Grasshopper Film (Firm)
Description
Every day, hundreds of visitors seek refuge at the Bibliothèque Publique d'Information (Public Information Library) in the heart of Paris. Between the bookshelves, we meet inspired students, passionate experts, and researchers exploring a topic, as well as individuals just seeking quiet and respite from the outside world. Forced English Subtitles.
2) Futura
Description
Following in the footsteps of a long line of documentarians, a collective of three Italian filmmakers known for their politically acute cinema Pietro Marcello (Martin Eden), Francesco Munzi (Black Souls), and Alice Rohrwacher (Happy as Lazzaro) set out to interview a cross-section of their nation₂s youth about their hopes, dreams, and fears for the future. With today₂s political divisions, socioeconomic unease, overreliance on technology, and...
Description
In 1976, William Eggleston's images were featured in the Museum of Modern Art's first one-man exhibition of color photographs. It is rare for an artist of such stature to allow himself to be shown as unguarded as Eggleston does in Michael Almereyda's intimate portrait. The filmmaker tracks the photographer on trips but gives particular attention to downtime in Memphis, Eggleston's home base. The film shows a deep connection between Eggleston's enigmatic...
Description
"The American Sector explores the presence of the Berlin Wall in the United States: as an object, artifact, and supposed symbol of national values. For 18 months Pacho Velez and Courtney Stephens traveled the US to document sections of the wall that are on display in over 75 locations, ranging from the serious (Fort Benning) to the bizarre (Main Street Station Casino in Las Vegas) and even the campus of nearby Capital University. Along the way, interviews...
6) Caniba
Description
Issei Sagawa was arrested in Paris on June 13, 1981, when spotted emptying two bloody suitcases containing the remains of his Dutch classmate. Two days earlier, Mr. Sagawa had killed her and begun eating her. Declared legally insane, he returned to Japan and has been free ever since. Ostracized from society, he has made his living off his crime by writing novels, drawing manga, appearing in documentaries and sexploitation films in which he reenacts...
7) Black mother
Description
Part film, part baptism, 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...
8) In my room
Description
Lost in life and beset by a recent passing, Armin has nowhere to go and just as much to show for himself. Fate (or something like it) intervenes when Armin awakes one morning and discovers that seemingly all of humanity has disappeared, leaving him to his limited devices and opening the door for self-discovery but the gift of maximum freedom bears complications.
Description
Winner of major prizes at the Berlin and Turin film festivals, this hauntingly beautiful debut feature from Pietro Marcello interweaves two love stories: the twenty-year romance between a Sicilian tough guy and a transsexual former junkie who he met in prison, and a poetic reverie of the Italian port town of Genoa, depicted in all its mysterious, fading glory. The Mouth of the Wolf masterfully combines documentary with fiction, melancholy home movies...
11) Los conductos
Description
Medelln̕, Colombia. Pinky is on the run. He has just freed himself from the grip of a religious sect. He finds a place to squat and a job in a tee-shirt factory. Misled by his faith, he questions everything. But as he tries to put back together with the pieces of his broken life, violent memories return to haunt him and ask for Revenge. Winner of the Best First Feature prize at the 2020 Berlin Film Festival.
12) Change of life
Description
Paulo Rocha's haunting second feature, Change of Life, is the beautifully told story of a young man who returns from abroad to his small fishing village to discover that much has changed.
Description
"A poetic, experimental debut feature circling the origin of the death myth from the Chinookan people in the Pacific Northwest, the film follows two people as they wander through their surrounding nature, the spirit world, and something much deeper inside. At its center are Sweetwater Sahme and Jordan Mercier, who take separate paths contemplating their afterlife, rebirth, and death. Probing questions about humanity's place on earth and other worlds,...
14) Bulletproof
Description
The documentary explores the complexities of violence in schools by looking at the strategies employed to prevent it. The film observes the longstanding rituals that take place in and around American schools: homecoming parades, basketball practice, morning announcements, and math class. Unfolding alongside these scenes are a collection of newer traditions: lockdown drills, teacher firearms training, metal detector screenings, and school safety trade...
15) Fourteen
Description
Mara and Jo, in their twenties, have been close friends since middle school. It soon becomes apparent that Jo, despite her intellectual gifts, is unreliable in her professional life, losing and acquiring jobs at a troubling rate. Substance abuse may be responsible for Jo's instability, but some observers suspect a deeper problem. Over a decade, the more stable Mara sometimes tries to help, sometimes backs away to protect herself, but never leaves...
Description
"A young man's disappearance is at the center of Ricky D'Ambrose's [debut] feature 'Notes on an appearance,' a film set inside New York City apartments, subway stations, bookstores, and cafés, as the supporters of an enigmatic and controversial political theorist embark on a covert program of indiscriminate violence and censure. But Todd and Madeleine, who search for the missing David, soon enter the company of strangers promising diversion and...
Description
"Though her life generated voluminous literature, most people ignore the fact that iconic deaf-blind author Helen Keller (1880-1968) was one of the most passionate socialist advocates of her time. Continuing his work of patient and insightful political filmmaking, director John Gianvito (Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind) resurrects Keller's radical views, which have been largely suppressed or sanitized over the years. In Her Socialist Smile,...
Description
Nominated for Best Documentary by the Director's Guild, Producer's Guild, Independent Spirit Awards, and Gotham Awards, and winner of Best Documentary at the Tribeca Film Festival, this film explores the paradoxical pursuit of wealth and progress in China. Loosely structured around the distinct social and economic classes that divide the nation, this extraordinary documentary follows factory workers, middle class consumers and elites as they chase...
19) Arábia =: Araby
Description
Andre, a teenager, lives in an industrial town in Brazil near an old aluminum factory. One day, a factory worker, Cristiano, suffers an accident. Asked to go to Cristiano's house to pick up clothes and documents, Andre stumbles on a notebook, and it's here that Araby begins or, rather, transforms. As Andre reads from the journal entries, we are plunged into Cristiano's life, into stories of his wanderings, adventures, and loves.
20) Rewind & play
Description
"In December 1969, legendary jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk ended his European concert tour with a performance at the Salle Pleyel in Paris. Before the show, he was invited to appear on a French television program to perform and answer questions in an intimate setting. Using newly discovered footage from this recording, director Alain Gomis (FÉLICITÉ) reveals the disconnect between Monk and his interviewer, Henri Renaud, whose unwittingly...