Behind the Mask - Stories of the COVID-19 pandemic (2021)

Biosludged

Biosludged reveals how the EPA is committing science fraud to allow the ongoing poisoning of our world with toxic sewage sludge that's being spread on food crops. Features former top government scientist and EPA whistleblower Dr. David Lewis.

Islands in the City

Like ghosts, the temporarily shut down cruise ships lie in the port of Hamburg. A young man comes into town and is stranded on the riverbank, waiting for a message. He watches couples strolling along in the sunset and gets himself some sweets. In a moment of collective pause, ISLANDS IN THE CITY captures a fragile romance. There is a departure in the air, the destination of which no one seems to know.

Totally Under Control

This documentary puts a spotlight on the White House’s failed response to the global pandemic and how it could have been prevented. Featuring damning testimony from public health officials and hard investigative reporting, director Alex Gibney reveals a system-wide collapse caused by a profound dereliction of presidential leadership.

Who Said Macbeth

Although the past two years have been challenging for the Theatre industry, they also showed its incredible strength and resilience. Through interviews with West End performers and creatives, this documentary outlines the difficulties presented to our industry over the course of the pandemic, as well as highlighting changes - both positive and negative - that have come from it. An emotional reflection on a battle it was worth fighting for. All profits will be going to 'Acting for Others', an organisation that provides support to all theatre workers through 14 member charities. We hope these stories full of passion for Theatre inspire you just as much as they inspired us!

K'i Tah Amongst the Birch

Filmmaker/activist Melaw Nakehk’o has spent the pandemic with her family at a remote land camp in the Northwest Territories, “getting wood, listening to the wind, staying warm and dry, and watching the sun move across the sky.” In documenting camp life—activities like making fish leather and scraping moose hide—she anchors the COVID experience in a specific time and place.

Thursday

Thursday shot from filmmaker Galen Johnson's high-rise apartment during COVID-19 “lockdown” in Winnipeg, captures people going about their daily routines in the city's eerily empty streets, yards and parking lots, on their balconies and on the riverbanks. The extreme distance and the diminutive scale of humans is paired with sound close-ups—a combination that embodies the strange, heightened intensity of feeling of the time, knowing an era-defining tragedy is happening yet being so physically removed.

Red Herring

When Kit Vincent, a young filmmaker, receives a terminal diagnosis aged 24, his first instinct is to turn on his camera and document those closest to him.

10 Letters to the Future

10 Letters to the Future is a documentary film that is a mid-term review in a world of intertwined crises. It is a puzzle, a kaleidoscope that enables a multi-voiced debate in society. The collectively made film was conceived in the era of the Coronavirus, when the reality of global anomalies pierced everything we took for granted. It was a time that caused many to reassess their lives in a new light. What happened to us and what kind of future do we want to be heading towards? Virus researcher, climate activist, political scientist and anti-vaccine protesters see the future challenges facing our society in a very different light. As the virus takes over the world, schoolchildren start collecting letters to be encapsulated in a wooden coffin built by students to be opened more than 50 years from now. The main characters in the documentary write their letters, addressing their loved ones or something unknown in the future.

The Panola Project

Highlighting the heroic efforts of Dorothy Oliver to keep her small town of Panola, Alabama safe from COVID-19, The Panola Project chronicles how an often-overlooked rural Black community came together in creative ways to survive.

The Standstill

In an observation over four seasons THE STANDSTILL shows Vienna and its surroundings along with encounters with people during and after the Corona crisis. The film tells of the immediate and also the long-term effects, which can only be evaluated and classified in the future.

Childhood 2.0

For the first time in history, mental illness and suicide have become one of the greatest threats to school-aged children. Many parents still view dangers as primarily physical and external, but they’re missing the real danger: kids spending more time online and less time engaging in real life, free play, and autonomy. What are the effects on the next generation's mental, physical, and spiritual health? Childhood was more or less unchanged for millennia, but this is Childhood 2.0.

Uróboro

The COVID-19 pandemic scars the citizens of Mexico City.

Um Metro e Meio

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We Met in Virtual Reality

Filmed entirely inside the world of virtual reality (VR), this immersive and revealing documentary roots itself in several unique communities within VR Chat, a burgeoning virtual reality platform. Through observational scenes captured in real-time, in true documentary style, the film reveals the growing power and intimacy of several relationships formed in the virtual world, many of which began during the COVID-19 lockdown, while so many in the physical world were facing intense isolation.

Na Sombra

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The Unseen Crisis: Vaccine Stories You Were Never Told

In the climate of a global pandemic, COVID-19 vaccines were rolled out under emergency use authorization after a much shorter than normal testing period. Millions of people rolled up their sleeves because they were told they were doing their part to end the pandemic. But for some—it didn’t go as expected. The Unseen Crisis is a feature-length documentary that provides an intimate, uncensored look into the lives of those who live with the debilitating after-effects of the COVID-19 vaccines. It examines the issue of COVID-19 vaccine injury claims in a fresh, honest, and comprehensive manner with expert interviews, whistleblowers’ statements, and government health statistics.

