2011 Titles
Director: Harrod Blank
Synopsis: Automorphosis looks into the minds and hearts of a delightful collection of eccentrics, visionaries and just plain folks who have transformed their autos into artworks. On a humorous and touching journey, we discover what drives the creative process for these unconventional characters. And in the end, we find that an art car has the power to change us -- to alter our view of our increasingly homogeneous world. Subjects featured include: Harrod Blank and his “Camera Van”; world-renowned spoon-bender Uri Geller and his fork-and-spoon-covered “Peace Car”; Howard Davis’s “Telephone Car,” an obsession-driven telephone collection; and Leonard Knight, a religious folk artist who has painted his vehicles as well as most of an entire mountain in the desert as a testament to his faith. Weaving his own tale amidst the others, Blank, as narrator, is the glue that binds these vibrant portraits.
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Directors: Andre Dahlman, Ian Cook
Synopsis: Amid the tangle of commuter traffic, shopping malls and office buildings that define life inside the Washington, DC Beltway rests a one-acre piece of farmland under the care of 89-year-old Charlie Koiner. With the help of his only daughter, Charlie continues to work his land, share his produce and enjoy the farm life he’s always known. Corner Plot explores one man’s steadfast authenticity in a changing world.
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Directors: Jen Gilomen, Sally Rubin
Synopsis: Deep in the Appalachian mountains of eastern Kentucky, where coal is king, Beverly May and Terry Ratliff find themselves at the center of a contentious community battle over a proposed mountaintop-removal coal mine.
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Director: Stanley Nelson
Synopsis: Freedom Riders is the first feature-length film about a courageous band of civil rights activists who called themselves the Freedom Riders. They challenged segregation in interstate transport in the American South during the spring and summer of 1961. The attention the movement generated caused the federal government to take down Jim Crow signs of “whites only” and “colored only,” allowing every American to travel freely—a legacy we enjoy today.
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If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front
Director: Marshall Curry
Synopsis: The film is a rare behind-the-curtain look at the Earth Liberation Front, the radical environmental group that the FBI calls America's 'number one domestic terrorist threat.' With unprecedented access and a nuanced point of view, the documentary tells the story of Daniel McGowan, an ELF member who faced life in prison for two multi-million dollar arsons against Oregon timber companies. The film employs McGowan's story to examine larger questions about environmentalism, activism, and terrorism.
Trailer
Director: Anthony Weeks
Synopsis: Three actors with disabilities currently working in the Hollywood entertainment industry address the authentic representation of disability in the media as well as the ongoing struggle for access and inclusion. This is a student film from Stanford University.
Trailer
It's About You: John Mellencamp
Director: Kurt Markus
Synopsis: This is a personal journey film about singer/songwriter John Mellencamp. It documents Mellencamp’s summer 2009 tour across America with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson and the recording of his new album No Better Than This in three historical locations. The story is told through the eyes of the father/son film- making team Kurt and Ian Markus, both first-time filmmakers.
Trailer
Director: Alex Rotaru
Synopsis: Kids with Cameras follows the progress and challenges of a group of children, aged 11 to 19 with Autism Spectrum Disorder, as they engage in an intensive film camp taught by national award-winning educator Brad Koepenick and organized by Actors for Autism. After teaching many children, Koepenick decided to hold a camp specifically for children with autism.
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Latin Music USA: The Chicano Wave
Director: John J. Valadez
Synopsis: Latin Music USA: Chicano Wave presents a fresh take on America’s musical heritage, reaching across decades and across musical genres to portray the rich mix of sounds created by Latinos and embraced by millions. In Latin Music USA: Chicano Wave, Mexican-Americans in California, Texas and across the Southwest create their own distinct musical voices during the second half of the 20th century. Their music played an important role in the struggle for Chicano civil rights. An entertaining look at the lively voice of Mexican-Americans. It was produced by the National Association of Latino Independent Producers.
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Director: Madeline Sackler
Synopsis: In a country where 58 percent of African-American 4th graders are functionally illiterate, The Lottery explains the failures of the traditional public school system and reveals that hundreds of thousands of parents attempt to leave the system every year. The Lottery follows four families from Harlem and the Bronx who have entered their children in a charter school lottery. Out of thousands of hopefuls, only a small minority will win the chance of a better future.
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Directors/Producers: Greg Jacobs, Jon Siskel
Synopsis: Louder Than a Bomb features four Chicago high school poetry teams as they prepare for and compete in the world's largest youth poetry slam. By turns hopeful and heartbreaking, the film captures their tempestuous lives, exploring the ways writing shapes their world, and vice versa. Louder Than a Bomb is about language as a joyful release, irrepressibly talented teenagers obsessed with making words dance, and the communities they create along the way.
