In the midst of a catastrophic steel industry collapse, a remarkable grassroots community effort leads to a national healthcare program that helps more than 200 million children...and counting.
Social & External
The people behind it
Lou Consolo
Protestor
Shows a campaign launched in Halifax in 1967 to probe the core of poverty in that city--low incomes, ill health and inadequate housing affect more than twelve thousand people in the central area. The project combines the efforts of local agencies with those of government agencies to alleviate these conditions.
This 1979 documentary depicts the daily life of gangs in the South Bronx. It deals primarily with two African American and Puerto Rican gangs known as the "Savage Skulls" and the "Savage Nomads".
After a routine partial hip replacement operation leaves his mother in a coma with permanent brain damage, what starts as a son's video diary becomes a citizen's investigation into the future of American health care.
FLYIN' CUT SLEEVES, completed in 1993, portrays street gang presidents in the Bronx. Their world was the streets, set against a backdrop of uprooted families, cultural alienation, drugs and violence. Neighborhood teenagers responded by organizing into street groups known to the members as "families", but labeled in the most alarming terms as violent gangs by the press. The documentation of these lives over a twenty-year period offers a remarkable perspective on life in the ghetto (spanning four generations), and the means that people devise to cope from the time that they are children to when they serve as parents and role models for a new generation.
Carmen accompanies a group of women who must travel from the island of Vieques to San Juan, capital of Puerto Rico, in order to perform breast biopsies. The long journey is by water and road. Amid many fears and vicissitudes, Carmen confirms once again the need for appropriate medical services for both women and for the rest of the Vieques population.
An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.
Megacities is a documentary about the slums of four different metropolitan cities.
This film is part of the Semmelweis Project, launched by Direkt36, an investigative journalism center based in Hungary, to show the reality and the causes of hospital-acquired infections, which are a growing problem in the country.
One billion people on our planet—one in six—live in shantytowns, slums or squats. Slums: Cities of Tomorrow challenges conventional thinking to propose that slums are in fact the solution, not the problem, to urban overcrowding caused by the massive migration of people to cities. (Lynne Fernie, HotDocs)
Focuses on the state of the Quebec health system in the early 1970s. This film reveals the harsh reality of emergency rooms. There, medical teams, facing a serious shortage of staff, are facing a real invasion of patients. The technical means, often insufficient, make the task even more difficult.
FRONTLINE and NPR investigate the growing inequities in American healthcare exposed by COVID-19. The Healthcare Divide examines how pressure to increase profits and uneven government support are widening the divide between rich and poor hospitals, endangering care for low-income populations.
Santiago Mitre co-directs his first movement following The Student together with choreographer Onofri Barbato. Although it would have been more accurate to say “his first film-story-adventure-movie-great movie following The Student”, the word movement fits perfectly in Los posibles, the most overwhelmingly kinetic work Argentine cinema has delivered in many, many years. The film deals with the adaptation of a dance show directed by Onofri together with a group of teenagers who came to Casa La Salle, a center of social integration located in González Catán, trying to find some refuge from hardship. Already entitled Los posibles, the piece opened in the La Plata Tacec and was later staged in the AB Hall of the San Martín Cultural Center. Now, it dazzles audiences out of a film screen, with extraordinary muscles and a huge heart: Los posibles is a rhapsody of roughen bodies and torn emotions. Precise and exciting, it’s our own delayed, necessary, and incandescent West Side Story.
The story of unemployment in New Zealand and In A Land of Plenty is an exploration of just that; it takes as its starting point the consensus from The Depression onwards that Godzone economic policy should focus on achieving full employment, and explores how this was radically shifted by the 1984 Labour government. Director Alister Barry's perspective is clear, as he trains a humanist lens on ‘Rogernomics' to argue for the policy's negative effects on society, as a new poverty-stricken underclass developed.
Every year many new drugs come to market which offer hope to the sick and dying. This documentary film investigates just how far drug companies are prepared to go to get their drugs approved, what they will do to make sure they get the prices they want, and what happens when profits are put before people.
