#Documentary
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Rama Rau – “The Daughter Tree”
Rama Rau is a writer-director. Rau’s debut fiction feature, “Honey Bee,” won the EDA Best Film Award at the Whistler Film Festival. Her film “League of Exotique Dancers”...
The Obamas’ Netflix Slate Includes Sundance Winner “American Factory” and a Callie Khouri TV Drama
Barack and Michelle Obama have finally announced the project slate for their Netflix-based Higher Ground Productions — and it does not disappoint. Currently, Higher Ground is producing seven...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Baljit Sangra – “Because We Are Girls”
Baljit Sangra uses documentary and factual entertainment to explore social and cross-cultural issues. A three-time Leo Award nominee, Sangra’s films have premiered at festivals around the world....
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Tülin Özdemir – “Red Moon”
Tülin Özdemir’s work asks the question, “Who is today’s modern woman?” The filmmaker made her first short documentary, “Our Wedding,” in 2008 and expanded on its...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Phyllis Ellis – “Toxic Beauty”
Phyllis Ellis is a creator, writer, director, producer, and performer in factual and scripted television and film. She was honored at the 2013 Canadian Screen Awards with the prestigious Donald...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Claudia Sparrow – “Maxima”
Claudia Sparrow was born and raised in Lima, Peru. Her first feature, “I Remember You,” won best dramatic feature film at the Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles and was released...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Emily Gan – “Cavebirds”
Emily Gan is a Chinese-Canadian photographer, filmmaker, and video artist born and based in Montréal. Gan has travelled across Canada, the US, India, and Malaysia working on various independent...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Aude Leroux-Lévesque – “A Place of Tide and Time”
Aude Leroux-Lévesque is a Montreal-based documentary filmmaker. Her first documentary, “Call me Salma,” aired on Arte, EBS Korea, Direct 8, and played in numerous international film...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Danielle Sturk – “El Toro”
Danielle Sturk is a bilingual multi-disciplinary artist. Sturk’s films have screened at over 30 film festivals, and have been broadcast on most major Canadian English and French networks, such...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Nance Ackerman, Ariella Pahlke, and Teresa MacInnes – “Conviction”
Nance Ackerman is a documentary photographer, filmmaker, and multimedia artist. Her films have won awards for direction and cinematography. Her credits include “Cottonland,” “Four...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Marcela Arteaga – “The Guardian of Memory”
Marcela Arteaga is a Mexican writer and director. Her 2003 documentary “Remembrance” was screened at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, the Festival des Films du Monde, and Hot Docs,...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Shannon Walsh – “Illusions of Control”
Shannon Walsh has written and directed four award-winning feature documentaries, as well as multiple shorts and 360 VR projects. Her work has been released theatrically in Canada, the UK, and South...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Megan Wennberg – “Drag Kids”
Megan Wennberg is a writer and director based in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. She works in both documentary and fiction, and her work has screened at festivals around the world and been broadcast on CBC,...
Weekly Update for April 26: Women Centric, Directed, and Written Films Playing Near You
FILMS ABOUT WOMEN OPENING Body at Brighton Rock – Written and Directed by Roxanne Benjamin (Also Available on VOD) “Body at Brighton Rock” Wendy (Karina Fontes), a part-time summer...
Rachel Mason’s “Circus of Books” Acquired by Netflix Ahead of Tribeca Premiere
“Circus of Books” will make its world premiere at Tribeca Film Festival this evening, but that’s not all writer-director Rachel Mason is celebrating. The doc has already found a...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Cindy Meehl – “The Dog Doc”
Cindy Meehl is a director and executive producer of documentary feature films. Her documentary feature “Buck” premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Nicole Schafer – “Buddha in Africa”
Nicole Schafer is a South African director. She produced award-winning stories for the Reuters pan-African magazine show “Africa Journal.” Her thesis film from the University of Cape...
Trailer Watch: Erin Lee Carr Investigates the USA Gymnastics Scandal & What’s “At the Heart of Gold”
“How much is a little girl worth?” asks Rachael Denhollander in a new trailer for “At the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics Scandal.” Denhollander was the first woman...
