An inside look at the notorious Sing Sing Correctional Facility, where one of the U.S.’s only in-prison college programs, Hudson Link, offers long-time inmates an education – and a new lease on life.
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Young members of 3 New Orleans school marching bands grow up in America's most musical city, and one of its most dangerous. Their band directors get them ready to perform in the Mardi Gras parades, and teach them to succeed and to survive.
Our era is marked by the transformation of social institutions, with universities central to Euro-American civilisation’s development. Despite past persecution, universities have become bastions of free thought and knowledge, crucial to democratic culture. However, commercialisation and massification have introduced challenges affecting teaching, research, self-governance, and the system overall. How do universities maintain academic freedoms, and what are the consequences of their failure? Can we identify and address these challenges?
Pete and Toshi Seeger, their son Daniel, and folklorist Bruce Jackson visited a Texas prison in Huntsville in March of 1966 and produced this rare document of of work songs by inmates of the Ellis Unit. Worksongs helped African American prisoners survive the grueling work demanded of them. With mechanization and integration, worksongs like these died out shortly after this film was made.
The youngsters housed in the "Almafuerte" Maximum Security Juvenile Institute have their first approach to audiovisual recording. A film and documentary video workshop serves as an excuse for them to make a short film inside the prison. The camera is a rabid toy that generates fascination in them and rescues a sheltered, innocent smile that seemed forgotten under the shadows. While inside libertarian cries bounce against the walls, outside sounds fanfares of an iron fist.
Animal captivity is a human decision. An apparently invisible but in the eyes of anyone behavioral pattern, calls into question the deprivation of freedom through a paranoid choreography.
The story of a pioneer, Germaine Le Goff (1891-1986). After World War I, the Breton teacher left Douarnenez for adventure, with a journey that led her to Senegal. In 1938, she founded and directed a teacher training college in Rufisque, near Dakar, the first for primary school teachers in Africa.
A documentary about young people just starting their higher education and their professional life.
The Big One is an investigative documentary from director Michael Moore who goes around the country asking why big American corporations produce their product abroad where labor is cheaper while so many Americans are unemployed, losing their jobs, and would happily be hired by such companies as Nike.
At America's elite MIT, a Ghanaian alum follows four African students as they strive to graduate and become agents of change for their home countries Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. Over an intimate, nearly decade-long journey, all must decide how much of America to absorb, how much of Africa to hold on to, and how to reconcile teenage ideals with the truths they discover about the world and themselves.
In the late 1960s, with the triumph of bilingualism and biculturalism, New Brunswick's Université de Moncton became the setting for the awakening of Acadian nationalism after centuries of defeatism and resignation. Although 40% of the province's population spoke French, they had been unable to make their voices heard. The movement started with students-sit-ins, demonstrations against Parliament, run-ins with the police - and soon spread to a majority of Acadians. The film captures the behind-the-scenes action and the students' determination to bring about change. An invaluable document of the rebirth of a people.
A documentary feature film which aims to expand the usually one-sided conversation between students and teachers. During its runtime, raw experiences heard from all sides of the conversation are laid bare during its 77 minute runtime. From all of these interviewees, including a student, a school psychiatrist, and five teachers, the viewer shouldn't expect to be confronted with a narrow perspective but rather a question: "where do I stand?"
In this short documentary, a Musqueam elder rediscovers his Native language and traditions in the city of Vancouver, in the vicinity of which the Musqueam people have lived for thousands of years. Writing the Land captures the ever-changing nature of a modern city - the glass and steel towers cut against the sky, grass, trees and a sudden flash of birds in flight and the enduring power of language to shape perception and create memory.
A group of uniformed Japanese schoolchildren make their way to class. But what they will be taught when they get there is a subject increasingly under government scrutiny. EDUCATION AND NATIONALISM traces growing government intervention in Japanese history and social science education over the last decade — a process embraced by the late Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Three boys, they all committed murder. After discovering their haunting faces and disturbing stories in a banned prison documentary from 1984, the filmmaker goes out to find them and discovers untold secrets and a Hungary he has never known.
Documentary profiling an Appalachian farming family struggling to scrape out a living. Linking education and economic development, The Children Must Learn suggests that better schooling, especially in agricultural techniques, would bring improvement.
