Playlist
Ruby, the only hearing person in her deaf family, is torn between her love of music and staying to support her family's fishing business.
After the death of his grandmother, a Mexican biologist living in New York returns to his hometown nestled in the majestic monarch butterfly forests of Michoacán after many years. The journey forces him to confront past traumas and reflect on his new hybrid identity, launching him on a personal and spiritual metamorphosis.
John, a boy on the edge of adolescence, traps his family in a hole in the ground in this unnerving coming-of-age tale.
A single man in his 40s hires a surrogate, and an unlikely friendship forms, challenging perceptions of love and connection.
Two men confront a shared past involving a murder they covered up as children, and the trauma that continues to haunt them.
An exploration of the shared histories of cameras, weapons, policing and justice. As surveillance technologies become a fixture in everyday life, the film interrogates the complexity of an objective point of view, probing the biases inherent in both human perception and the lens.
Not Available - Sundance Film Festival 2021
Three teenage girls in Texas confront the challenges of adolescence, freedom, and gender norms during a summer of transition.
Chronicles the Class of 2020 at Oakland High School amid a year of pandemic, social unrest, and activism for systemic change.
A group of rebellious Catholic nuns fight for social justice, civil rights, and equality throughout decades of resistance.
"A mother wonders, will my children love their perfect machines more than they love me, their imperfect mother? She switches on a smart-crib lulling her crying baby to sleep. This perfect mother is everywhere. She watches over us, takes care of us. We listen to her. We trust her."
A mother toils to save money to build a road in a Himalayan village to take her wheelchair-bound son for physiotherapy, but her husband, who believes that an expensive religious ritual is the remedy, steals her savings.
A mysterious break-in exposes tensions and buried conflicts in the life of a middle-class European family.
A NYC bartender returns to Thailand to help a terminally ill friend fulfill his bucket list, but both are hiding painful truths.
A mysterious and deadly pink cloud appears across the globe, forcing everyone to stay home. Strangers at the outset, Giovana and Yago try to invent themselves as a couple as years of shared lockdown pass. While Yago is living in his own utopia, Giovana feels trapped deep inside." Principal cast: Renata de Lélis, Eduardo Mendonça.
Sundance Film Festival 2021 / Image courtesy of Sundance Institute
Amidst the devastation of post-crisis Spain, mother and daughter bluff and grift to keep up the lifestyle they think they deserve, bonding over common tragedy and an impending eviction.
A young Swedish woman enters LA's adult film industry in search of fame, confronting the line between empowerment and exploitation.
A spiritual journey into the highlands of Harar, immersed in the rituals of khat, a leaf Sufi Muslims chewed for centuries for religious meditations – and Ethiopia's most lucrative cash crop today. A tapestry of intimate stories offers a window into the dreams of youth under a repressive regime.
Sundance Film Festival 2021 / Image Courtesy of Sundance Institute
Amin, a former Afghan refugee, recounts his hidden past and survival story decades after resettling in Denmark.
A Holocaust memoir turns out to be a fabrication, unraveling a tale of deception, trauma, and manipulation.
Valerie Taylor is a shark fanatic and an Australian icon – a marine maverick who forged her way as a fearless diver, cinematographer and conservationist. She filmed the real sharks for JAWS and famously wore a chainmail suit, using herself as shark bait, changing our scientific understanding of sharks forever.
Zimbabwe's opposition leader faces a pivotal election, navigating power struggles and democratic challenges.
With only a mobile phone and a gun, a small group rescues Yazidi girls enslaved by ISIS in Syria's most dangerous refugee camp.
A powerful man, who is also the former prime minister of Georgia, has developed an exquisite hobby. He collects century old trees along Georgia's coastline. He commissions his men to uproot them and bring them to his private garden. Some of these trees are as tall as 15-floor-buildings.
A powerful and uplifting documentary about the fearless journalists behind Khabar Lahariya, India's only newspaper run by Dalit ("untouchable") women, as they fight for truth and justice in the face of hostile patriarchy and the rise of the right.