Documentary about what makes a house a home.
The story of Shaista, a young man who—newly married to Benazir and living in a camp for displaced persons in Kabul—struggles to balance his dreams of being the first from his tribe to join the Afghan National Army with the responsibilities of starting a family. Even as Shaista’s love for Benazir is palpable, the choices he must make to build a life with her have profound consequences.
After the waning of the protests in Sanrizuka, Ogawa Pro started questioning the future of the collective and looking for other subjects to film. Following the method developed in the previous films, the filmmakers moved to the slum of Kotobuchi in the port city of Yokohama, where more than 6000 people were struggling to get by without any means of survival, exposed to industrial accidents and diseases. The result is one of the most moving films produced by the collective, a series of beautifully filmed portraits, voicing the silenced stories and songs of a group of people living in this community. Credit: ICA London
Peter Watkins' global look at the impact of military use of nuclear technology and people's perception of it, as well as a meditation on the inherent bias of the media, and documentaries themselves.
HOMELESS is a documentary that humanizes unhoused people and explores their backgrounds, dreams and struggles to find the way home. The film aims to raise awareness and funds to end homelessness, which is an ever more urgent global challenge: The United Nations Human Settlements Program estimates that 1.6 billion people live in inadequate housing, and the best available data suggests that more than 100 million people have no housing at all.
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
Vulgar, taunting texts blow up the phones of a teen and her boyfriend. Who's sending them — and why? This twisty documentary reveals the shocking answer.
A string of threatening emails escalates into a revenge plot involving a newly married US marshal and his ex-girlfriend.
In an intimate and joyful story of love in the face of loss, celebrated poets Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley find strength—and unexpected hilarity—in what might be their final year together.
Ranjit, a farmer in India, takes on the fight of his life when he demands justice for his 13-year-old daughter, the victim of a brutal gang rape. His decision to support his daughter is virtually unheard of, and his journey unprecedented.
An inside look at one of the most anticipated movie sequels ever with James Cameron and cast.
A tribute to Chadwick Boseman, celebrating his life and legacy.
An astonishing journey revealing the awesome power of the natural world. Over the course of one single day, we track the sun from the highest mountains to the remotest islands to exotic jungles.
A look at the origins, history and conspiracies behind the "Majestic 12", a clandestine group of military and corporate figureheads charged with reverse-engineering extraterrestrial technology.
Musician and performance artist Laurie Anderson reflects on the deaths of her husband Lou Reed, her mother and her beloved dog.
A documentary about the making of season five of the acclaimed AMC series Breaking Bad.
In a crime-plagued neighborhood near Miami, brutal, bare-knuckled backyard fights give young men a chance to earn money -- and self-respect.
Alexander McQueen's rags-to-riches story is a modern-day fairy tale, laced with the gothic. Mirroring the savage beauty, boldness and vivacity of his design, this documentary is an intimate revelation of McQueen's own world, both tortured and inspired, which celebrates a radical and mesmerizing genius of profound influence.
From the heights of her modeling fame to her tragic death, this documentary reveals Anna Nicole Smith through the eyes of the people closest to her.
A detailing of the rise to prominence and global sporting superstardom of six supremely talented young Manchester United football players (David Beckham, Nicky Butt, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, Phil and Gary Neville). The film covers the period 1992-1999, culminating in Manchester United's European Cup triumph.
A group of British children aged 7 from widely ranging backgrounds are interviewed about a range of subjects. The filmmakers plan to re-interview them at 7 year intervals to track how their lives and attitudes change as they age.
Director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born adults after a 7 year wait. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.
After the high-profile killing of Damilola Taylor, Cornelius' family move out of London. But when they discover their new town is run by racists, Cornelius takes a drastic step to survive.
A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.
Explores the true story of the notorious Jesse James, how the myth developed during his lifetime, and how the legends have persisted over 100 years after his death at the hands of his former friend, Robert Ford.