Trevor McDonald goes to Rockville Correctional Facility in Indiana to speak with some of the women that live there.
“The Walkout” is a new documentary that brings to light a pivotal but often overlooked moment in Texas history: the 1968 student walkout at Edgewood High School in San Antonio’s Westside. Fed up with underfunded classrooms, uncertified teachers, and crumbling facilities, a group of young Mexican American students and their families organized a bold protest that would become a catalyst for statewide education reform. Told through the voices of the original students, community leaders, and historians, The Walkout weaves together personal testimony, historical footage, and present-day reflections to honor the legacy of resistance born in San Antonio’s Westside. This film doesn’t just revisit the past; it also draws a direct line to today’s struggles over school funding and equity in Texas.
Incarcerated men defy the odds to expose a cover-up in one of America’s deadliest prison systems.
An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation's history of racial inequality.
In the past 40 years, the War on Drugs has accounted for 45 million arrests, made America the world's largest jailer, and destroyed impoverished communities at home and abroad. Yet drugs are cheaper, purer, and more available today than ever. Where did we go wrong?
An impressionistic portrait of the iconic actor Harry Dean Stanton comprised of intimate moments, film clips from some of his 250 films and his renditions of American folk songs.
This revealing documentary honors the legendary Sidney Poitier—iconic actor, filmmaker, and civil rights activist. Featuring interviews with Denzel Washington, Spike Lee, Halle Berry, and more.
The life and career of an actor, artist, and icon. His own journey through his own camera.
Examines the public scandal and private tragedy which led to legendary director Roman Polanski's sudden flight from the United States.
Documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman takes us inside Northeast High School as a fly on the wall to observe the teachers and how they interact with the students.
Those who knew iconic funnyman John Candy best share his story, in their own words, through never-before-seen archival footage, imagery, and interviews.
JB Smoove and Martin Starr host a celebration of 20 years of "Spider-Man" movies, from the Sam Raimi trilogy to Marc Webb's movies and the trio from Jon Watts.
A documentary on a former Miss Wyoming who is charged with abducting and imprisoning a young Mormon Missionary.
Join the likes of Jeremy Renner, Hailee Steinfeld, Florence Pugh, and Vincent D’Onofrio as they reveal how Marvel Studios’ “Hawkeye” was conceived and created. Witness firsthand what it took to pull off the show’s pulse-pounding action set pieces, and discover how iconic characters from the pages of Marvel Comics such as Kate Bishop were adapted and brought to life for the six-episode series.
SEDUCED AND ABANDONED combines acting legend Alec Baldwin with director James Toback as they lead us on a troublesome and often hilarious journey of raising financing for their next feature film. Moving from director to financier to star actor, the two players provide us with a unique look behind the curtain at the world's biggest and most glamourous film festival, shining a light on the bitter-sweet relationship filmmakers have with Cannes and the film business. Featuring insights from directors Martin Scorsese, 'Bernando Bertolucci' and Roman Polanski; actors Ryan Gosling and Jessica Chastain and a host of film distribution luminaries.
As a visually radical memoir, CAMERAPERSON draws on the remarkable footage that filmmaker Kirsten Johnson has shot and reframes it in ways that illuminate moments and situations that have personally affected her. What emerges is an elegant meditation on the relationship between truth and the camera frame, as Johnson transforms scenes that have been presented on Festival screens as one kind of truth into another kind of story—one about personal journey, craft, and direct human connection.
Unravel the case of Utah therapist Jodi Hildebrandt, whose child abuse arrest with parenting YouTuber Ruby Franke exposed a twisted tale of manipulation.
In this genre-bending tale, Errol Morris explores the mysterious death of a U.S. scientist entangled in a secret Cold War program known as MK-Ultra.
A documentary about ten very different lives connected by having appeared onscreen wearing masks or helmets in Star Wars.
A documentary about the making of season five of the acclaimed AMC series Breaking Bad.
Daniel Craig candidly reflects on his 15 year adventure as James Bond. Including never-before-seen archival footage from Casino Royale to the upcoming 25th film No Time To Die, Craig shares his personal memories in conversation with 007 producers, Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli.
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.