THE SLIGHTEST TOUCH

WORLD PREMIERE In the 1980s, Jerry Falwell, Jim Bakker, and Jimmy Swaggart each cultivate vast viewerships of particular constituencies of Christian fundamentalism. When Bakker’s empire is threatened by revelations of scandal, Falwell and Swaggart sense the potential business advantages of taking the moralistic high ground—and the power they can wield by collaborating with the Republican Party. Joe Berlinger’s first feature film in seven years is Shakespearean in its depiction of the ruthless holy war between these three titans of Christian televangelism’s early days. - Jaie Laplante

Primetime Preachers is one of 10 nominated films in DOC NYC’s inaugural Archival Storytelling Competition, developed in collaboration with Archival Producers Alliance and co-presented by Footage.Net, Fox Archives, and Global ImageWorks. To see the list of other nominated films, click here.

The first screening will be followed by a Q&A with director/producer Joe Berlinger.

All in-person screening venues provide sound amplification headphones upon request with venue management. IFC Center can also provide a T-Coil loop for compatible devices.

US PREMIERE The collaboration between filmmaker Sophie Fiennes and academic philosopher Slavoj Žižek celebrates its twentieth anniversary and third installment with The Pervert’s Guide to Utopias, following in the footsteps of The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema and The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology, the latter of which screened at DOC NYC in 2012. Whether it is your first or third rodeo with Žižek and Fiennes hardly matters; this zippy trip down the highway of ideas, about human culture as interpreted through popular movies, is breathlessly quirky and appeals to cinephiles of varying intensities. - Jaie Laplante

All in-person screening venues provide sound amplification headphones upon request with venue management. IFC Center can also provide a T-Coil loop for compatible devices.

NYC PREMIERE Joss Crowley’s rocking and insightful portrait of the singular Chrissie Hynde and the band she built around her goes way beyond the greatest hits. Now 75 and as fierce as ever, Hynde is an elusive subject, consenting to only one filmed interview with Crowley, which forms the throughline of Pretenders. Hynde’s independent streak has always marked her as a rebellious original, and in here we get the full force of her indelible personality—and her brilliance as a songwriter. - Jaie Laplante

Pretenders is one of 10 nominated films in DOC NYC’s inaugural Archival Storytelling Competition, developed in collaboration with Archival Producers Alliance and co-presented by Footage.Net, Fox Archives, and Global ImageWorks. To see the list of other nominated films, click here.

The first screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Joss Crowley.

All in-person screening venues provide sound amplification headphones upon request with venue management. IFC Center can also provide a T-Coil loop for compatible devices.

WORLD PREMIERE The story of New Vrindaban, a Hare Krishna commune in West Virginia that grew into one of America’s largest cults, has long been sensationalized for its lurid details of crime and internal corruption. But for brothers Abhay and Halavah, it is the world they were born into, and in Palace of Gold, they aim to show a more sensitive, nuanced side of their family’s reality. The brothers use humor and an affection for human foibles to chart a path from their parents’ original, lofty goals of spirituality to the problems that beset their community in its self-imposed isolation around a cult of personality. Through many unexpected twists, Abhay and Halavah reveal that the contemporary hunger for American alternatives to community continues to grow. - Jaie Laplante

The first screening will be followed by a Q&A with directors Halavah Sofsky and Abhay Sofsky and protagonist Ed Sofsky.

All in-person screening venues provide sound amplification headphones upon request with venue management. IFC Center can also provide a T-Coil loop for compatible devices.