In this layered short film, filmmaker Janine Windolph takes her young sons fishing with their kokum (grandmother), a residential school survivor who retains a deep knowledge and memory of the land. The act of reconnecting with their homeland is a cultural and familial healing journey for the boys, who are growing up in the city. It’s also a powerful form of resistance for the women.
The Kalaallit people of Greenland have been intimately connected to the eternal ice for millennia. These massive glaciers stand as records of ancient eras of the planet – but recently they began disappearing. As the foundation of their traditions literally melts beneath their feet, members of the Kalaallit community work with artists to capture the images and stories of a vanishing landscape and way of life.
Tra la Terra ed il Mare
Nestled behind high mountains and dark forests lies Triberg, the birthplace of the cuckoo clock. For centuries, this cult item has been handcrafted right here, attracting tourists from all over the world. Ever since the boom of the 1980s has faded, the cuckoo clock has gradually lost its appeal and magic. And so has the place, which now resembles a ghost town. Its residents however still believe in their clock: Vendors, clockmakers and tourist guides alike fight to preserve their beloved heritage. Between abandoned restaurants and souvenir shops they hope for new tourists, while the clock continues ticking away.
On the shores of Jeju Island, a fierce group of South Korean divers fight to save their vanishing culture from looming threats.
IJswee is a documentary film about an ice club, a village and the warm winters. In the film we follow Oringers, the inhabitants of Odoorn, through the winter. The Oringers all experience IJswee in their own way. You will also see the Icecounter (Rafael van der Ziel), who builds ice sculptures and drinks frozen milk. You see the Drenthe countryside changing with the weather. You see animations, archive material and you hear the mysterious sounds of IJswee in the music of Wietse de Haan. And there are two trumpet players, who welcome winter with their music and say goodbye to it.
An intimate, arresting portrait of cyclist Moriah Wilson—raised by a fierce, loving family—whose singular drive becomes her superpower, carrying her to athletic brilliance and, devastatingly, toward a life cut short by murder.
Sean Penn is almost a living legend. His filmography paints a picture of an 'other America': the lower class, the oppressed and the outsiders. Whether as an actor or director, he turns all the great myths upside down.
From 1949 to summer the next year, Robert Kloster and Brita Gjerdåker Skre documented the daily working lives of the people on Havråtunet (Havretunet), a cluster farm on Havrå, Osterøy, that remains one of the only cluster farms to survive the 1850 Land Consolidation Act. This is the 130-minute original version of the documentary, distributed on DVDs by Geir Sundal in 2004, with the permission of Norsk Filminstitutt.
Jesa is a Korean tradition honoring one's ancestors. The filmmaker interviewed her parents about this ritual. However, it goes totally unexpected.
In the 70s, Barsham Faire on August Bank Holiday became a tradition for many to celebrate things 'medieval' and raise funds for local arts events. It put Barsham on the map.
Set against the vibrant spectacle of the jaripeo, a symbol of Mexican cowboy tradition and machismo, this story unveils a hidden world of queer desire and quiet rebellion. As glances and gestures disrupt the rigid norms of masculinity, the rodeo becomes a stage for our protagonists to navigate identity, community, and the search for belonging in an oppressively traditional space.
For thirty years in the late-twentieth century, the people of Tahiti survived dozens of offshore nuclear tests by the French government. Since the country was colonized in 1880, the blasts left Tahitians picking through the remnants of their islands and culture in an effort to keep indigenous knowledges alive. The film offers a poetic glimpse into contemporary Tahiti, and the colonial struggles its people still face as they strive to sustain their way of life.
Donkey Sex: The Most Bizarre Tradition
Part film, part baptism, in BLACK MOTHER director Khalik Allah brings us on a spiritual journey through Jamaica. Soaking up its bustling metropolises and tranquil countryside, Allah introduces us to a succession of vividly rendered souls who call this island home. Their candid testimonies create a polyphonic symphony, set against a visual prayer of indelible portraiture. Thoroughly immersed between the sacred and profane, BLACK MOTHER channels rebellion and reverence into a deeply personal ode informed by Jamaica’s turbulent history but existing in the urgent present.
Hold mig fast. Før jeg forsvinder
Every New Year, and in celebration of their Independence, Haitian families gather together to feast in honor of a line of ancestors that fought for their freedom. The centerpiece of the festivity is the joumou soup—a traditional soup dating back centuries ago. The joumou soup is a concretization of war and victory, oppression and emancipation, and the deeply rooted celebratory traditions of the Haitian culture.
A look into the history and tradition of Queen's Football in it's golden era, featuring never before seen footage of the university in the 1960s.
A journey through Italy across a century of popular religious devotion. Ancient and more recent saints, white and black Madonnas, devotional processions... are the expression of a need for the sacred that seems very distant from our way of being, but perhaps is not that distant at all. Today, especially in the South, but with some “isolated” locations in the North, popular faith is still a very real thing, which finds its finest expression in song and in music.
Filmed in six countries during fifteen years , "The Last Transhumance" takes us into the world of shepherds who walk with their animals very long distances in search for food: an ancient way of life not compatible with the modern world.