Tattoo Girls

A bold reveal of a rose tattoo opens this 1980 documentary on tattooing in New Zealand. The potted history includes visits to tattoo parlours on K' Road and Hastings, and the studios of industry legends Steve Johnson and Roger Ingerton. Tattooists discuss public stigma, people's reasons for getting inked, and popular designs: sailors, serpents, swallows and tā moko. Made for documentary slot Contact, Skin Pics chronicles a time when "folk art has become high art".

Tattooing — "the world's oldest skin game" — is the subject of this iconic documentary. Writer/director Geoff Steven scored a major coup by signing Easy Rider legend Peter Fonda as his presenter. Travelling to Aotearoa, Samoa, Japan and the United States, the doco traces key developments in tattooing, including its importance in the Pacific, prison-inspired styles, and the influence of 1960s counterculture. Legendary tattooists feature (including Americans Ed Hardy and Jack Rudy), while the closing credits parade some eye-opening full body tattoos.

The film revolves around four female friends (Amina, Safynaz, Shahenda and Wedad) from Egypt with opposing religious, social, and political views in modern day Egypt. The four women listen to one another's views and argue openly, without ever breaking the bond that unites them.

This revealing documentary offers a rare view of daily life in West Africa. Shot in Senegal, Selbe focuses on the social role and economic responsibility of women in African society. Because men often leave their communities to earn money in the city, women are left with sole responsibility for their families. Through the character of Selbe we observe how one woman's personal struggle reflects the broader issues faced by many women in developing countries.

When we give something a name, does it lose or make sense? A female body proposes an apparently simple game - it asks women from diverse generations the definition of something that in theory unifies them. Part of a transmedia project, the film is the main entrance to a narrative that has many points of view and no right answer.

On October 23, 1998, a sniper carrying a high-powered rifle assassinated Dr. Barnett Slepian in his home, altering forever a family, a community, and the bounds of our imaginings about anti-abortion violence. This horrific act punctuated a decade of escalating harassment and violence against women’s heath care providers – a decade marred by murders, assaults, death threats, stalking, clinic blockades, arsons, bombings, and chemical attacks. How do these events affect the personal and professional lives of abortion providers? What motivates them to continue their work in the face of such terrorism?

It is the story of a little hair salon in the heart of the Arab community in Haifa (Israel); it is the story of a friendship between Arab and Jewish women in the city, which is considered a model of coexistence; and it is the story of Iris, the director, who worked as a hair washer at the salon so she could get to know women of the neighbourhood. Through her interaction with the women, in this unique frame, Iris wishes to tell the story of the community from the personal experience of the film's subjects, and to explore what it reflects of Israeli society.

Six young women programmed the world's first all-electronic programmable computer, ENIAC, as part of a secret US WWII project. They changed the world, but were never introduced and never received credit. These pioneers deserve to be known and celebrated: Betty Snyder Holberton, Jean Jennings Barik, Kay McNulty Mauchly Antonelli, Marlyn Wescoff Meltzer, Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum, and Frances Bilas Spence.

In this "beautifully intimate and utterly unique piece of cinema", Toby Amies crosses the line between filmmaker and carer, trying to cope with the strange and hilarious world view of the fragile eccentric, Drako Zarharzar. A love story. Drako Oho Zaraharzar can remember modeling for Salvador Dali and hanging out with The Stones. But he can’t remember yesterday. Following a severe head injury, Drako Zaraharzar suffers from terrible memory loss, he can access memories from before his accident, but can’t imprint new ones. As he puts it, “the recording machine in my head doesn’t work”. Consequently, and as an antidote to depression he chose to live “completely in the now” according to the bizarre mottoes delivered to him whilst in a coma.

Right at the heart of the debates on the discrimination of women in the film industry, this documentary raises questions, while offering a voice to women and their cinema. Catherine Breillat, Claire Denis, Mira Nair, Margarethe Von Trotta, Ulrike Ottinger, Micheline Lanctot, Rakshnan Bani-Etemad, María Novaro but also the names of the less visible directors of the general public. Joining the filmmakers are the voices and comments of producers, film specialists and archivists through whom our images are meticulously preserved.

Cuba, 1961: 250,000 volunteers taught 700,000 people to read and write in one year. 100,000 of the teachers were under 18 years old. Over half were women. MAESTRA explores this story through the personal testimonies of the young women who went out to teach literacy in rural communities across the island - and found themselves deeply transformed in the process.

Bloß keine Tochter!

For young Muslims who live in a free society, how is the culture of origin of the parents compatible with their own wishes? What significance does the commandment of virginity have?

The representation of women in contemporary Italian media

When terrorists shattered their lives, two women set off on an extraordinary journey to rebuild themselves and the lives of women half a world away.

A dive, the midday sunlight filtering down through the water. The air in her lungs has to last until she can dislodge the abalone. Dives like these have been carried out in Japan for over 2000 years by the Ama-San.

In 1985, the artist Ana Mendieta fell naked, thirty-four floors, from the window of her apartment in New York City. The only person with her at the time was her husband of only eight months, the renowned sculptor and art world celebrity, Carl Andre. Was her fall an accident, suicide or murder? "BloodWork' is the first film to address this controversial subject.

Sara writes a harsh blog about the bleak lives of Haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) women. Shulamit is an independent photographer who documents violent incidents on segregated busses on which women are required to seat at the back. Both of them were banned by their communities because of their desire to live normal, unsuppressed lives. These young women operate entirely alone and pay a very high price for violating the number-one rule of Haredi society: "Never air a dirty laundry in public." As they expose the violence of Haredi fanatics, acting in the name of modesty, they are punished by persecution and vilification. What will happen to them when they can no longer bear being shunned by their own family and friends? Wich way will they choose? where will they go? Black Bus, Soreret, tells the story of their singlehanded and courageous attempts to document and lead a change in the Haredi Society from which they have fled.

Documentary based on interviews during the Birmingham Tattoo Convention in the early '90s.

In the Espinhaço Mountains one winter, a group of small-town Brazilian girls are experiencing the end of their youth. Impossible romances leave marks on their bodies and the surrounding landscape. Each of the friends finds her own particular way to overcome the loneliness and to live within a tangle of uncertainty.