The Feminist on Cellblock Y
2018
10
Told through the charismatic voice of inmate Kenneth Reams, Free Men is a film about human resilience. In solitary confinement for the last 25 years, Kenneth has pushed back the walls of his cell to become a painter, a poet, the founder of a non-profit, and an art event organizer - while fighting at the same time for justice. At age 18, Kenneth Reams was convicted for capital murder without firing a bullet. He became the youngest inmate on Arkansas death row. Alongside art, the film shows how love can cross barbed wire and the length of an ocean in Kenneth's love for Isabelle, a French artist who wants to become his wife.
A convicted felon builds a feminist movement from behind bars at an all-male prison in Soledad, California.
The Feminist on Cellblock Y
2018
10
Released from prison, former oil oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky expounds on his newfound freedom and complex relationship with Vladimir Putin.
Chodorkowskis neue Freiheit
2016
0
Errol Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison.
Standard Operating Procedure
2008
6
In 1981, iconic Turkish film director escapes jail to France, his last work re-creating with other exiles the prison lives they left behind.
Ballad of Exiles: Yılmaz Güney
2016
0
Starting as a documentary on the sexually liberated culture of late-Sixties Denmark, Sexual Freedom in Denmark winds up incorporating major elements of the marriage manual form and even manages to squeeze in a montage of beaver loops and erotic art. All narrated with earnest pronouncements concerning the social and psychological benefits of sexual liberation, the movie, is a kind of mondo film dotted with occasional glimpses of actual sex.
Sexual Freedom in Denmark
1970
5
Metamorphosis is a documentary-style film giving the true account Bill Troester and the transformation he experienced by Jesus out of a life of violence, crime and drug addiction.
Metamorphosis
7
A compelling look at the choices that lead to incarceration and the reality of being locked up in Pelican Bay State Prison.
Extreme Consequences: The Reality of Prison Life
2007
0
Doaa el-Adl, the first woman to be awarded the esteemed Journalistic Distinction in Caricature, serves as a catalyst for transformation within the predominantly male-dominated realm of Egyptian political cartoonists. Challenging patriarchal norms, she routinely confronts censorship, harassment, and even threats to her life. In a remarkable fusion of documentary, cartoons, and animation, Egyptian director Nada Riyadh breathes life into el-Adl's most renowned works. This dynamic and fearless presentation delves into the issue of violence against women, stretching the boundaries of freedom of speech in a society often characterized by restrictions. Through her exceptional talent, el-Adl not only champions women's rights but also serves as an inspiration for societal change.
Draw Me Egypt - Doaa El-Adl, A Stroke of Freedom
2023
9
The Big One is an investigative documentary from director Michael Moore who goes around the country asking why big American corporations produce their product abroad where labor is cheaper while so many Americans are unemployed, losing their jobs, and would happily be hired by such companies as Nike.
The Big One
1997
6
In this French Canadian film, the lives of teenagers are examined in fantasy sequences and through the use of documentary interviews. Prompted by the filmmaker, nine teenagers individually act out their secret dreams and, between times, talk about their world as they see it. The fantasy sequences make creative use of animation, unusual film-development techniques, and stills. Babette conceives of herself as an abbess defending her fortress, a convent; Michelle is transported in a dream of love where all time ceases; Philippe is the revolutionary, defeating all the institutions that plague him, and so on, through all their fantasies. All the actual preoccupations of youth are raised: authority, drugs, social conflict, sex. Jutra's style in "Wow" exhibits his innovative approach to storytelling and filmmaking, showcasing his talents as a director during that period. With English subtitles.
Wow
1970
5
Workers Compensation, is the Worker's Con, a process flawed, buried in bureaucracy, adding insult to injury.
Workers Con
2017
10
These are strange times indeed. While they continue to command so much attention in the mainstream media, the 'battles' between old and new modes of distribution, between the pirate and the institution of copyright, seem to many of us already lost and won. We know who the victors are. Why then say any more?
