Winning is never a slam dunk. They were the most popular fraternity on the campus of college basketball in the early 1980's. Led by a Nigerian soccer player named Hakeem Olajuwon and a lightly recruited hometown kid named Clyde Drexler, the University of Houston Cougars not only electrified the NCAA Final Four with three straight appearances (1982-84), but they also helped transform the game itself. Director Chip Rives brings back the high-flying circus act under ringmaster Guy V. Lewis and spins a tale of true greatness and crushing heartbreak.
In our current world, where worth is often gauged by online popularity, an economy has developed for paying for followers and likes. Through access inside the “click-farms” of Bangladesh, Like explores the multi-million dollar industry that grows social media followings for celebrities and brands alike.
An eclectic group of actresses, musicians, writers, comedians, and moms compete in the Los Angeles women’s recreational basketball league. With team names guaranteed to make you smile (Shecago Bulls, Traveling Pants, Space Glam, Ba Dunka Dunks, LA Nail Clippers), this documentary shows that girls not only wanna have fun, they wanna ball too.
A short film showing a rehearsal and live performance by Jeanne Balibar. Costa would go on to make a feature-length documentary with the same title and subject matter in 2009.
Fed up with being pushed around, a group of gay and trans teens of color form a gang and fight back on the brutal streets of Washington D.C. They call their gang ‘Check it’ and this group of one-time victims of bullying, rape and abuse have turned the tables on anyone trying to hurt them. The group formed to provide its members safety in numbers and let people know that if they jump a queer kid in D.C., they may get beaten into a coma. This raw and intimate portrait follows three childhood friends as they struggle to survive and claw their way out of gang life through an unlikely avenue: fashion.
The lives and careers of four Asian-American rappers trying to break into a world that often treats them as outsiders. Sharing dynamic live performance footage and revealing interviews, these artists will make the most skeptical critics into believers.
Twenty five years after Miguel died from AIDS, his niece, filmmaker Cecilia Aldarondo, embarks on an excavation into a quagmire of unresolved family drama. Like many gay men in the 1980s, Miguel moved from Puerto Rico to New York City; he found a career in theater and a rewarding relationship. Yet, on his deathbed he grappled to reconcile his homosexuality with his Catholic upbringing. Now, decades after his death, Cecilia locates Miguel’s lover Robert, who has been shunned and demonized by the family, in order to understand the whole story.
General Electric sponsors this explanation of atomic energy, detailing some of its uses besides the bomb. Using animation and an off-screen narrator, the film describes the atom, elements and isotopes, the discovery of transmutation, experiments in artificial transmutation, and the reasons for the power of nuclear fission. The film argues that now, besides war, the atomic age holds promise for energy, farming, medicine, and research. The promise of the atomic age will depend on human wisdom.
Victor and Fernando are hairstylists in Mexicali. They are the go-to professionals for the city's socialites. To their customers, they were a lovely couple until they decided to legally marry. Losing the support of people and friends an confronting a blacklash of criticism, through their fight they woke up members of Mexiciali's society to fight homophobia and inequality.
He soared to the heights of stardom in the '80s as a teen idol, a soap star on "General Hospital," and a platinum-selling, Grammy-Award winning music artist. This concert event showcases the energy and vitality that propelled Springfield to the top of the pop charts, filled with spectacular live footage, giant projection screens, integrated music videos, and thousands of adoring fans. It's an unforgettable evening with one of the hottest performers of the '80s! Songs: Don't Walk Away, Alyson, Living in Oz, Affair of the Heart, Celebrate Youth, Human Touch, My Father's Chair, Jessie's Girl, State of the Heart, Bop 'Til You Drop, Don't Talk to Strangers, Love Somebody, Souls, Dance This World Away, Stand Up.
Celebrated filmmaker Tony Palmer follows Leonard Cohen on his 1972 European tour. The film, after extensive re-editing from its initial version, opened in London in 1974. It was shown on German television, but it disappeared for decades and was considered a lost film. Its original version, restored by the director, was released on DVD in 2010 and had its first theatrical release in 2017.
Seals, lies and videotapes. Violent confrontation boils over on the ice floes of Canada as activists, fishermen and politicians battle over the fate of baby seals.
In 2005, Mitch Mustain was the top high school quarterback in America; the first ever consensus Gatorade, Parade, and USA Today Player of the Year. He began his college career with eight consecutive victories. Then, momentum stopped.
German American artist Eva Hesse (1936 – 1970) created her innovative art in latex and fiberglass in the whirling aesthetic vortex of 1960s New York. Her flowing forms were in part a reaction to the rigid structures of then-popular minimalism, a male-dominated movement. Hesse’s complicated personal life encompassed not only a chaotic 1930s Germany, but also illness and the immigrant culture of New York in the 1940s. One of the twentieth century’s most intriguing artists, she finally receives her due in this film, an emotionally gripping journey with a gifted woman of great courage.
Part of Chris Marker’s Three Video Haikus series, Tchaïka is a brief visual meditation showing an overexposed view of a bridge and the river flowing beneath it.