of all time: a lesson on how to make people laugh.
When international sport governing bodies rule that 'identified' female athletes must medically alter their healthy bodies under the guise of fair play, four champion runners from the Global South fight back against racism, the policing of women's bodies in sport, and the violation of their human rights.
Both an activist and a documentarian, Valentina Pedicini also brings her background in anthropology to this impressively captured, claustrophobic nonfiction feature. Venturing beneath sea level, From the Depths profiles the lone woman at work in the last coal mine in Sardinia, Italy.
The first film in a Seven Up-like series examining the lives of three teenage girls in South Australia during the 1970s. It looks at issues such as boys and sex, abortion, marriage, pregnancy, career paths, and education.
When the lights dim and the stage is revealed, Meschke channels life through the strings of his puppets, triggering the spiritual connection between the creator and his alter-egos: the charismatic Don Quixote, the loving Penelope, the inquisitive Baptiste, or the mysterious Antigone. THE MAN WHO MADE ANGELS FLY is a poetic story about a master of his craft that has inspired audiences to reflect upon common issues of suffering and the mortal coil. Visionary and un-biographic, imaginary tribute to the puppeteer.
Joris Ivens and wife Marceline Loridan took their cameras into Pharmacy No. 3 in Shanghai, which in addition to dispensing drugs manages an outreach program of medical services, an extension of the pharmacy’s in-house medical care center.
Renee Tajima-Peña takes to the road to investigate questions about Asian-American identity.
Archival material from the original NASA film footage – much of it seen for the first time – plus interviews with the surviving astronauts, including Jim Lovell, Dave Scott, John Young, Gene Cernan, Mike Collins, Buzz Aldrin, Alan Bean, Edgar Mitchell, Charlie Duke and Harrison Schmitt.
Forky Asks a Question: What is Money? Hamm attempts to give Forky a lesson on how the US monetary system works.
Realizing the urban legend of their youth has actually come true, two filmmakers delve into the mystery surrounding five missing children and the real-life boogeyman linked to their disappearances.
A bunch of high school misfits in Hawaii, introduced by their new teacher, attend a science fair in which they draw up inspiration to build their own solar car and win a trip to compete in the 1990 World Solar Challenge in Australia.
Ben is a young bisexual man. He comes out to the world and develops an intense relationship with Sam, a man of color struggling with deep wounds of his own. As the summer progresses and their intimacy grows, Ben's past crawls to the surface.
By the mid-1980s, the fabled animation studios of Walt Disney had fallen on hard times. The artists were polarized between newcomers hungry to innovate and old timers not yet ready to relinquish control. These conditions produced a series of box-office flops and pessimistic forecasts: maybe the best days of animation were over. Maybe the public didn't care. Only a miracle or a magic spell could produce a happy ending. Waking Sleeping Beauty is no fairy tale. It's the true story of how Disney regained its magic with a staggering output of hits - "Little Mermaid," "Beauty and the Beast ," "Aladdin," "The Lion King," and more - over a 10-year period.
A British diplomat is arrested on charges of working with Russian mafia. After death threats to his wife, they are taken into protective custody. Then the MI6 shows up with a new piece of the puzzle.
Inspector Rizzo is accused of drug trafficking. In order to clear his name he has to find out who is the person, from a Mafia ring, who has infiltrated his police department.
Herzog and cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger go to Antarctica to meet people who live and work there, and to capture footage of the continent's unique locations. Herzog's voiceover narration explains that his film will not be a typical Antarctica film about "fluffy penguins", but will explore the dreams of the people and the landscape.
In Tuscany to promote his latest book, a middle-aged English writer meets a French woman who leads him to the village of Lucignano.
A horror-thriller centered on a woman living with "face-blindness" after surviving a serial killer's attack. As she lives with her condition, one in which facial features change each time she loses sight of them, the killer closes in.
A documentary on Al Gore's campaign to make the issue of global warming a recognized problem worldwide.
Documentary filmmaker Robert Kenner examines how mammoth corporations have taken over all aspects of the food chain in the United States, from the farms where our food is grown to the chain restaurants and supermarkets where it's sold. Narrated by author and activist Eric Schlosser, the film features interviews with average Americans about their dietary habits, commentary from food experts like Michael Pollan and unsettling footage shot inside large-scale animal processing plants.
It is just another evening commute until the rain starts to fall, and the city comes alive to the sound of dripping rain pipes, whistling awnings and gurgling gutters.
Nick Hume is a mild-mannered executive with a perfect life, until one gruesome night he witnesses something that changes him forever. Transformed by grief, Hume eventually comes to the disturbing conclusion that no length is too great when protecting his family.
Christopher Robin, the boy who had countless adventures in the Hundred Acre Wood, has grown up and lost his way. Now it’s up to his spirited and loveable stuffed animals, Winnie The Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, and the rest of the gang, to rekindle their friendship and remind him of endless days of childlike wonder and make-believe, when doing nothing was the very best something.
When a prisoner transfer van is attacked, the cop in charge must fight those inside and outside while dealing with a silent foe: the icy temperatures.
At Kichijōji Station, Tokyo, Taku Morisaki glimpses a familiar woman on the platform opposite boarding a train. Later, her photo falls from a shelf as he exits his apartment before flying to Kōchi Prefecture. Picking it up, he looks at it briefly before leaving. As the aeroplane takes off, he narrates the events that brought her into his life...
A closeted boy runs the risk of being outed by his own heart after it pops out of his chest to chase down the boy of his dreams.
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.