Steal This Film II
2007
6
In 1986, Ross McElwee (Sherman's March) and Marilyn Levine were making a film about the 25th anniversary of the Berlin Wall, when the imposing structure was still very much intact as the world’s most visible symbol of hardline Communism and Cold War lore. They thought they were making a documentary on the community of tourists, soldiers, and West Berliners who lived in the seemingly eternal presence of the graffiti emblazoned eyesore. But in 1989, as the original film neared completion, the Wall came down, and McElwee and Levine returned to Berlin, this time to capture the radically different atmosphere of the reunified city.
Something to Do with the Wall
1991
7
A surreal look at the day-to-day life of American soldiers stationed in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba through the eyes of a traveling circus troupe cleared to perform there.
Guantanamo Circus
2013
0
There are 100,000 US citizens in solitary confinement across the country, a staggering number prompting comment from both President Obama and the Pope. Situated in rural Virginia, 300 miles from any urban center, Red Onion State Prison is one of over 40 supermax prisons across the US built to hold prisoners in eight-by-ten-foot cells for 23 hours a day. Filmed over the course of one year, this eye-opening film braids stark prison imagery, stories from correction officers, and intimate reflections from the men who are locked up in isolation. The inmates share the paths that led them to prison and their daily struggles to maintain their sanity.
Solitary
2016
6
Derek and Nancy Haysom were brutally murdered in their house in Lynchburg, Virginia, on March 30, 1985. Suspicion fell on their daughter Elizabeth and her boyfriend Jens Söring. They flee to Europe, but are caught and extradited to the U.S. Elizabeth is sentenced to 90 years in jail for incitement to murder, Jens Söring to two life sentences. Karin Steinberger, Marcus Vetter and their team spent over three years researching this case, which achieved world-wide notoriety. They uncovered new evidence, including the fact none of the blood samples found at the scene of the crime belonged to Jens Söring.
Das Versprechen
2016
6
Into the Current tells the story of Burma's unsung heroes -its prisoners of conscience -and the price they pay for speaking truth to power in a military dictatorship.
Into the Current: Burma's Political Prisoners
2012
0
With unprecedented access, this documentary looks into the hidden world of one of Russia's most impenetrable and remote institutions - a maximum security prison exclusively for murderers. Deep inside the land of the gulags, this is the end of the line for some of Russia's most dangerous criminals - 260 men who have collectively killed nearly 800 people. The film delves deep into the mind and soul of some of these prisoners. In brutally frank and uncensored interviews the inmates speak of their crimes, life and death, redemption and remorselessness, insanity and hope. The film tracks them though their unrelenting days over several months, lifting the veil on one of Russia's most secretive subcultures to reveal what happens when a man is locked up in a tiny cell for 23 hours every day, for life. A startling insight into inscrutable minds and the forbidding world they have been condemned to. (Storyville)
The Condemned
2013
6
Welcome to Florence, Arizona: a cowboy town with a prison problem. Just 8,500 residents call the tiny community home—but over 17,000 inmates live there, housed in nine jails spread out over a sprawling industrial prison complex. The economic fate of the town’s inhabitants is inextricably linked with the prisons—and the townspeople are not necessarily happy about it. Director Andrea B. Scott follows four colorful characters whose lives are tied up with the prisons, including the town’s aspiring mayor, a retired correctional officer and speed shooter, a barber who longs for the town’s free-spirited cowboy days, and troubled teen Marcus, whose parents met through their prison careers. “Florence, Arizona” is a richly drawn, humorous look at a singular small town whose Wild West roots are still very much alive in its outlaw identity today. -TCFF database
Florence, Arizona
2015
0
This film is a powerful reminder of the importance of human freedom and the need to protect our rights and liberties. It follows the inauguration of Columbia University's new president, General David Eisenhower, and includes speeches from a number of dignitaries, including former Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, Admiral Leahy and Halsey. The film emphasizes the need to be educated and aware of the dangers of statism and communism, and the importance of preserving our freedoms and liberties, including the right of property, profit and wage incentives, competition, a free market, and a government that serves us, not rules us.
Freedom Is Indivisible
1953
0