Jenni Rivera Documentary in the Works
Fans will have the chance to see Jenni Rivera take the stage for her final concert. A documentary about the late Mexican-American singer is in development, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Made...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Pailin Wedel – “Hope Frozen”
Pailin Wedel is a Thai-American journalist and filmmaker who grew up in Asia. She has regularly produced documentary programs for Al Jazeera English, namely for its current events program “101...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Shosh Shlam and Hilla Medalia – “Leftover Women”
Shosh Shlam is a director and producer. She has directed several documentaries, including “Last Journey into Silence,” “Good Garbage,” and “Web Junkie.” Hilla...
Trailer Watch: Jill Magid Blends Her Art with a Famous Architect’s Legacy in “The Proposal”
Artist and filmmaker Jill Magid’s exhibition “The Proposal” has been called “ghoulish,” “grotesque,” and a “desecration,” as well as...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Karen Stokkendal Poulsen – “On the Inside of a Military Dictatorship”
Karen Stokkendal Poulsen is a writer and director with a background in foreign affairs and political science. Her 2014 documentary “The Agreement” was nominated for Best Nordic Documentary at the...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Jeanie Finlay – “Seahorse”
Jeanie Finlay is British documentary filmmaker. Her films tell small and intimate stories to international audiences, whether inviting them behind the scenes of Teesside’s last record shop...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Yu Gu – “A Woman’s Work: The NFL’s Cheerleader Problem”
Yu Gu is a filmmaker and visual artist born in Chongqing, China and raised in Vancouver, Canada. Her previous credits include hybrid documentary “A Moth in Spring” and feature documentary...
Agnès Varda’s Last Film “Varda By Agnès” Acquired by BFI
The film community is still mourning the recent loss of Agnès Varda, but we haven’t seen the last of the acclaimed French director’s work. Her final film, “Varda By Agnès,”...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Maya Newell – “In My Blood It Runs”
Maya Newell is an award-winning Australian filmmaker with a focus on social impact documentary. Her credits include short docs “Two”and “Growing Up Gayby,” as well as the...
Hot Docs 2019 Women Directors: Meet Tasha Hubbard – “nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up”
Dr. Tasha Hubbard is a writer, filmmaker, and associate professor at the University of Alberta. Her first solo writing/directing project, “Two Worlds Colliding,” premiered at imagineNATIVE in...
Trailer Watch: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Prepares to “Knock Down the House”
“If I was a rational person, I would have dropped out of this race a long time ago,” says Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a newly released trailer for “Knock Down the House.”...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Ellen Fiske and Ellinor Hallin – “Scheme Birds”
Ellen Fiske is a director, writer, and producer. She directed the award-winning short films “Keep Me Safe” and “Lone Dads,” both set in Scotland. She is currently co-directing another...
Tribeca 2019 Women Directors: Meet Lesley Chilcott – “Watson”
Lesley Chilcott is an award-winning filmmaker, documentarian, and producer. She directed the feature documentaries “A Small Section of the World” and “CodeGirl,” the latter...
Tribeca 2019 Preview: Cheerleaders Fighting Wage Theft, the USA Gymnastics Scandal, & More
Fifty percent of the film’s screening in competition sections at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival are women-directed or co-directed, and plenty more titles from female filmmakers appear in the...
Yolande Zauberman Will Chair Cannes’ Golden Eye Jury
Another Cannes jury will be led by a woman filmmaker. According to Cineuropa, “M” director Yolande Zauberman has been tapped to chair the Golden Eye Jury, which evaluates the...
Peabody 2019 Documentary Honorees: “The Judge,” “The Apology,” & More
The documentary winners of the 2019 Peabody Awards have been revealed by Variety. Four of the eight titles are women-directed. Directed by Liz Garbus (“What Happened, Miss Simone?”),...
Teaser Watch: Jennifer Siebel Newsom Tackles Income Inequality in “The Great American Lie”
“When the family you’re born into [and] the zip code where you’re born determines your destiny, that tears at the fabric of The American Dream,” says one of the characters...
