NYC PREMIERE Lorraine Hansberry, best known for A Raisin in the Sun, was a black writer, communist, feminist, lesbian and outspoken trailblazer at the height of the Civil Rights Movement. She led an active life, befriending James Baldwin, inspiring Nina Simone, breaking barriers from Broadway to Hollywood, being monitored by the FBI and seeking love […]
WORLD PREMIERE So an Egyptian lawyer, a couch-surfing custodian and an Orthodox Jew walk into a comedy club… and end up in a documentary. Standing Up follows these three unlikely aspiring stand-up comics, willing to risk everything in pursuit of their dreams of making it in comedy. Director Jonathan Miller tells their story with warmth […]
For her feature debut, a rousing film about young women striving for success, Tony Award-winning producer Amanda Lipitz received a Sundance Film Festival special jury award. Step focuses on three high-school seniors in the inaugural class of the Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women, whose mandate is to send every student to college. Taking inspiration […]
WORLD PREMIERE An unheralded yet pivotal figure in the art world of the 1960s and ’70s, Ken Dewey was a visionary artist and iconoclast. In his too-brief career, he introduced sitespecific participatory happenings to audiences in Europe and America and supported other artists through his position at the New York State Council on the Arts. […]
INTERNATIONAL PREMIERE Occupying the former Bell Laboratories, the West Village’s Westbeth Artists Housing has been home to an eclectic community of professional artists since 1970. The film puts the spotlight on three longtime residents as they engage with their craft over the course of a year: 75-year-old contemporary dancer Dudley; 82-year-old poet Ilsa; and 95-year-old […]
NYC PREMIERE The Pickle Family Circus was founded by a young couple in 1974, paving the way for the New American Circus Movement. Their son Lorenzo became a performer from a young age. Now an actor, he looks for answers to a lifetime of questions as he explores an unconventional relationship with a father who […]
If you can make it here… An artist embarks on The Moving Camera Project (USA, 5 min., Andrew Moynehan, Chelsea Moynehan), while a courthouse job helps a Working Stiff (USA, 5 min., Sarah Hanssen) support his art. The Dogist (USA, 6 min., E.J. McLeavey- Fisher) profiles an Instagram canine photographer and author, while The Tricks […]
NYC PREMIERE Girls and Boys is an observational portrait of a woman in Brooklyn, seemingly alone in her struggle to teach a group of playful, young students who are learning the basics of couple’s dancing in the Polish Folk tradition. Set in the basement auditorium of one of North Brooklyn’s last functioning Catholic schools, Girls […]
Five creators, five mediums. Jim Morrison’s last months in Paris, 1971 (USA, 11 min., David Khachatorian) are imaginatively recounted. James Turrell: You Who Look (USA, 8 min., Jessica Yu) offers a glimpse into the artist’s boundary-pushing work. A Brazilian punk poet is invited to Harvard after years of neglect by the literary establishment in Chacal: […]
WORLD PREMIERE When a Tony award winning actress stops speaking she relies on her students, colleagues and only daughter to speak for her.