WORLD PREMIERE Following advocates pushing for FDA approval of a pill demonstrated to boost female desire, this engaging documentary explores stark inequalities regarding women’s sexual health. The film exposes how medical education and healthcare institutions systematically ignore women’s sexual needs while normalizing dozens of drugs for male erectile dysfunction. Witty, urgent, and illuminating, The Pink […]
US PREMIERE A complex power structure of casteism, oppression, and corruption governs the lives of Dalit poppy farmers. Vardibhai, older and traumatized by casteist abuse, believes the way out is through hard work and resilience. Her son Mangilal chooses the political route to organize and agitate toward a resistance. The Hot Docs Best International Feature […]
NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE Drug-stricken Gottsunda is an underprivileged suburb of the city of Uppsala, Sweden, which has turned into a ghetto for immigrant families. In this first-person essay film that alternates observational scenes with experimental interludes shot in Super8, director Loran Batti crafts 21 elegant, self-reflexive scenes about his memories, his background, his encounters with […]
NYC PREMIERE Mega-talented keyboardist and songwriter Billy Preston was often referred to as “the best musician in the room.” Stylistically influenced by the Black church, Preston’s illustrious career includes collaborations with Aretha Franklin, the Rolling Stones, Elton John, the Beatles, and more. A private man who turned to drugs to dull the pain of personal […]
NY PREMIERE The extreme mental and physical rigor required of US Navy SEALs takes its toll post-service. This film follows a cohort of veterans, skilled at navigating the danger and adrenaline of deployment, but struggling in civilian life. Plagued by PTSD, survivor’s guilt, traumatic brain injury, chronic pain, and depression, the men try an experimental, […]
WORLD PREMIERE From his harsh childhood in the burnt-out Lower East Side, musician Harley Flanagan burst onto the punk music scene at age 11 as drummer for his aunt’s band, the Stimulators. The founder of the Cro-Mags tells his inconceivable story, with interviews with hard rockers and icons like Flea, Ice-T, Henry Rollins, Michael Imperioli, […]
WORLD PREMIERE The Electric Circus nightclub was a drug-fueled, multicultural oasis of dance and creativity in 1960’s NYC, frequented by icons like Jimi Hendrix, Timothy Leary, and Sly & the Family Stone. Against a hallucinogenic backdrop of hippies, Hell’s Angels, and circus performers, club founders Stan Freeman and Jerry Brandt share memories of the club’s rise […]
WORLD PREMIERE The Lunachicks, an all-female punk band renowned for their unabashed humor and unwavering pro-women ethos, made their mark on NYC’s underground music scene in the ‘90s. A rollercoaster of drugs, romances, and creative conflicts ultimately led to their 2000 breakup, but can love of the music reunite them for one last show? Buoyed […]
NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE Four friends struggling with heartbreak, drugs, desire, creativity, and mental illness in Stockholm seem to pose a question to us: “Is there love without madness?” A raw, nonlinear, gracefully cryptic exploration of alienation, old wounds, and radical empathy that creates its own cinematic language to reproduce the fragmented emotional state of its protagonists. […]
NYC PREMIERE A generation of great American writers went to Bennington College in the ‘80s, including Brett Easton Ellis, author of American Psycho. The film explores the world of this private liberal arts college that inspired and nurtured the most notable creative figures of the late twentieth century while epitomizing ‘80s culture of sex, drugs, […]