"The hardest thing is the sun"
A nine-year-old Syrian refugee girl contemplates her increasingly bleak future after being forced to drop out of school in the midst of Lebanon’s unprecedented economic collapse and battle with Covid-19.
Social & External
The people behind it
In the run-up to parliamentary elections in mid-October, Polish filmmaker Marcin Wierzchowski travelled across his country to gauge the atmosphere in a society that is more divided than ever.
There are thousands of comedians in New York City, performing every night, working hard for laughs from the world's toughest audience. What happens to them when the city that never sleeps grinds to a halt? When the comedy clubs close and no one is laughing? "Back At It" is a chronicle of the tumultuous summer of 2020 in New York, through the eyes of a diverse group of comedians who hustle to keep their comedy alive and to stand out from the throng. It follows them as they take to the streets, rooftops, and parks to entertain a city ravaged by the Covid-19 pandemic. It asks how the art of standup changes when the traditional systems and established hierarchy no longer exist? Who will evolve and raise their voice?
In the aftermath of war, an extraordinary professor brings hope to children haunted by trauma-induced nightmares.
Peels back the curtain on the two-week, claustrophobic nightmare when passengers and crew members boarded the luxury Diamond Princess cruise ship in January of 2020, they had no idea that the deadly novel coronavirus boarded the ship with them, turning the floating paradise into their worst nightmare.
As the Syrian war continues to leave entire generations without education, health care, or a state, Lost in Lebanon closely follows four Syrians during their relocation process. The resilience of this Syrian community, which currently makes up one fifth of the population in Lebanon, is astoundingly clear as its members work hard to collaborate, share resources, and advocate for themselves in a new land. With the Syrian conflict continuing to push across borders, lives are becoming increasingly desperate due to the devastating consequences of new visa laws that the Lebanese government has implemented, leaving families at risk of arrest, detention, and deportation. Despite these obstacles, the film encourages us to look beyond the staggering statistics of displaced refugees and focus on the individuals themselves.
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 WNBA season pivoted into a bubble site in Bradenton, Florida – where 144 players across 12 teams convened to face the rigors of an unrelenting schedule and finish their battle for a championship; all while just as dedicated to amplify social activism in response to the injustices that gripped that same summer. A documentary from ESPN Films.
As politicians debate and argue, the men, women and children at the heart of the European immigration wave have found themselves caught in the midst of a humanitarian crisis. On the frontline is the Greek island of Lesvos – the first point of entry into Europe for over half of the refugees. One week at the end of August 2015 marked a tipping point in the crisis. More refugees arrived than ever before, volunteers were inundated and local infrastructure just couldn’t cope; trains were overflowing, refugees were dying in the back of lorries and on beaches, and politicians responded by closing borders and arguing about how to stem the tide of people. Filmed over just five days, this first-hand account of that dramatic week on Lesvos is seen through the eyes of the refugees and volunteers caught in the crisis.
A 3-year-old girl and her family's long journey from a Greek refugee centre to Uppsala.
A French documentary on how Covid-19 affected Hollywood and the cinema industry in the United States.
A film about the unprecedented Swiss grassroots movement of regular citizens who rise to aid thousands of refugees stranded at the European borders. In rich and safe Switzerland people from all backgrounds leave their regular life behind to support people in need. There is a Swiss farmer and his wife who keep cows in the Swiss Alps, a former commander of the Swiss Army, an elder rich lady residing at the lakeside, and a successful comedian and entertainer. These unexperienced volunteers take on an adventure that will change their lives forever.
Follows the artist over two years as he explores his „life after Beethoven“, as he searches for his next challenge, his identity as an artist.
A child who just loved to skate from the age of eight, Poppy Starr Olsen became the number one female bowl skater in Australia at 14 and went on to take out bronze at the XGames at 17 - the ultimate competition in the world of skateboarding. The same year, skateboarding was announced as an official additional sport category at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. Now faced with the opportunity to represent Australia on the world stage Poppy grapples with the transition from skater to athlete and the pressure of competition mounts in a way it has never done before.
Forced to flee Bosnia when he was a child, Irvin returns to his homeland. In the same woods where thirty years earlier people took refuge, he decides to build a small village with his own hands. To restore dignity to this place and to the people who died in the war, to heal his wounds, and to fulfill his desire for redemption. But when he is on the River Drina, Irvin does not stop trying to discover what happened, and what could still happen.