Covidland: The Mask

This second episode of the Covidland series, The Mask, uncovers the real science behind face coverings and exploreds the physical and mental health impacts of facemasks.

The Truth About Fat

Scientists are coming to understand fat as a dynamic organ—one whose size may have more to do with biological processes than personal choices. Explore the mysteries of fat and its role in hormone production, hunger, and even pregnancy.

Die Bewegungskrise - Wie wir vom Sofa runterkommen

Increased screen time, excessive robotisation, the reign of the car, home delivery... At a time when new technologies are making sedentary lifestyles more explosive than ever, here's a look at some initiatives designed to get us moving again.

Full Circle

Faced with a traumatic injury that renders you permanently disabled; how would you reinvent yourself? Full Circle tells the story of Trevor Kennison and Barry Corbet’s shared resiliency and refusal to let their passion for life be limited by Spinal Cord Injury. It is an unblinking examination of the challenges of Spinal Cord Injury, and a celebration of the growth that such tragedy can catalyze.

Living Proof

Diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, documentarian Matt Embry takes viewers on a transnational journey — from Italy to Canada, and from the lab to the home — in order to examine the politics of the condition.

The Day Sports Stood Still

The story of the unprecedented sports shutdown in March of 2020 and the remarkable turn of events that followed. This sports documentary is a chronicle of the abrupt stoppage, athletes’ prominent role in the cultural reckoning on racial injustices that escalated during the pandemic, and the complex return to competition in the summer and fall.

Génération COVID

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The Door Is There

Portrait of the birth of a friendship between two men, while one helps the other to die. The acceptance of pain, the sense of humour and the commitment to family and friends, will accompany the virtual chats between Fernando and Eric, who were unable to meet due to the pandemic.

In the Same Breath

This documentary recounts the experiences of people on the ground in the earliest days of the novel coronavirus and the way two countries dealt with its initial spread, from the first days of the outbreak in Wuhan to its rampage across the United States.

Homeroom

Following the class of 2020 at Oakland High School in a year marked by seismic change, exploring the emotional world of teenagers coming of age against the backdrop of a rapidly changing world.

Alaska's Silent Summer

In 2019, 1.2 million people stepped off a cruise ship into the small, south-east Alaskan town of Ketchikan. The next year, in 2020, zero did. After decades of diligent work building a sleepy fishing, mining, and logging town into one of the most sought after cruise destinations in the world, the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed Ketchikan into an empty shell—lined with restaurants, shops, and attractions for the visitors who no longer come. Now, the town must find a way to survive without its key economy until the day arrives when cruise visitors once again pour into its docks.

COVID-19: The System

COVID-19. The whole world is in Lock Down. There is panic in society. What is going on? Is this actually about our public health?

The Teachers: pink, nature trail, ridge between rice paddies, plum

We no longer see children running around playing in the alleys of Seoul. Starting from elementary school, children go to private classes after their school. However, we see these people who are making efforts to protect children’s right to be a child and play like a child.

Out of Breath

An approach to the pandemic with a focus on care, revealing the human face of the collective struggle against Covid-19 in interviews with doctors, nurses and community workers.

Only Day and Night

A pandemic, a time of hard lockdown, when contact with other people is severely limited. The most common means of communication are online conversations, which the director uses to talk to people who, like him, are stuck alone in their apartments.

Condomínio em Quarentena

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Prendre soin

An immersive documentary about four nurses working in retirement houses in Alzheimer units. Near to Claire, Luca, Antoinette and Lika, we discover how the nurses work, how the care is possible, with patience, ability, intelligence, tenderness and love.

Perfecting the Art of Longing

Cut off from his loved ones due to the strict COVID-19 lockdown at the long-term care facility where he lives, a quadriplegic rabbi is filmed by his daughter while reflecting on love, mortality and longing.

Poisoned: The Dirty Truth About Your Food

Through revealing interviews with experts and victims' families, this gripping documentary examines the problem of deadly foodborne illness in the US.

In Delusion: Trump and the American Catastrophe

In 2020, the USA experienced a multiple catastrophe: No other country in the world was hit so badly by the coronavirus pandemic, the economic slump was dramatic, and so was the rise in unemployment. A rift ran through society. In the streets there were protests of both camps with violent riots, authoritarian traits were evident in the actions of the leader of the nation. And all of this in the middle of the election year, when the self-centered president fought vehemently for his re-election. From the start of his presidency, Donald Trump had divided American society, incited individual sections of the population against one another, fueled racism, hatred, xenophobia and prejudice, insulted competitors and denigrated critical journalists as enemies of the people. The documentary shows how this could happen and what role the targeted disinformation of certain sections of the population through manipulative media played.