Peabody Award Nominations: “Killing Eve,” Hannah Gadsby’s “Nanette,” & More
“Killing Eve” is up for a major honor stateside. The BBC America spy thriller dominates this year’s BAFTA TV nominations, and now word comes that the Sandra Oh-starrer is in the...
Trailer Watch: Beyoncé Makes Her Mark at Coachella in “Homecoming”
Beyoncé’ is revisiting her iconic 2018 Coachella performance and the lead up to the headline-making set. Netflix just dropped a trailer for “Homecoming: A Film By Beyoncé,” a...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Jane Gillooly – “Where the Pavement Ends”
Jane Gillooly is a director, producer, writer, and editor. A Guggenheim fellow, Gillooly is a nonfiction and narrative filmmaker committed to the art of narrative. Her work has screened at museums...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Jacqueline Zünd – “Where We Belong”
Jacqueline Zünd was born in Zurich, Switzerland. Her debut film, “Goodnight Nobody,” has been shown at many international film festivals and won numerous awards such as Best Newcomer at...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Bettina Perut – “Los Reyes”
Bettina Perut is a Chilean filmmaker born in Italy. She launched her career as an assistant director on documentary television shows. Her feature co-directing and co-producing credits include...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Vivian Vázquez Irizarry and Gretchen Hildebran – “Decade of Fire”
An educator and facilitator, Vivian Vázquez Irizarry ran educational and youth leadership development programs at the Coro Foundation and BronxWorks, and is currently the director of...
Trailer Watch: 20 Years Later, Survivors Share Their Stories in “We Are Columbine”
April 20 will mark the 20th anniversary of the mass shooting at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado. Even though two decades have passed since Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murdered 12...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Sahra Mani – “A Thousand Girls Like Me”
Sahra Mani is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, university lecturer, and founder of Afghanistan Documentary House. Her films include “Kaloo School” and “Beyond the Burka.” “A...
Full Frame 2019 Women Directors: Meet Patrizia Landi – “Ressaca”
Patrizia Landi is a Brazilian director, focused on documentaries and documentary series. “Ressaca” is her second feature film. In 2012, she directed “Hijas del Monte,” which...
Smashing Stigmas: Crowdfunding Picks
In her deeply personal book “The Cancer Journals,” Audre Lorde wrote about the value of speaking up. “My silences had not protected me,” she revealed. “Your silence will...
Trailer Watch: Aviva Kempner Tells the Story of Moe Berg, “The Spy Behind Home Plate”
Moe Berg was a man of many masks. The MLB catcher “loved being a mystery” and “was a loner who wanted to experience the world,” we’re told in a new trailer for...
“Women, War & Peace’s” Abigail Disney On Funding Women Filmmakers and Redefining War
Abby Disney is one of the those people who has been at the intersection of feminist work in New York for the last 25 years. She has been the board chair of the New York Women’s Foundation and...
Hot Docs Announces Full Lineup, Tasha Hubbard’s “nîpawistamâsowin” to Open the Fest
Hot Docs has unveiled the full lineup for its 2019 edition and it’s set to be an exciting one for women filmmakers. According to a press release, the festival will present 234 films and...
Women-Directed Docs Dominate PBS’ “POV” This Season
The films comprising the upcoming 32nd season of PBS’ “POV” have been revealed. Of 15 features announced, nine are directed or co-directed by women. A 16th film will be added to the...
Trailer Watch: Audiences Reflect on “Thelma & Louise’s” Legacy in New Doc
“It all started 25 years ago when I saw ‘Thelma & Louise.’ I couldn’t help but wonder how other viewers were reacting,” says director Jennifer Townsend in a trailer...
Trailer Watch: Sex Workers Receive Support in the Courtroom in “Blowin’ Up”
“No one in here wants to see you in jail,” a lawyer tells her client in “Blowin’ Up” — and that truly does appear to be the case. Stephanie Wang-Breal’s...