Some game trolls in the United States make a sport of getting other players “swatted” live during the game: they find out someone’s name and address, fake his caller ID, and make a bogus 911 call. The next thing you know, a SWAT team armed to the teeth is bursting into his house and giving him the fright of his life. This is all streamed live on camera, of course, so everyone can be in on the joke. Swatted is a cinematic exploration of this phenomenon based on 911 calls by offenders, YouTube videos of games and raids, and first-hand accounts of what it’s like to be swatted.
Bad Boy of Bonsai is an experimental art-house documentary that focuses on Guy Guidry, a Louisiana local, and his passion for bonsai.
An in-depth look at Dirty Harry (1971), featuring interviews with such film artists as Michael Madsen, 'Hal Holbrook', John Milius, 'Shane Black' and John Badham.
A young filmmaker struggles with her mental illness as she makes a documentary with the author Fiona Wright, and challenges her to express her experience with anorexia by preforming of one of her poems.
Underscored by French film legend Delphine Seyrig’s evocative recitation of a Henri Michaux poem, Maureen Fazendeiro’s film is a mysterious, multi-textured portrait of eclipse spectators in Portugal.
A generous and lyrical continuation of Lebanese artist Marwa Arsanios’ interest in the ties between ecology, feminism, and collective organization, this documentary showcases the radical politics of a Lebanese farming cooperative and the citizens of Jinwar, a women-only village in the north of Syria.
Documentary about the creative process of photographer Lua Morales, produced by the studio Bad Chinchilla.
In 1966, John Harlin II died while attempting Europe's most difficult climb, the North Face of the Eiger in Switzerland. 40 years later, his son John Harlin III, an expert mountaineer and the editor of the American Alpine Journal, returns to attempt the same climb.
The Kabul National Museum, once known as the "face of Afghanistan," was destroyed in 1993. We filmed the most important cultural treasures of the still-intact museum in 1988: ancient Greco-Roman art and antiquitied of Hellenistic civilization, as well as Buddhist sculpture that was said to have mythology--the art of Gandhara, Bamiyan, and Shotorak among them. After the fall of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan in 1992, some seventy percent of the contents of the museum was destroyed, stolen, or smuggled overseas to Japan and other countries. The movement to return these items is also touched upon. The footage in this video represents that only film documentation of the Kabul Museum ever made.
Grindcore Vacation melds the expository documentary, diary film, and live performance footage to produce a portrait of the musicians who play grindcore, an extreme sub-genre of punk/metal characterized by high speed and full volume. Shot during a weekend trip from Victoria BC to Dallas TX for a single DIY concert, it interviews members of Deterioration, Cognizant, and Imperial Slaughter. Live concert footage combines with interviews and Super 8mm film to create an impression of the people who play grindcore, why they love the genre, and their experiences as practitioners of the niche style.
A short about American life and history produced for the millennium New Year's Eve celebration.
A Calling Void is a short documentary-drama that sheds light on the complexity of emotion, distortions of reality and desperate needs for control a young woman encounters during her struggle with anorexia. Limited screenings in Vancouver are pending further festival submissions.
In a closed locker room, rugby players perform the last pre-match rituals. Warming up their souls and bodies, all tense in anticipation of the fight.
The National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), formed upon nationalization of the British Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, employed film systematically, producing many films on oil and petrochemical subjects. It also made films depicting Iran's progress and modernization, highlighting the role of the Shah and NIOC in that direction. Under its auspices, Ebrahim Golestan directed A FIRE (1961), a highly visual treatment of a seventy-day oil well fire in the Khuzestan region of southwestern Iran. This film was edited by the Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad and won two awards at the Venice Film Festival in 1961.
Documentary short film depicting the filmmaking activity at the Paramount Studios in Hollywood, featuring dozens of stars captured candidly and at work.
Harmful chemicals are disproportionately affecting Black communities in Southern Louisiana along the Mississippi River. I am One of the People is an experimental short film exposing the environmental racism of “Cancer Alley.”
The main (super)hero of Beatrice Baldacci’s documentary is a person depicted as the sum of her memories. The story of the director and her family is told in the first person, with home VHS recordings that show both Beatrice’s mother and Beatrice as a child taking on the role of an agent of memory. Outdated technology transforms the events of twenty years ago into an archaeological object.
El Lugar de los Peces
Having Cuba as a background, decadent and in crisis, in a black-and-white lacerated by the Caraibic swinging rain, Alex and Edith, a couple in their 30s, live their love story made of small daily gestures, stories from the past, nostalgia, and a deep intimacy.
A Japanese food writer embarks on her quest to cook the perfect Sunday roast. Her gravy evokes a taste of home both gently Japanese and quintessentially English. Blending her passion for British food with the memories that accompany each dish, it is a labor of love with all the trimmings.