This amazing, powerful, and inspiring documentary shows that even the most downtrodden and powerless can move mountains with determination and courage. Khabar Lahariya ("News Wave") is India's only all-woman news outlet, founded in 2002 in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh by Dalit women (once called, and still often treated as, "untouchables"). Widely predicted to fail immediately, it has instead flourished and, as the film begins, is undertaking the challenging but necessary switch from print to digital media. All the reporters are given smartphones—some of whom have never touched the family phone for fear of breaking it—and patiently encouraged. Wife-and-husband directing team Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh focus on three main characters: trailblazing head reporter Meera, new but promising recruit Shyamkali, and dedicated youngster Suneeta. The women are also shown at home, with husbands or fathers who are bemused or hostile to their careers. They investigate stories of unprosecuted rapes and murders, the corruption of illegal mining operations, the rise of Hindu nationalism, and much more. Facing entrenched gender bias, overwhelming obstacles, and threats, they continue to fight for truth and justice with surprising success. Winner of both the Audience and Special Jury documentary prizes at this year's Sundance Film Festival.
— Ruth Hayler
A character-driven vérité and revelatory investigation takes us on a journey embedded with firefighters and residents on a mission to understand the causes of historically large wildfires and how to survive them, discovering that the solution has been here all along.
In the 1800s, a man investigates violent attacks in a village, only to uncover a supernatural horror lurking beneath.
On the last day on Earth, one woman goes on a journey through LA to make it to her last party before the world ends, running into an eclectic cast of characters along the way.
As a disastrous virus grips the planet, a scientist and a park scout venture deep into the forest for a routine equipment run. Through the night, their journey becomes a terrifying voyage through the heart of darkness as the forest comes to life around them.
How did the Chinese government turn pandemic cover ups in Wuhan into a triumph for the Communist party?
Not available - Sundance Film Festival 2021 - US Dramatic Competition
A grieving woman searches for meaning and healing in the vast expanse of the American wilderness after a devastating event.
After a school shooting, the parents of the victim and the perpetrator meet for an emotionally fraught confrontation.
Larry Krasner is elected Philadelphia District Attorney in 2018. A powerful and progressive prosecutor, a leading civil rights advocate, he fights a relentless battle to reform a discriminating and violent system. A gripping politico-legal thriller in eight episodes, revealing the divides in a country that is tearing itself apart.
A criminal is sent to retrieve a kidnapped woman in a post-apocalyptic supernatural realm filled with curses and chaos.
At the Maca correctional facility in the Ivorian capital of Abidjan, the inmates run the prison, a place all but ruled by folkloric superstitions. Tonight, upon the rising of a red moon, a newly arrived prisoner (Koné Bakary), jailed for pickpocketing, has been selected by the autocratic Lord Blackbeard to assume the position of "Roman storyteller": he must keep his fellow inmates entertained with wild tales or risk his own life. As this Scheherazade-like scenario unfolds, he tells the story of Zama, the childhood friend who became a legendary crime boss. Paying homage to the tradition of the griot in West African culture, Night of the Kings is a work of Shakespearean fabulism and gripping, energetic filmmaking, an altogether original vision from Ivory Coast filmmaker Philippe Lacôte
Margaret has been plagued with dreams of a strange world since she was a little girl. After a mysterious man with a map visits her one night, she decides to give in to the incessant calls of The Blazing World...
A re-imagining of Romeo and Juliet, taking place through their cell phones, in a mash-up of Shakespearean dialogue with current social media communication.
Not Available - Sundance Film Festival 2021
In encounters alternately humorous and touching, a diverse set of New Yorkers navigate their preferred dating apps in search of their special someone.
Not Available - Sundance Film Festival 2021
In 2035, auditors don't just want to see your receipts for hidden expenses, they want to see your dreams. One such inspector, James (co-director Kentucker Audley), arrives at the house of Bella, an older woman, and finds himself falling in love with the younger version he encounters in her dreams. Meanwhile, a business conglomerate tries to populate her reveries with ads for fried chicken. Whimsical and unique, the film uses a story of blossoming love to depict the priceless sanctuary of imagination.
A lonely teen becomes immersed in a creepy online horror role-playing game, losing herself in its dark digital world.
Documentary filmmaker Rodney Ascher tackles this question "are we living in a simulation?" with testimony, philosophical evidence and scientific explanation in his for the answer.
