Silent Stories

I'm a Porn Star follows the lives of guys in the neighborhood who are likely a lot more famous than you - at least on the Internet. There are an estimated 370 million pornographic websites on-line. Porn is now a thirteen BILLION dollar business. So who's doing all this moonlighting? Turns out -- probably some people you know.

A powerful film about the struggle to maintain Pacific Islander culture and values within the Westernized society of modern day Hawaiʻi. It is told through the lens of an extraordinary Native Hawaiian who is both a proud and confident māhū, or transgender woman, and an honored and respected kumu, or teacher, cultural practitioner, and community leader.

Documentary about what makes a house a home.

In the heart of the Hoggar Mountains, Algerian and French climbers meet on the legendary walls of the central Sahara. More than just an ascent, Tissalatine tells the story of an encounter with oneself, with the land, and with history. The film also retraces Thomas Dulac's return, ten years later, to a site he helped to open up. Driven by the profound voice of singer Djam and the vision of director Hamza Mendil, Tissalatine unveils a living, vibrant Sahara, far removed from clichés, in a sweeping epic of adventure, brotherhood, and spiritual elevation.

FENEEN is a journey into Senegal's urban music scene. This project was born from the meeting of Italian producer Frank Sativa with Senegalese pop-star Leuz Diwane G and Italian-Senegalese rapper F.U.L.A. This gave rise to a song, a video clip and a documentary with the same name (Feneen). Feneen portrays the current urban and music subculture of Dakar suburbs. The documentary highlights the fundamental rule of the urban subculture in debunking the stereotypical image of the African continent.

Les Maisons De La Mer

This is the story of Africa's first Boxing World Champion, Battling Siki. Who was this boxer born in Senegal, decorated for Bravery in World War I? Why do so few know that he fought and won the World Light Heavyweight Title aged 25, only to lose it controversially six months later? And why was his life cut short on a New York Street aged 28?

Call Me Malcolm is an amazing story of the human spirit and God's spirit, and the liberating struggle to realize and express with confidence the marvelous gift of one's truest sense of self. As Malcolm shares his own story and through the stories of others we meet, Call Me Malcolm offers us a glimpse into the real lives of real people who are transgender. But it is only a glimpse. There are many stories to be told and Malcolm helps us make connections to our own stories, encouraging us to share them. That can seem daunting in a culture which has done more to heap shame on persons who identify as transgender. The good news of Malcolm's story is the way in which shame and fear are overcome by grace, compassion and knowledge. Viewers cannot help but come to a deeper understanding of faith, love, and gender identity, and by doing so, arrive at a deeper understanding of their own journey.

The Desert Rocker is an intimate, witty and profound portrait of the extraordinary Hasna El Becharia, a pioneer Gnawa artist. The first musician to break through the social barrier of this culture, she empowers and inspires women of all ages by reclaiming a musical tradition reserved for men for centuries . A singularly talented artist, she leads women to redefine their roles and challenge cultural norms , one musical performance at a time.

Sahara - Hutsetik Haitzera is a mountain documentary about the climbing of Tizouyag Nord in the Hoggar Desert in Algeria by the Spanish Basque team composed of Alberto Iñurrategi, Jon Lazkano, Juanjo San Sebastián, Jon Beloki and Asier Aranguren. Made by climber Alberto Iñurrategi in 2002 and produced by Iñurrategi Anaiak, it is part of the Oinak Izarretan series.

Jo is a 40-year-old transgender man addicted to cocaine. This addiction prevents him from achieving his transition in good conditions, and from maintaining fulfilling relationships. He is trying to quit drugs and to make a fresh start.

Made just three years after the end of the French-Algerian War (1954-1962), Gillo Pontecorvo's The Battle Of Algiers instantly ignited discussions of this complex historical period. Using the film as a point of reference, this 2004 documentary attempts to reconstruct the Algerian experience of the battle for independence.

