CommunityGrows

Explore the 1928 collapse of the St. Francis Dam, the second deadliest disaster in California history. A colossal engineering and human failure, the dam was built by William Mulholland, a self-taught engineer who ensured the growth of Los Angeles by bringing the city water via aqueduct. The catastrophe killed more than 400 people and destroyed millions of dollars of property.

Barack Obama launched into our national consciousness at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and ever since, he's delivered messages of patriotism, unity, and hope through the power of words. But of all the speeches he's given, six in particular may define his legacy as, in historian Doris Kearns Goodwin's words, "one of the best writers and orators in the presidency." Interviews with eminent historians and key figures in his writing process give rare insights into these iconic speeches, as well as the Obama presidency and the man himself.

Stream of consciousness awakened by the shots of an inauspicious summer.

An intimate portrait of Salt Lake City and its surroundings. Shot on 16mm film.

Mats Öberg, born 1971 in Umeå, Sweden, has been living in Stockholm for many years, where he moved when he entered the Royal Academy of Music, where for two and a half years he studied individual music and, among other things, studied with the pianist Stefan Nilsson. Frank Zappa is one of Mats Öberg's idols. Together with drummer Morgan Ågren, Mats formed the group Zappatetoot early on, which only played Zappa covers. Then when Frank Zappa played in Stockholm in 1988, Mats and Morgon had the opportunity to meet him and also sit in the band. It was the beginning of a continued collaboration which meant that they both got to participate in the projects Zappa's Universe and Zappa at Lincoln Center in 1993.

The Fall of the I-Hotel brings to life the battle for housing in San Francisco. The brutal eviction of the International Hotel's tenants culminated a decade of spirited resistance to the razing of Manilatown. The Fall of the I-Hotel works on several levels. It not only documents the struggle to save the I-Hotel, but also gives an overview of Filipino American history.

Younost, une jeunesse russe

Documentary which follows the construction of a trailblazing 36,000-tonne steel structure to entomb the ruins of the nuclear power plant destroyed in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

A collage of live performance, intimate interviews, and cityscapes featuring San Francisco punk club Mabuhay Gardens. With Flipper's Will Shatter, The Avengers' Danny Furious, Negative Trend and more.

A short anecdotal documentary about the nature of destruction, a debilitating deadlock of humanity.

Previously a central part of communal life, the movie palaces of New York’s Chinatown are now extinct. This documentary short takes us inside the title theater located on the Bowery, as it’s about to close its doors, with its caretakers ruefully looking back at the life that once was. Eric Lin’s poignant first film serves as a glimpse into the usually private—and, according to the Music Palace’s projectionist, “lonely”—operations of a theater, and mourns the loss of a once-vital movie-going locale.

Hosted by Damon Fox, this documentary takes us on a grim dive into the world of the coroner and what they see in their line of work.

The Bridge is a controversial documentary that shows people jumping to their death from the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco - the world's most popular suicide destination. Interviews with the victims' loved ones describe their lives and mental health.

Une vie avec Oradour

In Bergen, we find one of Norway's largest harbor communities. The residents live close to the water, and even closer to one another.

Members of the voluntary Human Extinction Movement in Mexico try to convince people not to procreate to achieve gradual human extinction. Soon, an involuntary event will put their ideas into perspective: a pandemic.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many Russians have started having dreams about their president and sharing them on social media. More than a thousand dreams about Putin have now been recorded and posted on public platforms. In Dreams About Putin, a selection of these dreams have been brought to life using Unreal Engine, a 3D graphics program for creating scenes for computer games. In this exciting experiment with form, the animations are complemented by rare archival footage of the Russian president. The dreams are related by a narrator, and their “translation” into 3D scenes is not literal; likewise, the archival footage has been lightly edited. The result is sometimes dryly comic, sometimes absurdist, sometimes disturbing, and sometimes even hopeful. A series of bizarre but therefore oddly familiar nightmares as a vision of Putin’s Russia.

"Born For This" chronicles the inspiring journey of Tia Bee Stokes, a mother of five who, while battling cancer, danced for 15 minutes every day, turning her fight into a powerful testament of resilience and hope.

After the news of the sale of the house where we lived for the last 15 years and its imminent demolition, I felt the need to revisit my story, marked by a violent childhood. Digging into the personal archives that I started filming at the age of 19, I discover that my life was very similar to my mothers and I decide to start a dialogue with her, in the hope of healing a shared wound.

A paralysingly beautiful documentary with a global vision—an odyssey through landscape and time—that attempts to capture the essence of life.