Popular Documentary Movies on Kanopy - Page 264

Sweaty Betty

2015

Sweaty Betty

2015
6
On the border of Washington DC, two stories of big dreams take place – a family is determined to turn their 1000 pound pig into the Redskins’ football team mascot, and two teenage fathers scheme a better life for themselves and their children.
Which Way Is East: Notebooks from Vietnam

1994

Which Way Is East: Notebooks from Vietnam

1994
6
In this illuminating study of cultural contrasts, American filmmaker Lynne Sachs and her sister, Dana, travel north from Ho Chi Minh City to Hanoi, recording conversations with Vietnamese strangers and friends. The sisters' expansive travel diary covers tourism, insights into city life, pervasive culture clashes and a bracing historic inquiry. What begins as a picaresque road trip soon blossoms into a richer social and political discourse.
Land Mines: A Love Story

2005

Land Mines: A Love Story

2005
Habiba and Shah who, because of the wars fought in Afghanistan over the past 25 years, have experienced immense suffering, but who have survived to show how it is possible to be brave and moral in this world of sanctioned violence and lies. Shah, a former Mujaheddin soldier and land mine victim, works as a cobbler on the pavements of the ruined city of Kabul. One day, he noticed a pretty Tajik girl who had only one leg, and he began to court her. Amidst the chaos and violence, and despite all the obstacles of tradition and religion, Shah and Habiba were able to marry.
Wagner's Jews

2013

Wagner's Jews

2013
9
Who were they? What brought them to Wagner, and what brought him to them? These questions are at the heart of Hilan Warshaw's documentary "Wagner's Jews," the first film to focus on Wagner's complex personal relationships with Jews.
David Hockney's Diaries

1970

David Hockney's Diaries

1970
Renowned English painter, David Hockney, takes us on a visual journey as he shares with us his treasured photo diaries. Consisting of polaroids Hockney has been collecting since 1967, the diaries act as both a tribute and an artist's notebook, often times including images the painter used for his large canvas works. A fine example of Hockney's pictorial inspiration are several photographs of castles he took during a boat trip down the Rhine that were later adapted for a suite of etchings to accompany six Grimm's fairy tales. Seeing his projects long before the work begins, Hockney used his camera to slow time and capture images that would go on to boast his unique style of realism. In David Hockney's Diaries the artist is seen at work on a large canvas of his friends Celia and Ossie Clark and their cat Percy, commissioned by the Tate Gallery.
Pride of Place

1976

Pride of Place

1976
6.3
In this first project of Kim Longinotto while she was a student at Englands National School of Television and Film she filmed the daily life in a girls boarding school situated in an old isolated castle in Buckinghamshire. Until she was 17, Longinotto lived in this boarding school, finaly she run away from there. In this dark and expressive black and white documentary, Longinotto exposes the repressive school from the students perspective. It seems to be a kind of miniature state with bizzare rules, idigestibel food and absurd punishments. The documentary begins with an graduation ceremony. The director blows her own trumpet, afterwards the film describes the daily routine of schoollife. The film ends up with the students leaving for holidays. As a result of this documentary, the boarding school was closed down one year after the release of the film.
Gurukulam

2013

Gurukulam

2013
Every individual confronts fundamental questions about the nature of reality, self-identity, and elusive happiness, yet few make these their life goal. An international group of students have traveled to a monastery in a remote area of southern India with the single purpose of discovering these answers. GURUKULAM is a journey into their lives, a wisdom tradition, and the contemplative space in which it is carried.
Mothers of Bedford

2011

Mothers of Bedford

2011
10
Eighty percent of women in US prisons today are mothers of school-age children. Filmmaker Jenifer McShane spent four years visiting Bedford Hills and following the women and their families. A mother herself, Jenifer was drawn to the universal themes of motherhood and the staggering power of the mother-child relationship. In all walks of life, mother and child care for each other. As we watch the mothers inside Bedford trying to become their better selves, we see parts of our own selves - and that gives us all hope.
Milk?

2012

Milk?

