My Brother's Wedding

An African-American man working at a slaughterhouse in the Watts area of Los Angeles leads a dissatisfied and listless existence.

A hitchhiker named Martel Gordone gets in a fight with two bikers over a prostitute, and one of the bikers is killed. Gordone is arrested and sent to prison, where he joins the prison's boxing team in an effort to secure an early parole and to establish his dominance over the prison's toughest gang.

In 1902, an African-American family living on a sea island off the coast of South Carolina prepares to move to the North.

An enigmatic drifter from the South comes to visit an old acquaintance who now lives in South-Central LA.

A naive young woman moves from the South to stay with her aunt and uncle in Compton. As an outsider, she struggles at first to find her footing, but soon falls into the middle of a community of rebellious youth. She soon becomes more and more aware of the social injustices of the big city.

In this meditative film the everyday lives of poor Ethiopian peasants are shown using documentary as well as storytelling techniques, with its drama arising out of the timeless yet persistent issues of their lives.

Charlie Banks, chronically unemployed, struggles to find dignity and a meaning for life in the impoverished Los Angeles neighborhood of Watts.

The story of Dorothy and her husband T.C. He is a discharged Vietnam veteran who thought he would return home to a "hero's welcome." Instead he is falsely arrested and imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit. Her life revolves around the welfare office and a community facing poverty and unemployment. As a result of the film's events, both the main characters become radicalized and Dorothy eventually turns to violence.

Eddie Warmack, an African American jazz musician, is released from prison for the killing of a white gangster. Not willing to play for the mobsters who control the music industry, including clubs and recording studios, Warmack searches for his mentor and grandfather, the legendary jazz musician Poppa Harris.

Daydream Therapy is set to Nina Simone’s haunting rendition of “Pirate Jenny” and concludes with Archie Shepp’s “Things Have Got to Change.” Filmed in Burton Chace Park in Marina del Rey by activist-turned-filmmaker Bernard Nicolas as his first project at UCLA, this short film poetically envisions the fantasy life of a hotel worker whose daydreams provide an escape from workplace indignities. —Allyson Nadia Field

Ashes and Embers is an original screenplay by Haile Gerima, about a Vietnam veteran, who, several years after the war, is struggling to come to terms with his role in the war, and his role as a Black person in America. He survives by working odd jobs in Washington, D.C. and living with his girlfriend and her son. When criticism of his alienated behavior come from her and a father figure too often, he runs to the streets or to his grandmother's rural house in Virginia. Her criticism and his memories of the past both send him fleeing again to Los Angeles, where he is surrounded by superficial people who have forgotten how to be compassionate human beings. It is here that the advice of his friends and grandmother combine to transform him from an embittered ex-soldier to a strong and confident man.

Filmed in response to the LAPD’s shooting of Eulia Love in 1979, Gidget Meets Hondo opens with stills taken by Bernard Nicolas of a demonstration against Love’s killing. Nicolas’ Gidget is a self-absorbed young white woman who remains clueless to the violence erupting around her, ultimately to her own peril. The film asks whether such police brutality would be tolerated if the victim were a middle-class white woman.

A coming-of-age story about the formative sexual experiences of a young man who has an unusual pastime – staking out a known gay beat and watching men hook up. His ritual is disrupted one day when the boy he fancies turns up looking for casual sex with a stranger. When this encounter goes awry, he finds himself up close and personal with his infatuation and discovers the gap between sex as it exists in his imagination and reality.

Set in a small Nagano village in the 1930s, the film follows Hanji, a young boy captivated by a local kabuki performance. Inspired by Yukio, Hanji learns kabuki with Utako. As they grow, they become skilled actors, performing in a final kabuki before World War II. After the war, Hanji returns to revive kabuki and restore the community’s spirit. In the 1980s, as he nears death, the villagers organise a final performance in his honour, where he performs “Tenryu Koishibuki” for Yukio.

Dr Viktoria Wex arrives in a town in Masuria. She is about to say goodbye to the uncle who raised her as a surrogate father. The letter she received suggests that he has decided to take his own life.

Eight-year-old Kirill has big problems: he struggles at school, his parents are boring, and he has nowhere to put his lame stray dog. In short, he is at odds with the whole world. Then he meets journalist Vadim, who is easy to get along with and interesting. Vadim's interest is genuine — after all, Kirill is named after his deceased friend.

About the first Komsomol members.

The story revolves around Suha, the spoiled and only daughter of her father and engaged to Essam. During a trip she falls from a hill and loses her eyesight, her fiancée abandons her. Suha loses confidence in herself and all the people around her, and refuses to proceed to do another surgery after the failure of the first one. Doctor Salah tries to persuade her and pressure her through Essam to agree to the operation.