Documentary
From Adolphe Sax’s workshop to the legendary times of jazz and bebop, conquering the classical music stages, forbidden by Nazis and Communists and banned by the Pope: in its 170-year history the saxophone has always been the most seductive as well as the most feared musical instrument. Award-winning Canadian filmmaker Larry Weinstein illuminates and mythologizes the story of the saxophone, its most legendary players and its allegedly longstanding curse about saxophonists falling prey to the instrument’s dark powers.
Following on from his recent look at alcoholism, the UK’s premier documentarian returns with another sensitive film, this time on living with a brain injury. Earl’s personality and interests have radically altered since he was involved in a car crash, while Dan – who sustained his injury in the late 90s – is desperate to live independently again. Elsewhere, Amanda is struggling to readjust to family life, and Natalie’s carers share her especially affecting story.
In August, 2014, a video of the public execution of American photojournalist James Foley rippled across the globe. Foley wore an orange jumpsuit as he knelt beside an ISIS militant dressed in black. That image challenged the world to deal with a new face of terror. And it tested one American family. Seen through the lens of filmmaker Brian Oakes, Foley’s close childhood friend, Jim takes us from small-town New England to the adrenaline-fueled front lines of Libya and Syria, where Foley pushed the limits of danger to report on the plight of civilians impacted by war.
Based on Robert Sullivan’s bestselling book, Morgan Spurlock and his team travel around the world to bring viewers face to face with rats while delving into humans’ complicated relationship with the creepy creatures.
It’s a great pop music myth that in Liverpool everything began and ended with the Beatles. It didn’t. Get Back documents the real story of the city’s music outpourings, from post war years to present day. It’s a story of a city where literally thousands of bands and artists, hundreds of clubs, promoters and managers put on the biggest, loudest and longest party in history. The golden era of The Cavern and Merseybeat generated a massive tectonic shift in popular culture and in the 1970s it started again with a new scene and yet another cellar club at its heart – Eric’s. Bands such as Deaf School, Echo and the Bunnymen and OMD led the way. Then Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the Farm, the La’s, the Christians. And more recently it continued, the city’s bands always inventive and always re-inventing, with the Zutons, Coral, Wombats and more. The story is unending but Get Back offers music fans a chance to enjoy the narrative and the sounds created so far in the city that rocked the world…
When “Star Trek” first aired in 1966, it expanded the viewers’ imaginations about what was possible in their lifetimes. Today, many of the space-age technologies displayed on the show, like space shuttles, cell phones, and desktop computers, have already gone from science fiction to science fact. Other innovations, like warp drive, teleportation, and medical tricorders are actively in development. Join us as we celebrate the 50th Anniversary of “Star Trek” – a show that continues to inform, enrich, and inspire.
Louis spends time at King’s College Hospital in London where he immerses himself in the lives of patients in the grips of alcohol addiction and the medical staff trying to make them better.
September 18, 1980, 6:25 p.m., Titan II base in Damascus, Arkansas. On this fateful night an explosion kills an Air Force member and transforms the lives of everyone on the base. Honing in on a single case of so-called “human error”, Command and Control juxtaposes precision on a minute scale against the gargantuan risks inherent in the United States’ aggressive nuclear proliferation policy during the Cold War.
A behind the scenes look at the sport of rugby with the 2015 Rugby World Cup as a backdrop, featuring interviews from players, coaches, referees and fans.
A documentary that explores the range of experiences lived by transgender Americans.
American Addict 2 delves deeper into the world of corruption, politics and pharmaceutical greed.
An account of the final tour of the band Rush, including interviews with the band, crew, and fans.
Ghostheads is a documentary that explores the extreme side of the Ghostbusters fandom. Join us as we travel the world meeting extreme Ghostbusters fans. Every Ghosthead is unique. Every Franchise is its own. Every pop culture fandom should learn how to give back to the community.
Sixteen years after his documentary When Louis Met Jimmy, Theroux seeks to understand how he was tricked by a man who became his friend
Documents the writing, recording and performing of Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds’ sixteenth studio album, Skeleton Tree.
Sonia Kennebeck takes on the controversial tactic of drone warfare, and demands accountability through the personal accounts—recollections, traumas, and responses—of three American military veterans whose lives have been shaken by the roles they played in this controversial method of attack.
Patton Oswalt delivers a fresh hour plus of stand-up, covering everything from misery to defeat to hopelessness. It’s his most upbeat special to date.
The strange story of John McAfee, who went from millionaire software mogul to yogi, Kurtz-like jungle recluse to potential murderer, and most recently a prospective presidential candidate for the American Libertarian Party.
After losing sight in 1983, John Hull began keeping an audio diary, a unique testimony of loss, rebirth and renewal, excavating the interior world of blindness. Following on from the Emmy Award-winning short film of the same name, Notes on Blindness is an ambitious and groundbreaking work, both affecting and innovative.
Going deeper than fine fabrics and silk linings, Suited takes a modern, evolved look at gender through the conduit of clothing and elucidates the private and emotional experience surrounding it. With heart and optimism, the film documents a cultural shift that is creating a new demand—and response—for each person’s right to go out into the world with confidence.