2012
4.3
Using engaging interviews and arresting visuals, this documentary investigates the case for milk as a nutritious food. Is milk good for us or not?
I Am Secretly An Important Man

2010

I Am Secretly An Important Man

2010
8
A portrait of the writer and poet Steven J. Bernstein (aka Jesse Bernstein), one of Seattle's most celebrated and troubled voices. His angry, surprisingly fresh, lyrical writings are about sensitive souls, drifters and drug addicts, people alienated by a society that refuses to understand them. Bernstein was an integral part of the legendary Seattle rock scene of the late 80's and early 90s, and in 1991 was dubbed the 'Godfather of Grunge.'
The United States of Autism

2013

The United States of Autism

2013
Follow one man's 11,000 mile, 40 day journey across the American landscape to visit twenty families and individuals affected by autism while searching for answers for his own son. With interviews from around the nation that include the widest spectrum of backgrounds - each conducted in the participants' original language - the film weaves a broad and compelling tapestry across the spectrum of American life in all its faiths, disparities, colors, and cultures. What he learns along the way will change not only his life, but the lives of those he meets, forever. It's a story about the best days that still lie ahead for our nation, the families, and the people who give America its heart.
How to Make a Book with Steidl

2010

How to Make a Book with Steidl

2010
5.5
For 40 years, Gerhard Steidl has combined the roles of printer and publisher, resolved to personally check each sheet leaving his printing shop in Göttingen. This perfectionism, combined with an unconditional love for books, for the traditional printing craft, and a commitment to the quality standards of manufacturing (in the original sense of the word, made by hand), has gained worldwide attention. The most internationally renowned photographic artists vie for the opportunity to collaborate with Gerhard Steidl, to conceive and produce the perfect publication with him.
Spiritual Revolution

2008

Spiritual Revolution

2008
Spiritual Revolution examines Eastern Spirituality in the West: its origins, forms, and the many ways it has evolved and been embraced in the United States as a philosophy and an ethical approach to life. The film explores various forms of Hinduism and Buddhism through interviews with a Whos Who of spiritual leaders, swamis, gurus, Zen Masters and Tibetan Lamas as well as scientists, psychotherapists and scholars.
Bending Steel

2013

Bending Steel

2013
6
The Cyclone, The Freakshow, The Mermaid Parade: all Coney Island icons. But Chris “Wonder” Schoeck has always preferred the Coney Island Strongman. Bending Steel follows the sweet, unassuming Schoeck as he parlays his extraordinary strength into the pursuit of his lifelong dream. Training with an elite group of men whose hands bend, drag, twist and shred metal, he tackles an enormous physical and mental challenge, taking a surprisingly emotional journey as a result.
American Mystic

2010

American Mystic

2010
5.5
Documentary about three young people, each a member of a fringe religious community, who have separated themselves from mainstream America in order to live immersed in their faiths. Set against depressed but quintessentially American landscapes - the former revivalist district of upstate New York, old mining country in the mountains of northern California, and the stark badlands of South Dakota - the film interlaces three very intimate, apolitical portraits of young individuals trying to lead more extraordinary, mystical lives.
Ghost Bird

2009

Ghost Bird

2009
7
This documentary chronicles the obsession that overtook bird watchers after a kayaker reported seeing a thought-to-be-extinct ivory-billed woodpecker.
Uprising

2012

Uprising

2012
6
The leaders of Egypt's 2011 revolution discuss the fire, courage and resiliency behind their movement to remove President Hosni Mubarak from office.
Moving Midway

2007

Moving Midway

2007
6.5
When New York film critic Godfrey Cheshire returns home to North Carolina in early 2004 and hears that his cousin Charlie Silver plans to uproot and move the buildings of Midway Plantation, their family’s ancestral home, an extraordinary, emotional journey begins.
Deaf

1986

Deaf

1986
8.3
The School for the Deaf at the Alabama Institute is organized around a theory of total communication i.e. the use of signs and finger spelling in conjunction with speech, hearing aids, lip reading, gestures and the written word. The film shows sequences dealing with various aspects of this comprehensive training such as teaching students and parents to sign; speech therapy; psychological counseling; regular academic courses; vocational training; disciplinary problems; parents visits; sports and recreational activity; training in living and working independently; and developing skills in home and money management.
Belzec

2005

Belzec

2005
8
Although it was in full operation for less than one-year, Belzec was a very efficiently run Concentration Camp were over 600,000 Jews were slaughtered. As the Russian army was drawing closer and closer to the camp, the Nazi dismantled Belzec and eradicated virtually all the evidence that the camp ever existed. This documentary tells the story of Belzec and reminds the world "never forget".