Children Underground follows the story of five street children, aged eight to sixteen who live in a subway station in Bucharest, Romania. The street kids are encountered daily by commuting adults, who pass them by in the station as they starve, swindle, and steal, all while searching desperately for a fresh can of paint to get high with.
In Breaking Bread, exotic cuisine and a side of politics are on the menu. Dr. Nof Atamna-Ismaeel - the first Muslim Arab to win Israel's MasterChef - is on a quest to make a social change through food. And so, she founded the A-sham Arabic Food Festival in Haifa. There, pairs of Arab and Jewish chefs collaborate on mouthwatering dishes like kishek (a Syrian yogurt soup), and qatayef (a dessert typically served during Ramadan), as we savor the taste of hope and discover the food of their region free from political and religious boundaries.
A look at the first years of Pixar Animation Studios - from the success of "Toy Story" and Pixar's promotion of talented people, to the building of its East Bay campus, the company's relationship with Disney, and its remarkable initial string of eight hits. The contributions of John Lasseter, Ed Catmull and Steve Jobs are profiled. The decline of two-dimensional animation is chronicled as three-dimensional animation rises. Hard work and creativity seem to share the screen in equal proportions.
An exposé of comic proportions that only Chris Rock could pull off, GOOD HAIR visits beauty salons and hairstyling battles, scientific laboratories and Indian temples to explore the way hairstyles impact the activities, pocketbooks, sexual relationships, and self-esteem of the black community.
When Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were put to death in 1953 for selling atomic secrets to the USSR, their two children were orphaned after every family member refused to take them in. Documentarian Ivy Meeropol, raised to believe in her grandparents' innocence, begins investigating what actually happened, interviewing family members and friends. With declassified papers indicating Julius was participating in espionage in some capacity, Ivy tries to understand the beliefs that drove the couple.
Kha, architect and builder of tombs for the pharaohs, must undertake the journey to the Underworld. Telling us the story of his voyage is Jeremy Irons, in the guise of a narrator. His words take us inside the secret world of Egyptian mythology, religion and funerary culture, interweaving the story with the history of the oldest museum in the world, the Museo Egizio in Turin, founded in 1824 and will soon be celebrating its 200th anniversary. In fact, the Kha’s own Tomb is to be found in Turin along with the most complete and most valuable private collection of grave goods outside of Egypt.
In this "beautifully intimate and utterly unique piece of cinema", Toby Amies crosses the line between filmmaker and carer, trying to cope with the strange and hilarious world view of the fragile eccentric, Drako Zarharzar. A love story. Drako Oho Zaraharzar can remember modeling for Salvador Dali and hanging out with The Stones. But he can’t remember yesterday. Following a severe head injury, Drako Zaraharzar suffers from terrible memory loss, he can access memories from before his accident, but can’t imprint new ones. As he puts it, “the recording machine in my head doesn’t work”. Consequently, and as an antidote to depression he chose to live “completely in the now” according to the bizarre mottoes delivered to him whilst in a coma.
Dr. Roger Payne explores the unique relationship between humans and whales, weaving together natural history and biography. A pioneer in whale song research, Payne has passionately promoted the protection of these majestic sea creatures for four decades and continues to do so by studying ocean pollution.
When Rehtaeh Parsons was 15 years old, she went to a party that would define her remaining teenage years. She was sexually attacked and had no memory of it, until photographic evidence spread through social media. The resulting humiliation and bullying the Nova Scotia teen received led to her tragic suicide less than two years later. News of her death reverberated worldwide, a stunning demonstration of the power of images and social networks to amplify the extent of rape culture and effects of depression. Now, her parents and those who knew her reassemble the pieces of Parsons’s life in their courageous quest to make accountable the systems that failed to protect her. With the support of Anonymous, an online campaign and public pressure, they forced the Nova Scotian government and RCMP to address the case and bring the perpetrators to justice. Parsons’s story epitomizes the immense capacity of new tools in these nascent years of social networking.
A nurse journeys to discover the truth behind a disease so bizarre, patients who suffer from it are regularly written off as delusional by doctors and loved ones.
In 1982, Wim Wenders asked 16 of his fellow directors to speak on the future of cinema, resulting in the film Room 666. Now, 40 years later, in Cannes, director Lubna Playoust asks Wim Wenders himself and a new generation of filmmakers (James Gray, Rebecca Zlotowski, Claire Denis, Olivier Assayas, Nadav Lapid, Asghar Farhadi, Alice Rohrwacher and more) the same question: “is cinema a language about to get lost, an art about to die?”
In the early 20th century, impoverished teenage Italian cobbler Salvatore Ferragamo sailed from Naples to America to seek a better life. He settled in Southern California, and became Hollywood's go-to shoemaker during the silent era. In 1927, he returned to Italy and founded in Florence his namesake luxury brand. This feature-length documentary recounts his adventures.
A fascinating portrait of Ben Ferencz, the last surviving Nuremberg Trial prosecutor, who continues to wage his lifelong crusade in the fight for law and peace.
A filmmaker who grew up alongside Chucky the killer doll seeks out the other families surrounding the Child's Play films as they recount their experiences working on the ongoing franchise and what it means to be a part of the, "Chucky" family.