Houda al-Habash, a conservative Muslim preacher, founded a Qur'an school for girls in Damascus, Syria when she was just 17 years old. Every summer, her female students immerse themselves in a rigorous study of Islam, in addition to their secular schooling. A surprising cultural shift is underway-women are claiming space within the mosque, a place historically dominated by men. Challenging tradition, Houda insists education for women is a form of worship. Using Qur'anic teachings, she encourages her students to pursue higher education, jobs, and public lives, while remaining committed to an interpretation of Islam prioritizing women's role as wives and mothers. In a world rarely seen, The Light In Her Eyes tells the story of a leader who challenges the women of her community to live according to Islam, without giving up their dreams. Shot right before the uprising in Syria erupted, the film is an exclusive look at a social movement thriving in a country controlled by a repressive regime
This is the story of a year in the life of one mother whose daily struggles illuminate the challenges faced by more than 42 million American women and the 28 million children who depend on them.
A documentary on the war between the Guatemalan military and the Mayan population, with first hand accounts by Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchú.
With an off beat sense of humour, the film looks at the politics and glamour of lipstick and the dilemmas of the modern woman in a marketed world.
Through one woman's experience as an adopted person and also as a mother who relinquished her child in 1971, this documentary highlights the many complex issues associated with adoption.
There are places that we don’t want to know anything about, places that we would rather pretend don’t exist at all. One such place is a dumpsite. From the humans’ point of view, it is a ghastly place, a stinking desert of trash. But it’s a desert that is teaming with life.
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.
Inês Etienne Romeu was an opponent to the Brazilian's dictatorship. She was kidnapped, tortured and raped in jail, where she stayed for almost 100 days. She was later sentenced to life imprisonment. She stayed ten years in prison, from 1971 to 1979. Delphine Seyrig directed this film in 1974, when Inês was still in prison, protesting against this imprisonment and in support to Inês.
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.
Tells the true story of one woman's quest to help two elephant landmine survivors-Motala and Baby Mosha-walk on their own four legs.
Learn the origins and rise of modern day hula-hooping through eight extraordinary stories of hoop devotees who have embraced it as an art form, a teaching aid, and even an instrument of redemption. From the streets, to intimate clubs, to giant arenas, we alternate between self-filmed video diaries, verité documentary footage, and spectacularly filmed performances in an attempt to celebrate the healing power of movement and the spirit of human inventiveness.
Filmed with irony, the film describes brief moments in the lives of tourists, workers, and local vacationers around the construction of an artificial beach somewhere in the Caribbean.
Beneath Hong Kong's glittering facade, Filipina domestic helpers work in relative anonymity and for near-slave wages. In a beauty pageant like no other, five helpers give themselves makeovers for a day and gleefully reclaim their dignity.
Uncovering the profiteering of the state's water barons and how they affect farmers, average citizens, and unincorporated towns throughout California.
At 14 Rabha El Haimer was an illiterate child bride, beaten, raped and then rejected. Ten years later, she is a single mother, fighting to legalise her sham marriage and secure a future for her illegitimate daughter. With unprecedented access to the Moroccan justice system, “Bastards” follows Rabha’s fight from the Casablanca slums to the high courts.
Feisty, fiercely independent and firmly rooted in place, 90 year-old Mabel Robinson broke barriers back in the 40s when she became the first woman in Hubbards, Nova Scotia, to launch her own business—a hairdressing salon where she still provides shampoo-n-sets over 70 years later. Weaving animation and archival imagery with intimate and laugh out loud moments in the salon, the film celebrates the power of friendship, doing what you love and staying active. With no desire to retire anytime soon, Mabel gives voice to a generation who are not front and center of cinema or the pop hairstyles of the day, and subtly shifts the lens on our perception of beauty and the elderly.
When Harvard PhD student Jennifer Brea is struck down at 28 by a fever that leaves her bedridden, doctors tell her it’s "all in her head." Determined to live, she sets out on a virtual journey to document her story—and four other families' stories—fighting a disease medicine forgot.
A nonfiction account of the Ferguson uprising told by the people who lived it, this is an unflinching look at how the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown inspired a community to fight back—and sparked a global movement.
From the Montana Rockies to the wheat fields of Kansas and the Gulf of Mexico, families who work the land and sea are crossing political divides to find unexpected ways to protect the natural resources vital to their livelihoods. These are the new heroes of conservation, deep in America's heartland.
Wellman’s first all-talkie, scripted by Herman Mankiewicz, with arrogant boxer Richard Arlen romancing Mary Brian, then falling for temptress Olga Baclanova (Freaks) on the eve of the big fight.
When the luxury ocean liner Empress of Ireland collided with the Norwegian coal vessel Storstad on May 29, 1914, it took a mere 14 minutes for the ship to disappear beneath the sea, killing 1,012 of the 1,477 people aboard. Using archival photos, underwater photography, animation and interviews with a variety of experts, this fascinating documentary chronicles the story behind Canada's worst nautical disaster of all time.
Having lost her place among the social elite, a widow remarries and starts a family.
Captain Kim is grievously wounded in the first days of the war. When the northern troops continue their advance, his wife and small daughters flee south to Taegu, dragging him along in a two-wheel handcart. His wife struggles to keep herself and their surviving daughter alive. Working as a market trader, she meets a kind young man -- who happens to be tall, dark and handsome.
A doctor goes to meet a beautiful girl at a park bench near a wooded area. When he arrives, he finds her battered body lying next to a stream! He then finds himself to be the prime suspect. Who's the killer?
A music clip OVA using full versions of songs that were from the anime.
To further her career, elite commercial director Peggy agrees to leave her husband and her young son at home to shoot an ad on an isolated offshore island with alcoholic, incompetent action star Mr. Big. With the star, his family, his manager, and their children, Peggy attracts the attention of gangster Cobra, who is on the island to search for a legendary treasure left from the Ming Dyanasty. Juggling a spoiled superstar, kids, and a team of evildoers, how will Peggy get herself off the island so she can see family again?
Tito, a determined manager, sets his sights on marrying Tirza, but her father's unexpected question triggers his deepest fear: circumcision. Facing a daunting dilemma, Tito embarks on a slapstick quest to overcome his fear, leading to a sidesplitting journey of absurd antics and unexpected revelations in his pursuit of love.
An isolated village in the Lithuanian countryside. Seated in her house, an elderly woman recites an old folk story. Then she climbs up the tall ladder that takes her to the rooftop of the church.
Kit (Jacky Cheung) accidentally stumbles upon a house after his motorbike went out of control, and a girl (Maggie Cheung) helps him on his feet, then disappears. But Kit soon finds himself juggling more women than he might want after his female friend who has now moved next door (Pat Ha) expresses her interest along with her sister (Dodo).
Mike Myers is a stock, horror movie background character tasked with facilitating the horrible circumstances other unsuspecting horror characters find themselves in. He fiddles with a loose road sign arrow indicating the location of an insane asylum. The arrow spins in the wrong direction, causing a group of unsuspecting young people on their way to a camp, to instead drive to the insane asylum.
A man wrestles with his personal demons and obsession with a writer's life.
She is a former air hostess; he is a fair-haired St Petersburg-born politician with a secret past and a thorough knowledge of German. Despite the familiar-sounding characters, the film’s makers claim that its hero is not Russian President Vladimir Putin, but a fictional Russian politician named Alexander Platov.
The boss of the Hung Hing gang, Tian Sang, has died. Ho Nam and Hon Bun find Sangs younger brother, Yang to lead the gang. Meanwhile, Hon Bun receives news that his younger brother, a leader of the Tuen Mun gang has been assasinated. They travel to Hong Kong to settle the matter.