First Chair (2021)

The Venerable W.

A view of the religious tensions between Muslims and Buddhist through the portrait of the Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu, leader of anti-Muslim movement in Myanmar.

The Haida in Canada

Haida Gwaii, an archipelago off the west coast of Canada, is home to Skil Jaadee and her family. They live in harmony with nature and have made it their mission to save their language and preserve their history.

When My Knife Strikes You

Shot in various villages throughout Yugoslavia, this is a disturbing document of a time when people were stabbing each other with knives without any real reason. Murderers, people who witness these murders and the families of victims all talk about the senseless violence and the human condition.

Manufacturing Happiness

Books, apps, coaching sessions: Today, happiness is everywhere. We might think that there is nothing wrong with this common-sense concern. But it’s actually the opposite of social reality. So what lies behind this contemporary obsession with happiness and the billions of euros generated by its industry? Philosophers, sociologists, economists and psychiatrists including Christophe André, Éva Illouz, Martin Seligman and Julia De Funès, confront their point of view and decipher one of the most captivating and worrying phenomena of this early century.

Inside My Heart

A documentary film by Canadian Director Debra Kellner, produced by Frank Giustra, Serge Lalou, and Richard Copans. Inside My Heart chronicles the plight of three refugee families fleeing their war torn countries over a period of nearly 3 years. Despite having lost everything and their harrowing stories about the atrocities of war, each family continues their fight to stay alive. Unable to return to their countries without the risk of being killed, today they are forced to live with the consequences of their broken dreams.

Sociology Is a Martial Art

"I often say sociology is a martial art, a means of self-defence. Basically, you use it to defend yourself, without having the right to use it for unfair attacks." (Pierre Bourdieu) The world has witnesses who speak out loud what others keep to themselves. They are neither gurus, nor masters, but those who consider that the city and the world can be thought out. The sociologist, Pierre Bourdieu is one such witness." Over a three- year period, Pierre Carles' camera followed him through different situations: a short conversation with Günter Grass, a lively conference with the inhabitants of a working-class suburb, his relations with his students and colleagues and his plea that sociology be part of the life of the city. His thinking has a sort of familiarity, which means it is always within our reach. It is the thinking of a French intellectual who has chosen to think his times.

Les scandaleuses

Béatrice Dalle, Lio, Brigitte Fontaine, Corinne Masiero, Aïssa Maïga, Virginie Despentes, Maria Schneider, Gisèle Halimi, Juliette Gréco, and Adèle Haenel—these women lived on their own terms, defying conventions and embracing lives often deemed "scandalous." Labeled frivolous, hysterical, or simply too free and too loud, they faced criticism yet used controversy as a force for change, challenging norms and advancing women's rights. This documentary retraces seventy years of their bold and unconventional journeys, telling the story of the fearless women who shaped history and fought for a more equal world.

We Did It on a Song

This film tells the stormy tale of a group of friends from Boulogne-sur-Mer, a French town hit by the financial crisis. A year between dreams and disillusion, imagined by teenagers from a working or middle class background, with songs that regularly add poetry, laughter, and emotion to reality.

Land Without Bread

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.

Ten Eleven O Two

Over the weekend of October 11, 2002, my uncle along with two friends set out on a camping trip in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Upon returning home, they were changed men, and recounted tales of alien abduction. Today, only two of the three men are alive to tell the story of what unfolded before, during, and after that fateful outing, and they're convinced it was extraterrestrial. This film explores the haunting accounts of two friends who underwent an alien abduction experience while camping in the remote mountains. Featuring psychedelic visuals and an alien hand print, Ten Eleven O Two opens a plethora of questions and is a must-see for anyone interested in the paranormal. Based on the true life events of Ken Mathis and Adolph Santistevan.

A Calling to Care

A Calling to Care is the inspiring story of 55 year-old Grace Stanley, a Canadian nurse who left her home and prestigious career behind to answer a calling halfway around the world in Karachi, Pakistan. Teaching nursing to local women in a strict Muslim culture that forbids them to even to touch men is a formidable task. However, Grace challenges her own values and belief systems to find common ground with her students, helping them to excel and feel respect for themselves in a culture that doesn't respect them. Whether it is getting her hands painted with henna, swimming fully-clothed in the ocean, or marching bravely with them on International Women's Day, Grace bonds with her students in a very special way, and ultimately discovers how the West can learn a lot more from the Third World than she ever thought.

The Aryans

THE ARYANS is Mo Asumang's personal journey into the madness of racism during which she meets German neo-Nazis, the US leading racist, the notorious Tom Metzger and Ku Klux Klan members in the alarming twilight of the Midwest. In The ARYANS Mo questions the completely wrong interpretation of "Aryanism" - a phenomenon of the tall, blond and blue-eyed master race.

Until I Fly

A charismatic Indian-Nepali boy, lives a bohemian life in a remote Himalayan village. As he transitions from childhood to teenagehood, his poetic journey of perseverance echoes issues that span across ages and communities.

