Fondations

1/2 Mensch

A visual documentary of Einstürzende Neubauten, the German underground band, by Japanese cult director Sogo Ishii, made during their 1985 tour of Japan. The band makes an elaborate and remarkably choreographed appearance in the ruins of an old ironworks which was scheduled for demolition; footage of same was incorporated into the movie and a brief appearance on stage.

Blacksmith

Blacksmith is a 15-minute poetic documentary that highlights the work of Rob Flurry, the resident blacksmith at the Spindletop-Gladys City Boomtown Museum in Beaumont, Texas.

The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here!

The daughter in a family of werewolves decides to put an end to the family curse.

The Cowboy and the Indians

Finding Indians stealing from his ranch, Gene learns they are suffering from malnutrition. Store owner Martin is cheating them and now he is after the Chief's valuable necklace. When the dying chief is found, having been attacked and robbed, Martin blames Lakhona who would become the new chief. When Gene helps Lakhona they soon find themselves fleeing from the law.

A Year in Champagne

The exploding cork. Endless tiny bubbles floating up and up in the glass. An indulgence. A celebration. A seduction. A triumph. This is the essence of Champagne, isn’t it? But it’s not just bubbles in a glass that makes the wine, or the mystique. Only sparkling wine produced within the boundaries of the Champagne region is truly “Champagne.” At first glance, the region is not an obvious source of romance. Champagne’s history is grim and bloody, swept by war and destruction from Attila the Hun to the filthy trenches of WWI and the Nazi depredations of WWII. The environment for winemaking is desperately hard — northerly latitude, chalky soil, copious rain, frost, rot. Yet it’s these difficulties that help make the wine unique.

9-Man

'9-Man' is an independent feature documentary about an isolated and exceptionally athletic Chinese-American sport that's much more than a pastime. Since the 1930s, young men have played this gritty streetball game competitively in the alleys and parking lots of Chinatown. At a time when anti-Chinese sentiment and laws like the Chinese Exclusion Act forced Chinese restaurant workers and laundrymen to socialize exclusively amongst themselves, nine-man offered both escape and fraternity for men who were separated from their families in China and facing extreme discrimination and distrust. Pivoting between oil-spotted Chinatown parking lots and jellyfish-filled banquet scenes, the film captures the spirit of nine-man as players not only battle for a championship but fight to preserve a sport that holds so much history.

La soule

In the debacle of the battle of Vitoria in Spain in 1813, Pierre Cursey was robbed of the horses of his unit by a fugitive. He is taken prisoner and sent to a floating pontoon. He managed to survive but vowed to find the traitor who had put him through hell. He finds him two years later in a village in the Dordogne. Francois Lemercier is the town's shoemaker and above all the captain and hero of the local soule team, a ball game that dates back to the Middle Ages. Cursey will discover in Lemercier a man of chivalrous honor.

James Ensor: Demons Teasing Me

This film explains what James Ensor (1860-1949) meant for the development of art and makes palpable where he got his inspiration from.

American Drug War 2: Cannabis Destiny

Director Kevin Booth navigates through the cutting edge of Cannabis research while becoming a foster parent to a child court ordered to take powerful mind altering drugs.

Bosna!

The carnage in Sarajevo provides the focus of this French documentary which seeks to call attention to the terrible conflict in the hopes of finally ending it. The film is divided into five parts. Each part covers a time frame ranging from April 4, 1992, the beginning of the war, to the present. The major issues that occur are three-fold. It depicts the systematic genocide of Bosnians, the silence of Western countries, and the determination of the Bosnians to resist. They refuse to be seen as victims, even though the filmmakers portray them so. Also included are the origins and political aspects of the war. It offers interviews with participants. It also reveals how the U.S. State Department censored reports about Serbian death camps.

Tsahal

The ideologies underlying the foundation of modern Israel are explored in this documentary, the third of a trilogy (created over a twenty year span) exploring the Jewish experience. The two earlier documentaries, "Porquoi Israel," and "Shoah," have had great effect on the ways documentaries are produced. "Tsahal" zeroes in on the crucial role of the military in Israeli society and politics. The film uses many in-depth interviews to present the many feelings and thoughts about the Israeli military.

Łódź Ghetto

The Polish city of Łódź was under Nazi occupation for nearly the entirety of WWII. The segregation of the Jewish population into the ghetto, and the subsequent horrors are vividly chronicled via newsreels and photographs. The narration is taken almost entirely from journals and diaries of those who lived–and died–through the course of the occupation, with the number of different narrators diminishing as the film progresses, symbolic of the death of each narrator.

Life on the V: The Story of V66

Boston's V66 music video station came and went in the mid-1980s but in the 18 months on the air, it was one of the only over-the-air music video channels ever created. But even popular success didn't mean it was going to last...

Mad As Hell

MAD AS HELL follows Cenk Uygur's transformation from unknown talk show host on local Public Access TV to an internet sensation with his online news show "The Young Turks," which has amassed over one billion views on YouTube. Once Cenk ventures from the internet into national television and lands the 6 PM time slot on MSNBC, his uncensored brand of journalism is compromised and Cenk becomes the nexus in the battle between new and old media.

Grad izobilja

A documentary about punk and subculture scene of Pula, Croatia from 1978 to 1991, the city that gave birth to one of the most vivid punk and alternative rock scenes in former Yugoslavia, despite having population of just over 60,000 residents.

Genius

New York in the 1920s. Max Perkins, a literary editor is the first to sign such subsequent literary greats as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When a sprawling, chaotic 1,000-page manuscript by an unknown writer falls into his hands, Perkins is convinced he has discovered a literary genius.

Clara Immerwahr

Clara Immerwahr and her husband to be Fritz Haber are both young and gifted chemists. Their struggle for acknowledgment in nationalistic Germany during World War I lead to the development and use of the first chemical weapons.

Hanuman Airlines: Fly Over Everest

Two Nepali men climb Mt. Everest, launch a paraglider from the summit, fly over the top and set a new free flight world record.

Julian Assange, le prix de la vérité