In the Mediterranean, the sea on which our civilization was founded, miles of refugees await Europe to welcome them. "Stranded" approaches the daily life of these long-term refugees, in occupied buildings or in refugee camps At the gates of Europe these people try to keep hope alive while they live.
With his industry on lockdown and no end in sight, Toronto chef Luke Donato tries to keep his culinary passion alive during the COVID-19 pandemic - even if it means teaching a group of misfits online.
In the midst of a pandemic, government arbitrariness and the precariousness of Brazilian artists, the documentary shows how these four rappers resisted the difficulties of this period using only one weapon... music. Using plurality, creativity and cleverness, how did they produce music? What role did music play in this period? What did they have to do to stay alive as rappers?
In 2022, an exhibition on the Swiss painter-sculptor Flavio Paolucci was planned in a German museum. The museum had reserved a white wall on which the artist was to create a work. Everything was ready, but the pandemic prevented the 88-year-old artist from travelling. So Flavio Paolucci had the idea of creating this mural in his studio and then destroying it.
Faced with the global crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the head of a family trusts in the curative and preventive properties of the Palo Amargo tea, but his believes end up reverberating within the family dynamic.
Filmmaker Christopher Quinn observes the ordeal of three Sudanese refugees -- Jon Bul Dau, Daniel Abul Pach and Panther Bior -- as they try to come to terms with the horrors they experienced in their homeland, while adjusting to their new lives in the United States.
More than 65 million people around the world have been forced from their homes to escape famine, climate change and war, the greatest displacement since World War II. Filmmaker Ai Weiwei examines the staggering scale of the refugee crisis and its profoundly personal human impact. Over the course of one year in 23 countries, Weiwei follows a chain of urgent human stories that stretch across the globe, including Afghanistan, France, Greece, Germany and Iraq.
A deep dive into the making of the Paranormal Activity films with first time ever interviews with cast and crew, never-before-seen footage from the movies, and a preview of the seventh installment in the franchise.
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.
A documentary on the modeling industry's 'supply chain' between Siberia, Japan, and the U.S., told through the experiences of the scouts, agencies, and a 13-year-old model.
An astonishing journey revealing the awesome power of the natural world. Over the course of one single day, we track the sun from the highest mountains to the remotest islands to exotic jungles.
A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab’s life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. Her camera captures incredible stories of loss, laughter and survival as Waad wrestles with an impossible choice– whether or not to flee the city to protect her daughter’s life, when leaving means abandoning the struggle for freedom for which she has already sacrificed so much.
Never-before-seen footage shows how our living in lockdown opened the door for nature to bounce back and thrive. Across the seas, skies, and lands, Earth found its rhythm when we came to a stop.
Amber Heard and Nicole Kidman discuss their characters Mera and Atlanna.
A documentary about the making of David Fincher's 2008 film THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON. Virtually every element in the evolution of the Fincher's film is documented here, from the project's attachment to numerous other directors during the 1990s, to its shoot in 2006 and 2007 in New Orleans, to its complex, CGI-intensive postproduction process.
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.
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 woman’s Holocaust memoir takes the world by storm, but a fallout with her publisher-turned-detective reveals her story as an audacious deception created to hide a darker truth.
49 Up is the seventh film in a series of landmark documentaries that began 42 years ago when UK-based Granada's World in Action team, inspired by the Jesuit maxim "Give me the child until he is seven and I will give you the man," interviewed a diverse group of seven-year-old children from all over England, asking them about their lives and their dreams for the future. Michael Apted, a researcher for the original film, has returned to interview the "children" every seven years since, at ages 14, 21, 28, 35, 42 and now again at age 49.In this latest chapter, more life-changing decisions are revealed, more shocking announcements made and more of the original group take part than ever before, speaking out on a variety of subjects including love, marriage, career, class and prejudice.
An intimate documentary delving into Rian Johnson's process as he comes in as a director new to the Star Wars universe.
Police pull over a woman who claims she just gave birth. But the baby — and the blood — aren't hers. Twisted lies unravel in this true-crime documentary.
The film follows adventurer Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia.
Elizabeth Smart's harrowing abduction at 14 from her family's Utah home unfolds through her own words and never-before-seen material in this documentary.
A look at how climate change affects our environment and what society can do to prevent the demise of endangered species, ecosystems, and native communities across the planet.
This documentary looks to forge the greatest, most definitive, documentary on everything He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, She-Ra, the live action movie, New Adventures of He-Man, the 200x series and much more! They delve into the toys, comics, cartoons, and movies from all eras by talking to the artists, creators, executives and actors who helped make it a reality.