Tell Me the Truth About Love (2000)

McKellen: Playing the Part

Built upon a 14 hour interview, McKellen: Playing the Part is a unique journey through the key landmarks of McKellen's life, from early childhood into a demanding career that placed him in the public eye for the best part of his lifetime. Using an abundance of photography from McKellen's private albums and cinematically reconstructed scenes, a raw talent shines through in the intensity, variety and devotion to that moment in the light.

Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise

A celebration of Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining civil rights moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her swinging soirees with Malcolm X in Ghana to her inaugural speech for President Bill Clinton, we are given special access to interviews with Dr. Angelou whose indelible charm and quick wit make it easy to love her.

Nin E Tepueian: My Cry

NIN E TEPUEIAN - MY CRY is a documentary tracks the journey of Innu poet, actress and activist, Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, at a pivotal time in her career as a committed artist. Santiago Bertolino's camera follows a young Innu poet over the course of a year. A voice rises, inspiration builds; another star finds its place amongst the constellation of contemporary Indigenous literature. A voice of prominent magnitude illuminates the road towards healing and renewal: Natasha Kanapé Fontaine.

Harto the Borges

A fragmented biography, inconclusive, partial, of the brilliant Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges, based on different testimonies: his links with Leonor de Acedevo —his mother— and María Kodama —his second wife—; his vast culture and devout dedication to literature, his and that of others; his country: the politicians and the disloyal military. Borges gradually builds his own impersonation of Borges.

Make Me Famous

An investigation of Edward Brezinski, an ambitious, charismatic Lower East Side painter hell-bent on sucess, who thwarted his own career with antics that roiled NYC’s art elite. Brezinski’s quest for fame gives an intimate portrait of the art world’s attitude towards success and failure, fame and fortune, notoriety and erasure.

The Books and the Night

A dramatized approach to the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) through the recreation of some of his works and the staging of various aspects of his thought and his life.

Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man

Poet, singer / songwriter and ladies man Leonard Cohen is interviewed in his home about his life and times. The interview is interspersed with archive photos and exuberant praise and live perfomances from an eclectic mix of musicians, including: Jarvis Cocker, Rufus & Martha Wainwright, Teddy Thompson, ANOHNI, The Handsome Family and U2's Bono and The Edge.

When You're Strange

The creative chemistry of four brilliant artists —drummer John Densmore, guitarist Robby Kreiger, keyboardist Ray Manzarek and singer Jim Morrison— made The Doors one of America's most iconic and influential rock bands. Using footage shot between their formation in 1965 and Morrison's death in 1971, it follows the band from the corridors of UCLA's film school, where Manzarek and Morrison met, to the stages of sold-out arenas.

Ricky Martin: A Loco Life

The third time was the charm. Twice turned down by "Menudo" for being too short, Ricky Martin (born Enrique Martin Morales) joined the boy band at the age of 12 and emerged as a teen heartthrob. Five years later, he was on his own, singing in 5 languages, propelling Latin pop to mainstream music. There was Mexican theater, a TV show, and then an American soap opera and sitcom along the way. The child who began as a choir altar boy and sang fast food TV ads in Puerto Rico would transcend his "Livin' La Vida Loca" lyrics and reveal his true self as a gay man. A six-year marriage, 4 children by surrogacy, and divorce would follow. Some may call it "A Loco Life."

Dans les yeux d'Elsa Triolet

Portrait of the writer Elsa Triolet, wife of poet Louis Aragon. The tile is a play on a famous poem by Louis Les yeux d'Elsa.

The Eyes of Dante

He is considered the greatest European poet of the Middle Ages and his work unfolds the whole panopticon of occidental education – theology, philosophy, sciences, politics and literature. But who has really read it, the “Divine Comedy”? Who knows more of its creator Dante Alighieri than that he had an eagle-like profile and was in love with a woman named Beatrice? 700 years after Dante’s death, the filmmaker Adolfo Conti travels through Italy with Dante’s words in mind and eyes to see the world as Dante did. As the film encounters the beauty of arts and the Tuscan landscape, the forces of nature, a dramatic life story is unfolded.