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Director: J. Clay Tweel
Synopsis: A coming-of-age journey set in the quirky subculture of magic, Make Believe follows six of the world's best young magicians as they pursue the title of Teen World Champion magician and lead us on their personal journeys of transformation through stage magic. As the competition unfolds in Las Vegas, magicians from Japan and South Africa, as well as the U.S. vie for first prize.
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The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
Directors/Producers: Judith Ehrlich, Rick Goldsmith
Synopsis: In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg, a leading US government Vietnam War strategist, came to realize that America’s role in the war was based on decades of lies. He leaked 7,000 pages of top-secret documents to The New York Times, an act of conscience that led directly to Watergate, President Nixon’s resignation and the end of the American war in Vietnam. Ellsberg and other political and journalistic figures give a riveting account of those world-changing events.
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The New Frontier: Sustainable Ranching in the American West
Director: C. Melinda Levin
Synopsis: In the face of growing population and increasing development and residential sub-divisions, three ranchers—from Texas, Colorado and New Mexico—demonstrate how they are integrating their ranching into their respective ecosystems, taking care to sustain and maintain the watershed, wildlife migration and the land, while supporting their respective livelihoods.
Trailer
Director: Judy Irola
Synopsis: In the summer of 1966, a group of 65 idealistic young American Peace Corps volunteers headed for Africa and landed in the dusty, heat-scorched desert of Niger. They stayed for two years working in agriculture, digging wells and starting health clinics for women and their babies. In 2008 five of the volunteers returned to Niger to revisit the country, see old friends and witness how the work of the volunteers had improved the lives of the people there. The documentary also explores the culture shock of re-entry into the US in the turmoil of 1968 and how the volunteers’ experience in Africa influenced their future work.
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No Crossover: The Trial of Allen Iverson
Director: Steve James
Synopsis: On February 13, 1993, 17-year-old high school basketball star Allen Iverson entered a Hampton, Virginia bowling alley with several classmates. It was supposed to be an ordinary evening, but a quarrel soon turned into a brawl pitting Iverson's black friends against a group of white men. The fallout from the fight and the handling of the subsequent trial landed the nation's best high school athlete in jail and sharply divided the city along racial lines. Oscar nominee Steve James (Hoop Dreams) returns to his hometown of Hampton, where he once played basketball, to take a personal look at this still disputed incident and examine its impact on Iverson and the shared community.
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Director: Lisa Leeman
Synopsis: Where does an elephant go after a life in the circus? Sixteen years have passed since circus producer David Balding adopted Flora, the orphaned baby African elephant he lovingly raised as part of his family and made the star of his show. As Flora approaches adulthood, he realizes that she is not happy performing. Ultimately, David must face the difficult truth that the circus is no place for Flora. She needs to be with other elephants. The road to Flora’s retirement, however, is a difficult and emotional journey which tests their bond in unexpected ways. Ten years in the making, One Lucky Elephant explores the consequences of keeping wild animals in captivity, while never losing sight of the delicate love story at its heart.
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Director: Sara Nesson
Synopsis: Poster Girl is the story of Robynn Murray, an all-American high-school cheerleader turned “poster girl” for women in combat, distinguished by Army Magazine’s cover shot. Now home from Iraq, her tough-as-nails exterior begins to crack, leaving Robynn struggling with the debilitating effects of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Shot and directed by first-time filmmaker Sara Nesson, Poster Girl is an emotionally raw documentary that follows Robynn over the course of two years as she embarks on a journey of self-discovery and redemption, using art and poetry to redefine her life.
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Director: Anne Makepeace
Synopsis: The Wampanoag nation of southeastern Massachusetts helped the first white settlers in America survive, but eventually lost their own culture. We Still Live Here tells the story of the return of the Wampanoag Indian language. No one alive still spoke it until it was revived by indomitable linguist Jessie Little Doe. The Wampanoag are now teaching their language and culture to new generations.
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Title: Bottle
Director: Kirsten Lepore
Animated on location at a beach, in snow, and underwater, this stop-motion short details a transoceanic conversation between two characters via objects in a bottle.
Title: Kiwi
Director: Dony Permedi
The story of a Kiwi who spends his whole life working toward achieving his dream.
Title: Singles
Director: Rebecca Sugar
A simple story about making a sandwich turns into a multidimensional trip outside the self.
Title: Something Left, Something Taken
Director: Max Porter & Ru Kuwahata
An animated dark comedy about a vacationing couple's encounter with a man they believe to be the Zodiac Killer.
Title: Work
Director: Michael Rianda
One boy's obsession with Moon Shoes forces him to make the ultimate choice.