Drugs: A multi-billion-dollar industry that fuels crime and violence like no other substance on the planet. Turning cartel leaders into billionaires, the illegal drug industry also provides vital income to hundreds of thousands of poor workers across the globe. While some users sacrifice their lives to an addiction they can’t escape, others find drugs to be their only saving grace from physical or emotional pain almost impossible to overcome. Where should the lines be drawn in this lucrative industry?
An in-depth look at the prison system in the United States and how it reveals the nation’s history of racial inequality.
Follow actress Kate Lyn Sheil as she prepares for her next role: playing Christine Chubbuck, a Florida newscaster who committed suicide live on-air in 1974. As Kate investigates Chubbuck’s story, uncovering new clues and information, she becomes increasingly obsessed with her subject.
The story of Tony Blair’s destruction of the Labour Party, his well-remunerated business interests, and the thousands of innocent people who have died following his decision to invade Iraq.
Free to Run tells the amazing story of the running movement over the past five decades, the struggle for the right to run – especially for women – against conservative Federations, the explosion of grass roots road races and marathons, until the boom of running as a vast business enterprise.
Off a dirt road in rural Maine, a precocious 20-year-old woman named Michelle Smith lives with her mother Julie. Michelle is quirky and charming, legally blind and diagnosed on the autism spectrum, with big dreams and varied passions. Searching for connection, Michelle explores love and empowerment outside the limits of “normal” through a provocative fringe community. Will she take the leap to experience the wide world for herself? Michelle’s joyful story of self-discovery celebrates outcasts everywhere.
From a young age Magnus Carlsen had aspirations of becoming a champion chess player. While many players seek out an intensely rigid environment to hone their skills, Magnus’ brilliance shines brightest when surrounded by his loving and supportive family. Through an extensive amount of archival footage and home movies, director Benjamin Ree reveals this young man’s unusual and rapid trajectory to the pinnacle of the chess world. This film allows the audience to not only peek inside this isolated community but also witness the maturation of a modern genius.
On-ice enforcers struggle to rise through the professional ranks of the world’s most prestigious hockey league, only to be confronted with a new found fight for the existence of the role itself.
In the early 1960s, Henry Ford II and Enzo Ferrari went to war on the battlefield of Le Mans. This epic battle saw drivers lose their lives, family dynasties nearly collapse, and the development of a new car that changed racing.
A feature documentary that explores the influence of the Commodore Amiga and how it took video game development, music and publishing to a whole new level and changed the video games industry forever.
Sergei Polunin is a breathtaking ballet talent who questions his existence and his commitment to dance just as he is about to become a legend.
Follow Aisholpan, a 13-year-old girl, as she trains to become the first female in twelve generations of her Kazakh family to become an eagle hunter, and rise to the pinnacle of a tradition that has been typically been handed down from father to son for centuries.
As a visually radical memoir, Cameraperson draws on the remarkable footage that filmmaker Kirsten Johnson has shot and reframes it in ways that illuminate moments and situations that have personally affected her. What emerges is an elegant meditation on the relationship between truth and the camera frame, as Johnson transforms scenes that have been presented on Festival screens as one kind of truth into another kind of story—one about personal journey, craft, and direct human connection.
On a remote patch of the Mojave Desert, amidst dusty tumbleweeds and rangy Joshua Trees, sits an anomaly: a high school where educators believe empathy, life skills, and the constancy of a caring adult are the differences that will give at-risk students command of their fates. On any given day, principal Vonda Viland calls kids at the crack of dawn to see if they’ll make it to school. And if they need a ride? Well, she’ll pick them up. Vonda knows each student’s challenges and coaches them tirelessly, never fostering false hopes. Her philosophy combines loving compassion with realism, and given her school’s rising graduation rate, it seems to be working.
An average magician can entertain but a world-class artist can reawaken your faith in the impossible. In this utterly charming showbiz chronicle, four stellar magicians will amaze even the staunchest of skeptics. But for each of these virtuosos, true success seems illusory. Among them: Brian Gillis was Johnny Carson’s favourite close-up magician and a regular on The Tonight Show; David Minkin can levitate almost anything with his mind; and Jon Armstrong might be the best card trickster in the world—but none of them are satisfied. Each can captivate a crowd, but how long can they chase their dreams and at what cost? Following the artists on and off the stage, Magicians: Life in the Impossible captures the sacrifices, the obsessive drive, and the very real possibility of losing everything for the one true love of their lives.
A feminist filmmaker follows the Men’s Rights Movement and begins to question her own beliefs. A comprehensive look at Gender Politics.
The true story of John Romulus Brinkley, a small-town Kansas doctor who discovers in 1917 that he can cure impotence by transplanting goat testicles into men. And that’s just the tipping point in this stranger-than-fiction tale. With the balls of a P.T. Barnum, the gonads of goats, and the wishful dreams of flaccid men, Brinkley amassed a fortune, was almost elected Governor of Kansas, invented junk mail and the infomercial, and built the world’s most powerful radio station. By the time all of the twists and turns of Brinkley’s story are revealed, Nuts! certainly earns its title.
Not Available