Fayçal Hammoum recounts the 2014 presidential election through non-voting inhabitants of Algiers who, like him, are in their thirties. Be it Bilel, a grocer by default exposed to his customers’ political babbling, or the more politically-charged comments of Younes, a militant FM radio journalist opposed to President Bouteflika’s fourth term, the variety of conversational scenes in no way changes the determination not to vote for an old man who has been invisible for almost two years. The rappers Omar and Brahim are as bereft of hope and voter’s cards as the Tellek webradio DJ, since “the match is fixed”. Moving away from his focus on this subject to film their daily life, the filmmaker draws the portrait of a generation who, as Bilal says with poignant simplicity, “just wants to live

Immigrated to the Paris region since 1964, Kader decides to spend the summer holidays with his family in his native village, not far from Algiers. These few weeks, so eagerly awaited by both sides, constitute a special moment full of strong emotions. The camera follows the family in their meetings, their reunions, their difficulties, their visions of the country and its region, the celebrations, the weddings, their return to France… This film raises many questions. Within this family itself, between those who stayed in the country and those who emigrated to France, how do we perceive the situation in Algeria? What hopes do each of them have for their country? What about the Franco-Algerian relationship? Contemporary immigration? The desire for exile of Algerians today? Different discourses on both sides of the Mediterranean? The desires of each of them…

This is the journal of an expedition that, starting from the oasis town of Djanet, embarked on a 12-day journey guided by a member of the Algerian Tourism Club to discover the rock paintings of Tassili n'Ajjer in southeastern Algeria. These paintings date back to prehistoric times (10,000 to 5,000 years ago) and are located on an uninhabited rocky plateau whose highest point reaches 2,158 meters. Considered one of the largest and oldest "open-air rock art museums" in the world, the Tassili n'Ajjer boasts a particularly rugged landscape: the vast rocky plains, which sometimes give way to "forests" of monoliths, are riddled with akbas (holes in the escarpments accessible only on foot or by camel) and numerous faults and canyons. The Tassili n’Ajjer National Park was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1982 and classified as a biosphere reserve in 1986.

This documentary bears witness to the events that took place more than thirty years before the filming of this movie, on October 17, 1961, in Paris, during the Algerian War. It is a work not only about historical truth but also about memory. Constructed primarily from interviews conducted with those involved in the events, along with archival footage, photographs, and radio broadcasts from the time, our investigation proves that nearly 200 Algerians were killed (drowned, tortured) that night and in the days that followed by the French police. "A Missing Day" seeks to ask two key questions: how could such events have unfolded in the capital of a Western democracy barely thirty years ago? And why have they been silenced ever since?

Nooko Bokk

On October 17, 1961, in response to the curfew imposed on Muslim Algerians by Paris police prefect Maurice Papon, the FLN Federation of France organized a peaceful demonstration in the streets of the capital. The demonstration turned into a bloody crackdown: unprecedented violence, thousands of arrests, hundreds missing, and dozens dead. Today, much is known about the violence of that night: at least 200 Algerians were killed, beheaded, beaten, or thrown into the Seine; 11,500 others were arrested and often tortured. Hundreds were deported back to Algeria. Long silenced, the repression has been acknowledged thanks to the work of remembrance and eyewitness accounts.

Cheikh Djemaï looks back on the genesis of Gillo Pontecorvo’s feature film, The Battle of Algiers (1965). Through archive images, extracts from the film and interviews with personalities, the filmmaker retraces the journey of a major work - from the events of the Algiers Casbah (1956-1957) to the presentation of the Lion of 'Or causing the anger of the French delegation in Venice - which left its mark as much in the history of cinema as in that of Algeria.

Emperors of Nothing is an unprecedented immersion within Forest, a prison in Brussels notorious for its inhumane incarceration conditions, bearing witness to how the human spirit resists or submits to this harsh world. Deeply personal and candid moments shared with inmates and wardens alike, those who have forfeited or devoted their lives to prison, expose universal truths of what it means to be "behind bars".