Retirement Home

A group of elders spends their weekdays in a retirement home in Sandim, in the north of Portugal, where they talk, do arts and crafts, practice yoga and pray. We follow them between October 2012 and March 2013, when an economic crisis overshadowed Portuguese society and unemployment rates reached record levels. Meanwhile, arrangements are made for the Carnival ball. Will they bring the first place home this time?

Fuck

A documentary on the expletive's origin, why it offends some people so deeply, and what can be gained from its use.

Capitalism: A Love Story

Michael Moore comes home to the issue he's been examining throughout his career: the disastrous impact of corporate dominance on the everyday lives of Americans (and by default, the rest of the world).

Uppity: The Willy T. Ribbs Story

An in-depth profile of the life and career of Willy T. Ribbs - the controversial Black driver who shattered the color barrier of professional auto-racing and became the first Black qualifier in the storied history of the Indy 500.

Never Surrender: A Galaxy Quest Documentary

A feature-length documentary about the film Galaxy Quest and its legacy, celebrating its milestone 20th anniversary.

The Police vs Grime Music - A Noisey Film

In February, Just Jam's event at The Barbican was cancelled at the last minute. It was an event that seemed to be yet another victim of the London authorities now notorious risk assessment procedure, Form 696.

Yakuza and Constitution

Since the enactment of the Anti-Boryokudan Act and Yakuza exclusion ordinances, the number of Yakuza members reduced to less than 60,000. In the past 3 years, about 20,000 members have left from Yakuza organizations. However, just numbers can’t tell you the reality. What are they thinking, how are they living now? The camera zooms in on the Yakuza world. Are there basic human rights for them?

Mole Man

MOLE MAN follows RON, a 66-year-old autistic man who has spent the last five decades building a 50-room structure in his parents' backyard. Using no nails or mortar, Ron instead creates perfectly balanced structures from scavenged materials he finds in the woods outside his Western Pennsylvania home. When Ron's father passes away, leaving him living alone with his 90-year-old mother, Ron's siblings are left to figure out what's best for Ron - who has never been officially diagnosed with autism - when his mother can no longer care for him. In an effort to find the money to keep Ron in his home, his friends team up in search of a mythical mansion Ron insists lays abandoned in the forest. But will they be able to find it? And, more importantly, does it even exist? This is the story of an extraordinary life, a family, and the beauty of thinking differently.

Les dents de la mer: Un succès monstre

In the summer of 1975, the young director Steven Spielberg set new standards for cinema worldwide with an oversized shark bite, a plastic shark fin and an unmistakable two-note main theme composed by John Williams. With the horror from the deep, a man-eating, gigantic great white shark, the film of the same name became a similarly traumatic reference as Alfred Hitchcock's "Psycho": it triggered lasting primal fears across generations. On the beaches of the world, there was clearly a "before" and an "after". Steven Spielberg, who was only 28 at the time, not only set new standards for the thriller genre, but also hid his biting criticism of US capitalism in the 1970s behind it.

When a City Rises

Behind the gas masks of Hong Kong’s democracy movement, the often very young activists are just as diverse as the youths of the rest of the world. But they share a demand for democracy and freedom. They have the will and the courage to fight – and they can see that things are going in the wrong direction in the small island city, which officially has autonomy under China but is now tightening its grip and demanding that ‘troublemakers’ be put away or silenced. Amid the violent protests, we meet a 21-year-old student, a teenage couple and a new father.

Adieu sauvage

Since the year 2000, there have been several waves of suicides among the indigenous population of the Colombian Amazon. I discovered that the men commit suicide because of love sorrow. Their wives leave them for white men. The latter think that the Indian feels nothing because they do not express themselves in the same way and, in their language, there are no words to describe feelings. Is it possible that a whole people, the Cácuas Indians, do not feel anything?

Bertrand's Farm

1972 in Haute-Savoie (France) : the Bertrand's farm, with a hundred dairy cows owned by three bachelor brothers, is filmed for the first time. In 1997, they were the subject of Gilles Perret's first movie, as they let their farm to their nephew Patrick and his wife Hélène. Nowadays, 25 years later, Gilles Perret take another look at this farm, managed by Hélène who will step down. Through their words, an intimate, social and economic history of the rural world.

The Society of the Spectacle

Guy Debord's analysis of a consumer society.

Going to Hell

A documentary film exposing the truth about psychics and fortune-tellers. All the ins and outs of magical TV shows and services of the most famous psychics with evidence, names and prices.

Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck in Time

A documentary 33 years in the making. A director and friend of Kurt Vonnegut seeks through his archives to create the first film featuring the revolutionary late writer.

Malartic

Ten years after an enormous open-pit gold mine began operations in Malartic, the hoped-for economic miracle is nothing more than a mirage. Filmmaker Nicolas Paquet explores the glaring contrast between the town’s decline and the wealth of the mining company, along with the mechanisms of an opaque decision-making system in which ordinary people have little say. Part anthropological study, part investigation into the corridors of power, Malartic addresses the fundamental issue of sustainable and fair land management.

Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover

Compulsive Twitterer, Elon Musk bought himself his favorite social network in 2022, and brutally shaped it according to his desires. This punchy investigation relates the stormy relations between the platform and the billionaire, and their impact on the public debate.

Fog in February

On the eve of the publication of a biography of Claude Jutra, one of the most famous and celebrated filmmakers in Quebec and Canada, a leak leaked to the press reveals that the book contains anonymous allegations of pedophile acts committed by the filmmaker. The rumor spread like lightning, suddenly igniting the entirety of Quebec society. By finding today some of the main witnesses propelled overnight into the heart of an unparalleled media tornado, the documentary reconstructs with archive images and other previously unpublished images, the sequence of events which led to a rewriting of the story.

The One Percent

Jamie Johnson takes the exploration of wealth that he began in Born Rich one step further. The One Percent, refers to the tiny percentage of Americans who control nearly half the wealth of the U.S. Johnson's thesis is that this wealth in the hands of so few people is a danger to our very way of life.

McCarthy

"McCarthy" chronicles the rise and fall of Joseph McCarthy, the Wisconsin senator who came to power after a stunning victory in an election no one thought he could win. Once in office, he declared that there was a vast conspiracy threatening America — emanating not from a rival superpower, but from within. Free of restraint or oversight, he conducted a crusade against those he accused of being enemies of the state, a chilling campaign marked by groundless accusations, bullying intimidation, grandiose showmanship and cruel victimization. With lawyer Roy Cohn at his side, he belittled critics, spinning a web of lies and distortions while spreading fear and confusion. After years in the headlines, he was brought down by his own excesses and overreach. But his name lives on linked to the modern-day witch hunt we call “McCarthyism.”

Time

Fox Rich, indomitable matriarch and modern-day abolitionist, strives to keep her family together while fighting for the release of her incarcerated husband. An intimate, epic, and unconventional love story, filmed over two decades.

VHS Revolution

Using testimonies by pioneers and witnesses of the times, delve into the feverish visual culture the media generated – with far-fetched examples of canine television games, seduction manuals, aerobics class while holding a baby, among others.

Twenty Two

Follow the lives of the elderly survivors who were forced into sex slavery as “Comfort Women” by the Japanese during World War II. At the time of filming, only 22 of these women were still alive to tell their story. Through their own personal histories and perspectives, they tell a tale that should never be forgotten to generations unaware of the brutalization that occurred.

Revolution of Our Times

Throughout Hong Kong’s history, Hongkongers have fought for freedom and democracy but have yet to succeed. In 2019, a controversial extradition bill was introduced that would allow Hongkongers to be tried in mainland China. This decision spurred massive protests, riots, and resistance against heavy-handed Chinese rule over the City-State. Award-winning director Kiwi Chow documents the events to tell the story of the movement, with both a macro view of its historical context and footage and interviews from protestors on the front lines.

The Last Fistful of Land

'L'ultimo pugno di terra' (The Last Fistful of Land) is a 1966 documentary film directed by Fiorenzo Serra about the anguish and instability of the lower classes in a destitute Sardinia. Originally commissioned by the Sardinian regional government as a celebratory piece on the 'miraculous' effects of the 'Piano di Rinascita della Sardegna' (Sardinia's Rebirth Plan), the film instead shows an island still 'standing still in time', barely affected by the painful oxymoron of the inevitable changes taking place.

The Secret Order

Phil Comeau shines a spotlight on the Ordre de Jacques-Cartier, a powerful secret society that operated from 1926 to 1965, infiltrating every sector of Canadian society and forging the fate of French-language communities. Through never-before-heard testimony from former members of the Order, along with historically accurate dramatic reconstructions, this film paints a gripping portrait of the social and political struggles of Canadian francophone-minority communities.

Kids On Ice

Quiet towns across rural Australia are in the grip of an Ice epidemic. Major international drug cartels are working with local outlawed motorcycle gangs to push crystal meth to a captive market of children.

Cam Girlz

A look at the world of webcam workers who find economic freedom, empowerment, intimacy and creative self expression from the comfort of their own homes.

This Is England

Edward R. Murrow narrates Humphrey Jennings' short documentary about life in England during wartime.

Pitch Black

Pitch Black takes us inside the claustrophobic worlds of three young men immersed in the online black-pill subculture, as they struggle to reckon with their actions.

Polanski, Horowitz. The Wizards From the Ghetto

Filmmaker Roman Polanski and photographer Ryszard Horowitz meet in Kraków, Poland, where, strolling the streets, they share memories of their childhood and youth, the hardest days of their lives, when, during World War II, they met in the ghetto established by the Nazi occupiers.

Schlaue neue Welt - Das KI-Wettrennen

The race for supremacy in the age of artificial intelligence is on: between the USA, China and Europe. Between big tech companies and start-ups. Who will win the competition? Will Europe be left behind? And who will determine a technology that will shape the future of humanity?

L'Odyssée des Jeux olympiques

Plot unavailable

Sympathy for the Devil

While The Rolling Stones rehearse "Sympathy for the Devil" in the studio, an alternating narrative reflects on 1968 society, politics and culture through five different vignettes.