After a traumatic event, a woman hears mysterious knocking in her apartment, questioning her sanity and the reality around her.
The revelation in 2017 that the late Dr. Karbaat clandestinely used his own semen to inseminate over 65 of his patients shocked the world. SEEDS OF DECEIT is a vivid portrayal of how that happened and how it haunts today those affected: the emotional trauma of coming to terms with a changed, uncertain genetic origin.
Mae, lonely and awkward, navigates pandemic-era dating with unexpected consequences after a video dinner with a stranger.
In present-day South Africa, a devout woman enters a transactional relationship to support her ill husband.
A lonely old man visits one of the last animals on Earth — a creature named Yoruga.
A single Afghan father juggles work and childcare in a new country while dealing with racism.
An update to the 1970s Black ABCs, blending documentary, performance, and satire to reflect on Black identity.
A biracial bride hires her Black father to walk her down the aisle in a racially tense Southern wedding.
A young girl is taken to a shaman after shaming her family; she undergoes a painful awakening and transformation.
A son struggles with how to say goodbye to his deceased father in an awkwardly emotional moment.
Just before the pandemic, the world experiences a phenomenon never seen before. Marilene looks for her daughter Roberta, a trans woman who went missing. While running out of time, she discovers a hope for the future.
A life insurance company uses an AI algorithm to determine the risk of a new applicant. The subsequent denial sparks a period of introspection for the individual in question.
Forever was created with the experimental technique of using LiDAR to capture real life moments and environments. The LiDAR unit used to acquire the footage was originally created for self-driving cars. This junction of technology and filmmaking intersects with the subject of the film. AI uses LiDAR to "see" humanity in accurate detail, but has resolution limitations. In both story and style, Forever explores the boundary of advanced technology and the human experience.
A powerful confrontation with the experience of being Black in the 21st century.
Depressed influencer Igor believes his social media success is sabotaging his dating life.
A woman faces the emotional aftermath of reporting sexual harassment at work.
River stories intertwine as a woman reunites with an ex and a man seeks treatment for insomnia at a temple.
A poetic meditation on grief, familial loss, and the lasting presence of love.
A young Mormon missionary must confront his shame over pornography addiction during a temple interview.
As Seolgi is lying on a grass field with friends, a shooting star falls, and dark, intrusive thoughts hit her. Her melancholy blooms into bright and colorful "flower people," dancing and wishing for a meteorite to end the world.
Based on the ancient animistic beliefs and shamanic rituals in Mongolia and Siberia, an exploration of the indigenous worldview and wisdom. Against the backdrop of the modern existential crisis and the human-induced rapid environmental change, there is a necessity to reclaim the ideas of animism for planetary health and non-human materialities.
A surreal film about bodily transformation and the desire to disappear completely.
The film follows Native Hawaiian slam poet Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio as she reconnects with her art through activism, particularly in the movement to protect sacred sites atop Maunakea, Hawai'i.
A "tears teacher" helps people find emotional healing through guided crying therapy in Japan.
Snowy, a pet turtle, has spent a decade relegated to a dark corner of a basement. When his happiness and well-being are called into question, his owner valiantly tries to improve the reptile's situation with mixed results.
A former soldier reflects on war video game scenarios used for trauma recovery and how they shaped his identity.
On a volcanic island, inhabitants are caught in an unending cycle: the threat of impending eruptions and earthquakes, and the burden of past traumas loom over them. Some draw upon myth and religious beliefs to interpret their precarious situation, while others demonstrate resilience, rebuilding their villages from the volcanic rocks. Mirroring the ethereal atmosphere of the island's landscapes, the film gradually takes on the appearance of the stories it recounts.
When We Were Bullies begins with a puzzling "coincidence" from 25 years ago, which leads the director to track down his fifth grade class (and their teacher) to see what they remember about a bullying incident that occurred there 50 years ago. In a way that is both playful and poignant, he begins to understand his complicity and the elusive nature of memory.
This film was nominated for an Academy Award in the Documentary Short Film category in 2022.
A global documentary project capturing a single day (July 25, 2020) of life around the world, filmed by people in every country.