Shady Chocolate

Documentary depicting the lives of child prostitutes in the red light district of Songachi, Calcutta. Director Zana Briski went to photograph the prostitutes when she met and became friends with their children. Briski began giving photography lessons to the children and became aware that their photography might be a way for them to lead better lives.

A documentary that follows a new piece of legislation on its way to Capitol Hill. The Internet Community Port Act, also known as CP80 or Community Port 80, asks that adult content be placed on separate channels (ports) on the Internet so that parents can keep it out of their homes and schools. What ensues is a ferocious debate between parents, pornographers, doctors, technologists, addicts, business owners and children. But one voice is missing: our political leaders.

Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer is one of the first and most influential surf movies of all time. The film documents American surfers Mike Hynson and Robert August as they travel the world during California’s winter (which, back in 1965 was off-season for surfing) in search of the perfect wave and ultimately, an endless summer.

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.

For consumers, bananas are a delicious and nutritious start to the day, a healthy snack and a fixture in our fruit bowls. For millions of residents in the banana lands, the production of bananas means social upheaval, violence and pesticide poisoning. Banana Land explores the origins of these disparate realities, and opens the conversation on how workers, producers and consumers can address this disconnect.

Mögöbalu, Les Maîtres des Tambours d'Afrique

Sales of organic products have increased tenfold in 20 years. In 2020, the market will have exceeded 13 billion euros in sales. The heavyweights of the food industry are surfing on this consumer craze for healthy food by offering more and more "green" products. But organic does not necessarily mean nutritionally balanced.

Brought by poverty, Petang and Cereno are driven into the realm of child labor to live by the clock. Film Weekly follows their journey as they step back to breathe and to be children once again.

Wisconsin's tribe's ongoing fight to protect Lake Superior for future generations. "Bad River" shows the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa's long history of activism and resistance in the context of continuing legal battles with Enbridge Energy over its Line 5 oil pipeline. The Line 5 pipeline has been operating on 12 miles of the Bad River Band's land with expired easements for more than a decade. The Band and the Canadian company have been locked in a legal battle over the pipeline since 2019.

A Ghanaian maintenance technician at a Virginia retirement community dreams of becoming an American citizen to provide a better life for his family. With their future at stake, he enlists the help of two elderly residents to prepare for the biggest test of his life: the US Citizenship exam.

The film exposes the links between Agrifood and politics. With a pool of international experts it analyses the many problems related to factory farming: water pollution, migrants exploitation, biodiversity loss and antibiotic resistance.

An examination of the infamous thirty-year-old cold case of Iowa paperboy Johnny Gosch, the first missing child to appear on a milk carton. The film focuses on Johnny’s mother, Noreen Gosch, and her relentless quest to find the truth about what happened to her son. Along the way there have been mysterious sightings, bizarre revelations, and a confrontation with a person who claims to have helped abduct Johnny.

King Corn is a fun and crusading journey into the digestive tract of our fast food nation where one ultra-industrial, pesticide-laden, heavily-subsidized commodity dominates the food pyramid from top to bottom – corn. Fueled by curiosity and a dash of naiveté, two college buddies return to their ancestral home of Greene, Iowa to figure out how a modest kernel conquered America. With the help of some real farmers, oodles of fertilizer and government aide, and some genetically modified seeds, the friends manage to grow one acre of corn. Along the way, they unlock the hilarious absurdities and scary but hidden truths about America’s modern food system in this engrossing and eye-opening documentary.

Unfolding on three continents, this engaging documentary follows four groups of people whose lives are wrapped up in the complex world of chocolate.

Nana Benz is the story of the legendary queens of the West African mercer, self-made women, coming out of nowhere, building empires. These women were heroes to the people, Mercedes driver at the West African coast. They influenced the history of Togo and were witnesses of the fights for independence, the dictatorship till the globalization nowadays. Thomas Böltken manages to establish closure to the protagonists by letting their heirs - grandchildren, widows, lovers - speak.

Morgan Spurlock subjects himself to a diet based only on McDonald's fast food three times a day for thirty days without exercising to try to prove why so many Americans are fat or obese. He submits himself to a complete check-up by three doctors, comparing his weight along the way, resulting in a scary conclusion.

Returning to the mountains of northern Vietnam to investigate the mysterious abduction of his teenaged friends, an Australian filmmaker uncovers a local human trafficking crisis, and sparks an incredible series of events. Sisters For Sale is a powerful, very personal story exploring the complex realities of human trafficking; an inspiring true story of hope, courage and freedom, with the power to make a real difference.

In the middle of an economic crisis, in the shadow of Wall Street, an institution that represents a less well-known American tradition is booming. The Park Slope Food Coop: a cooperative supermarket where all 16,000 members work 3 hours per months to earn the right to buy the best food in New York at incredibly low prices. The success of this cooperative is a bad new for capitalism and aggro-alimentary business, and an opportunity to change the food production and distribution systems. We will see what has become of the Park Slope Food Coop, now a well-rooted institution in the heart of Brooklyn: the way it functions, its hundreds of rules, the diversity and eccentricity of its members. We'll see how the culture that has been created at the coop gives its members daily visceral lessons in democracy, how this could represent a potential change in mentality for Americans faced with increasingly difficult economic times.

Wars of the future will be fought over water as they are over oil today, as the source of human survival enters the global marketplace and political arena. Corporate giants, private investors, and corrupt governments vie for control of our dwindling supply, prompting protests, lawsuits, and revolutions from citizens fighting for the right to survive.

A New Zealand man discovers the health benefits of a plant-based diet after he suffers a heart attack.