The Source

Traces the Beats from Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac's meeting in 1944 at Columbia University to the deaths of Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs in 1997. Three actors provide dramatic interpretations of the work of these three writers, and the film chronicles their friendships, their arrival into American consciousness, their travels, frequent parodies, Kerouac's death, and Ginsberg's politicization. Their movement connects with bebop, John Cage's music, abstract expressionism, and living theater. In recent interviews, Ginsberg, Burroughs, Kesey, Ferlinghetti, Mailer, Jerry Garcia, Tom Hayden, Gary Snyder, Ed Sanders, and others measure the Beats' meaning and impact.

Leopardi. The Infinity Poet

Showcases the life of Giacomo Leopardi, an Italian poet known for his melancholic verses on fleeting happiness, existentialism, and human suffering.

Omar and Cedric: If This Ever Gets Weird

A film that charts the artistic and personal relationship between two era-defining artists, Omar Rodríguez-López and Cedric Bixler-Zavala (At the Drive-In/The Mars Volta), told almost entirely through hundreds of hours of self-shot footage filmed by Omar over the last 40 years.

The Voyage of Bashô

A fictionalised documentary about the great Japanese poet Bashô (1644–1694), the spiritual father of haiku poetry. A monk, portraying the poet, journeys through Japan, following Bashô's journal and writing many of his haikus. A ruminant, poetic, Zen Buddhist observation of nature – a return to the lost paradise of unspoilt nature.

Love, Cecil

A documentary about Academy Award-winning costume designer Cecil Beaton. A respected photographer, artist, and set designer, Beaton was best known for designing on award-winning films such as 'Gigi' (1958) and 'My Fair Lady' (1964). The film features archive footage and interviews with a number of models, artists, and filmmakers who worked closely with Beaton during his illustrious career.

Hideaway

Documentary portrait of the poet Karla Erbová is a confession of a creative personality who, despite many twists and turns in life, remains true to her ideals and moral values. We witness the final year of the author's life, during which, even at the age of ninety, she continues to engage in public appearances and, above all, actively works on her craft. Through letters that Erbová wrote to her friend, the film offers an intimate, often self-deprecating reflection on old age, solitude, and relationships with loved ones, as well as an indomitable faith in poetry. The film "Ulita" not only highlights the pivotal moments of her life but also serves as a sociological exploration of the lives of the oldest generation.

The Nameless Woman: The Story of Jeanne & Baudelaire

The story, hidden by historians and biographers, of Jeanne, a black woman, whose real name is unknown, who was the muse and companion of the mythical French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867).

Alexander Pope: Rediscovering a Genius

Docudrama that recounts the astonishing life story of a forgotten genius, English poet Alexander Pope, who lived from 1688 to 1744.

Boom for Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat

Exploring the pre-fame years of the celebrated American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, and how New York City, its people, and tectonically shifting arts culture of the late 1970s and '80s shaped his vision.

The Capote Tapes

A portrait of the brilliant American writer Truman Capote (1924-84) and the New York high society of his time.

Video Letter

This remarkable compilation follows an exchange of video letters that took place between Shuji Terayama and Shuntaro Tanikawa in the months immediately preceding Terayama's death. It can be thought of as a home video produced by two preeminent poets and inter-laid with highly abstract philosophizing, slightly aberrant behavior and occasionally flamboyant visuals.

Wild Flamenco: Bambino's Story

In his time of greatest splendor, the singer Miguel 'Bambino' Vargas Jiménez (1940-99) was the last frontier of flamenco, an immense musical genre that he developed and brought closer to large audiences: an artist of artists, the idol of the roadside bars, whose inimitable style, scenic magnetism and heartbreaking personality made of his figure a myth, a king without a kingdom, a giant of the popular music of the 20th century.

Danny Says

DANNY SAYS is a documentary unveiling the amazing journey of Danny Fields. Fields has played a pivotal role in music and culture with seminal acts including: the Doors, the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, MC5, Nico, the Ramones and beyond.

Little Richard: I Am Everything

The story of the black, gay origins of rock n' roll. It explodes the whitewashed canon of American pop music to reveal the innovator – the originator – Richard Penniman. Through a wealth of archive and performance that brings us into Richard's complicated inner world, the film unspools the icon's life story with all its switchbacks and contradictions.

Being in a Place: A Portrait of Margaret Tait

Drawing on a wealth of unseen archival material and unpublished notebooks, the film weaves a complex and personal portrait of Margaret’s life, from the perspective of a fellow artist sensitive to the potential Margaret envisaged for film as a poetic medium.

A Bigger Splash

After a difficult break-up, Hockney is left unable to paint, much to the concern of his friends.