The story of how one Pittsburgh boy’s fascination with monsters drove him to the very top of the Hollywood food chain. In 1989, Greg Nicotero, much to his parents’ chagrin, quit medical school and headed for Hollywood to pursue a dream of making monsters. Together with gore masters Howard Berger and Robert Kurtzman, Nicotero went on to create KNB EFX Group, one of the most prolific makeup effects studios in the world. After twenty years as the “go to guy” for the world’s most successful horror/sci-fi films, Greg Nicotero is the first one directors like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez call.
Documentary about the life of avant-garde filmmaker Maya Deren, who led the independent film movement of the 1940s.
Brooklyn Castle is a documentary about I.S. 318 – an inner-city school where more than 65 percent of students are from homes with incomes below the federal poverty level – that also happens to have the best, most winning junior high school chess team in the country. (If Albert Einstein, who was rated 1800, were to join the team, he’d only rank fifth best.) Chess has transformed the school from one cited in 2003 as a “school in need of improvement” to one of New York City’s best. But a series of recession-driven public school budget cuts now threaten to undermine those hard-won successes.
A film about non-territorial office space, multi-mobile knowledge workers, Blackberries and Miles&More. A road movie discovering the working world of tomorrow. This documentary will take you on a journey through the post-industrial knowledge and services workshops, our supposed future working place. In this new world work will be handled more liberally. Time clocks cease to exist. Attention is not compulsory any more. The resource “human“ comes into focus. The film closely follows the high-tech work force – people who are highly mobile and passionate to make their work their purpose in life. Further episodes resume this topic and lead into the world of modern office architecture and into the world of Human Resource Management.
Long before Timothy Leary urged a generation to "tune in, turn on and drop out," lysergic acid diethylamide, or LSD, was being used by researchers trying to understand the human mind. This documentary is a fascinating look at the story of "acid" before it hit the streets. Featuring interviews with many LSD pioneers, Hofmann's Potion is much more than a simple chronicle of the drug's early days. With thoughtful interviews, beautiful music and stunning cinematography, it is an invitation to look at LSD, and our world, with a more open, compassionate mind.
The Mayan Calendar is ending on December 21st 2012. What will happen to us between now and then? Are there other prophecies that also predict the closing of this world age and the start of a new beginning? Join author Sharron Rose on an adventure into the future. In this exciting and thought provoking feature documentary she travels across the entire United States speaking to the many experts on this fast approaching prophecy. They help her to reveal the secrets that will unfold before our eyes and will shape our future.
Belgian filmmaker Chantal Akerman lives in New York. Filmed images of the City accompany texts of Akerman's loving mother back home in Brussels. The City comes more and more to the front while the words of the mother, read by Akerman herself, gradually fade away.
A documentary on the work of sex-change specialist Dr. Leo Wollman, including interviews with Dr. Wollman and a few of his patients, with an illustrated lecture on the various aspects of transsexuality plus actual footage of a sex-change operation, which is what gives the film its notoriety
From cinema-verite; pioneers Albert Maysles and Joan Churchill to maverick movie makers like Errol Morris, Werner Herzog and Nick Broomfield, the world's best documentarians reflect upon the unique power of their genre. Capturing Reality explores the complex creative process that goes into making non-fiction films. Deftly charting the documentarian's journey, it poses the question: can film capture reality?
Seen through the eyes of Asun Casasola, mother of Nagore Laffage, we take a look at the woman's life since her daughter was murdered. The crime, committed during Pamplona's San Fermin celebrations in 2008 by a psychiatric intern, shook society and hit the media headlines as never before. The trial took place in November 2009, with the defendant being convicted of manslaughter. Asun, her family, and all those who support them, continue their struggle to see justice done and have the culprit sentenced for murder with intent. This documentary talks about Nagore's murder, converting it into an emblematic story representing the countless similar cases taking place throughout today's society.
Impressions of the rue Mouffetard, Paris 5, through the eyes of a pregnant woman.
Dive into more than a century of decadence with this tantalizing look at the evolution of burlesque. Cabaret star Leslie Zemeckis traces the art form from vaudeville-style variety show through its extinction and contemporary rebirth. Vintage photos, film clips and ads illustrate burlesque's resilient history and how the public's sexual appetite kept it alive amid moral and legal ado.
The untold and intimate life story of one of the greatest American photographers of all time, Bert Stern. After working alongside Stanley Kubrick at Look Magazine, Stern became an original Madison Avenue 'mad man', his images helping to create modern advertising. Ground-breaking photos of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, Marilyn Monroe and Twiggy, coupled with his astonishing success in advertising, minted Stern as a celebrity in his own right.
FIGHTVILLE is about the art and sport of fighting: a microcosm of life, a physical manifestation of that other brutal contest called the American Dream...
"Behind Jim Jarmusch" is an intimate an intriguing portrait of director Jim Jarmusch, at work on the set of his movie "The Limits of Control" (starring Isaach de Bankolé, Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, John Hurt...)
Timeless: Live in Concert, recorded at her Las Vegas show on New Year's Eve 1999, takes as its subject the star herself. It opens with a dramatization of her first, amateur recording session, with young Lauren Frost playing a part described in the credits as "Young Girl," though Streisand later refers to her as "mini-me." Frost doesn't get too far before being joined by Streisand herself on a stirring version of "Something's Coming" from West Side Story. The rest of "Act One" traces Streisand's career from her club days to her movie performances. "Act Two" has less of a narrative structure, though it is equally autobiographical, with Streisand displaying and commenting on videos of herself performing with other stars and building up to the stroke of midnight with a combination of old, recent, and new specially written songs. At 57 that night, Streisand remains in good voice.
With Olin's 85-year-old father as guide, we experience Norway's most adventurous valley, Oldedalen in Nordfjord. He grew up here, and here generations before him have lived in balance with nature.
Women (many of them lesbian) artists, writers, photographers, designers, and adventurers settled in Paris between the wars. They embraced France, some developed an ex-pat culture, and most cherished a way of life quite different than the one left behind.
An intimate portrait of the woman whose groundbreaking books revolutionized our relationship to the natural world. When 'Silent Spring' was published in September 1962 it became an instant bestseller and would go on to spark dramatic changes in the way the government regulated pesticides.
Every year hundreds of people - mostly women - are attacked with acid in Pakistan. Follow several of these survivors, their fight for justice, and a Pakistani plastic surgeon who has returned to his homeland to help them restore their faces and their lives.