The world couldn't keep its eyes off two athletes at the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer - Nancy Kerrigan, the elegant brunette from the Northeast, and Tonya Harding, the feisty blonde engulfed in scandal. Just weeks before the Olympics on Jan. 6, 1994 at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Kerrigan was stunningly clubbed on the right knee by an unknown assailant and left wailing, "Why, why, why?" As the bizarre "why" mystery unraveled, it was revealed that Harding's ex-husband, Jeff Gillooly, had plotted the attack with his misfit friends to literally eliminate Kerrigan from the competition. Now two decades later, THE PRICE OF GOLD takes a fresh look through Harding's turbulent career and life at the spectacle that elevated the popularity of professional figure skating and has Harding still facing questions over what she knew and when she knew it.
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.
The film describes the microcosmos of the small village Wacken and shows the clash of the cultures, before and during the biggest heavy metal festival in Europe.
A Zen priest in San Francisco and cookbook author use Zen Buddhism and cooking to relate to everyday life.
Jesus Camp is a Christian summer camp where children hone their "prophetic gifts" and are schooled in how to "take back America for Christ". The film is a first-ever look into an intense training ground that recruits born-again Christian children to become an active part of America's political future.
E-Team is driven by the high-stakes investigative work of four intrepid human rights workers, offering a rare look at their lives at home and their dramatic work in the field.
Fed Up blows the lid off everything we thought we knew about food and weight loss, revealing a 30-year campaign by the food industry, aided by the U.S. government, to mislead and confuse the American public, resulting in one of the largest health epidemics in history.
Five interwoven stories of remarkable courage from Nuremberg to Rwanda, from Darfur to Syria, and from apathy to action.
The Mona Lisa Curse is a Grierson award-winning polemic documentary by art critic Robert Hughes that examines how the world's most famous painting came to influence the art world. With his trademark style, Hughes explores how museums, the production of art and the way we experience it have radically changed in the last 50 years, telling the story of the rise of contemporary art and looking back over a life spent talking and writing about the art he loves, and loathes. In these postmodern days it has been said that there is no more passé a vocation than that of the professional art critic. Perceived as the gate keeper for opinions regarding art and culture, the art critic has supposedly been rendered obsolete by an ever expanding pluralism in the art world, where all practices and disciplines are purported to be equal and valid. Robert Hughes, however, is one art critic who has delivered a message that must not be ignored.
Alanis Obomsawin’s documentary The People of the Kattawapiskak River exposes the housing crisis faced by 1,700 Cree in Northern Ontario, a situation that led Attawapiskat’s band chief, Theresa Spence, to ask the Canadian Red Cross for help. With the Idle No More movement making front page headlines, this film provides background and context for one aspect of the growing crisis.
Follows the behind-the-scenes work of Studio Ghibli, focusing on the notable figures Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Toshio Suzuki.
According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, one veteran dies by suicide in America every 80 minutes. While only 1% of Americans has served in the military, former service members account for 20% of all suicides in the U.S. Based in Canandaigua, NY and open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the Veterans Crisis Line receives more than 22,000 calls each month from veterans of all conflicts who are struggling or contemplating suicide. This timely documentary spotlights the traumas endured by America’s veterans, as seen through the work of the hotline’s trained responders. CRISIS HOTLINE captures extremely private moments, where the professionals, many of whom are themselves veterans or veterans’ spouses, can often interrupt the thoughts and plans of suicidal callers to steer them out of crisis.
In the early twentieth century, the Hotel Nueva Isla was an emblematic luxury hotel. After the Cuban Revolution, it was confiscated by the State and became a shelter for homeless people. Located in Old Havana, today it is an imposing ruin. Jorge de los Rios, a retired clerk, is one of the few residents who remain there, along with La Flaca, his lover, and Waldo, a young itinerant. As the rest leave for safer places, Jorge clings to his dilapidated home and its buried treasures, slowly digging his way through its debris. The film speaks poignantly to a lost generation who fought in the Cuban Revolution and dreamed of a better society.
Commissioned to make a propaganda film about the 1936 Olympic Games in Germany, director Leni Riefenstahl created a celebration of the human form. This first half of her two-part film opens with a renowned introduction that compares modern Olympians to classical Greek heroes, then goes on to provide thrilling in-the-moment coverage of some of the games' most celebrated moments, including African-American athlete Jesse Owens winning a then-unprecedented four gold medals.
Commissioned to make a propaganda film about the 1936 Olympic Games in Germany, director Leni Riefenstahl created a celebration of the human form. Where the two-part epic's first half, Festival of the Nations, focused on the international aspects of the 1936 Olympic Games held in Berlin, part two, The Festival of Beauty, concentrates on individual athletes such as equestrians, gymnasts, and swimmers, climaxing with American Glenn Morris' performance in the decathalon and the games' majestic closing ceremonies.
Finns have a quirky sense of humour - and are a bit shy. But: Tango is THE folk music of the Finns. The documentary discovers the Finnish tango from the viewpoint of the singer Chino Laborde, the guitarist Diego "DIPI" Kvitko and the bandoneonist Pablo Greco. The three Argentine musicians travel to Finland to find out whether Aki Kaurismäki is telling the truth when he asserts that tango music was invented in Finland.
Half a million people descend upon a tiny Serbian village for the 50th anniversary of the world's largest trumpet festival. Brasslands chronicles the cultural and musical collisions through the personal journeys of 3 musicians - American, Serbian, Roma - whose lives are bound to Balkan brass for very different reasons.
In the sixties, Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007) built a house on the remote island of Fårö, located in the Baltic Sea, and left Stockholm to live there. When he died, the house was preserved. A group of very special film buffs, came from all over the world, travel to Fårö in search of the genius and his legacy. (An abridged version of Bergman's Video, 2012.)
A magic realist fable about invisible elves, financial collapse and the surprising power of belief, told through the story of an Icelandic woman - a real life Lorax who speaks on behalf of nature under threat.
Perfect Life, the second feature by Emily Tang (Tang Xiaobai), at first revolves around Li Yueying, a young woman in the cold north-east of China. In a world where no one is waiting for an untrained, inexperienced woman, she knows that in order to fulfil her dreams she will have to resort to her own stubbornness and selfishness. Her father deserted her mother and the money saved by the family is destined for her younger brother's studies. When she stops working for a shop making artificial limbs in order to take a job as a chambermaid, she attracts the attention of a mysterious criminal, Mongol. Then in the editing, the documentary story of Jenny from Hong Kong starts to emerge. She thought she had her life perfectly worked out, but when her marriage breaks down, she also finds herself in financial problems and has to fight for the custody of her children.