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- This film follows the hunting of a giraffe by four members of the Ju/'hoansi (a !Kung Bushmen tribe) over a 13-day period in the Kalahari desert. The film consists of footage shot in 1952-53 on a Smithsonian-Harvard Peabody expedition.
- Through the eyes of African filmmakers, an unforgettable portrait of Sierra Leone's heroes as they confront Ebola during the most acute public health emergency of modern times.
- An examination of biculturalism wrapped in an extraordinary personal odyssey.
- This film provides a broad overview of !Kung life, both past and present, and an intimate portrait of N!ai, a !Kung woman who in 1978 was in her mid-thirties.
- This little-known World War II battle with Japanese forces on the Alaskan island of Attu includes the accounts of two surviving soldiers. The film tells of the tragic operation that saw ill-prepared American troops take on massive casualties.
- Five individuals with disabilities unlock their potential towards employment, live independently and show the value they can bring to society.
- Fate of the Lhapa is a feature-length documentary about the last three Tibetan shamans living in a Tibetan refugee camp in Nepal. Each lhapa requested that their story be filmed. Their fear was that the next heir might not appear until after their own deaths. Subsequently, with no lhapa alive to mentor the children, the documentary would be used to transmit the knowledge to the next generation. Their tales of nomadic childhoods, shamanic callings and apprenticeships, cosmologies of disease and treatments, and of their flight from Tibet during the Chinese occupation in the late 1950s is be juxtaposed with images of present-day life in the camp, current healing practices and shared concerns of the future and the fate of their tradition.
- Presents an intimate portrait of several generations of women in a village family in India. Focuses on a grandmother in a Jat farm family in Haryana, and gives her viewpoint as well as those of her daughters-in-law.
- A detailed overview of contemporary life in the tiny South Pacific country of Tuvalu, this film documents the earth's first sovereign nation faced with total destruction due to the effects of global warming. With a population of about 11,000 living on a total landmass of only 20 square miles - less than Manhattan - spread over nine low-lying atolls 600 miles to the north of Fiji, Tuvalu has been inhabited for over four millennia. The warm-spirited and highly community-oriented people of this ex-British colony struggle to survive economically while confronting the likelihood of having to evacuate their homeland en masse within the next 50 years. As the industrial world just begins to address the threat and causes of global warming, rising seas and increasingly violent changes in climate have already left their marks on this poor island nation. The government of Tuvalu and other concerned organizations are directing their pleas for solutions to the wealthy countries whose high pollution emissions could be the central human contribution to this phenomenon. Observation, narration, and interviews with Tuvalu citizens from various walks of life flesh out a full portrait of a unique community confronting a dubious future on the front lines of a global environmental assault.
- An Autobiography of Michelle Maren is another gripping portrait from the Michel Negroponte, the director of Jupiter's Wife. Once again, Negroponte's subject is a haunted woman whose past will not release her. The film begins with an email from Michelle Maren to the filmmaker because she has seen and admired Jupiter's Wife. A middle-aged former beauty queen, go-go dancer, professional escort, and porn star, Michelle lives on disability checks and struggles with clinical depression, borderline personality disorder, eating disorders and childhood trauma. Isolated and alone, she is seeking transformation and another chance through film. What unfolds is a cinematic blend of exposure therapy, psychological investigation, and confession. Secrets are revealed and the film builds to a startling conclusion that is as riveting as any fiction.
- In the late 19th century, the Canadian government removed ritual objects from the possession of the Kwakiut'l. In 1921 the Kwakiut'l people of Alert Bay, British Columbia, held their last secret potlatch. In 1980 at Alert Bay, the U'mista Cultural Centre (u'mista means "something of great value that has come back") opened its doors to receive and house the cultural treasures which were seized decades earlier and only then returned to the people. This film documents the cultural significance of these events for today's Kwakiut'l people. It is an eloquent testimony to the persistence and complexity of Kwakiut'l society and to the struggle to redefine cultural identity in one Northwest Coast native American community.
- Sardar Sarovar, an impressive cement wall of 121 meters in height, stops river Narmada's flow. It is part of the faraonic "Narmada Valley Development Project", that plans the construction of more than 3000 dams, some of them of huge dimensions. Over two and a half million people are affected, most of them adivasis (indigenous) who are losing their houses and ways of life. For twenty years they have been struggling against the interests of the government and the big corporations. Women have gained consciousness of the dimensions of the problem and have become the main role in this unequal fight. Is this the single way of development? The situation in the Narmada Valley is an example of the 21th century's biggest war: water control, natural resources control.
- Gambell, Alaska is a Yupik-speaking community on St. Lawrence Island on the Bering Sea. Here, as on the coast, sea mammals are still the major source of food.
- From the streets of the American city of New Bedford to beautiful shores of the Portuguese Island of Madeira, this film takes viewers on a journey to the roots of what has become the world's largest Portuugese Religious Feast.
- When Medicine Got it Wrong is the groundbreaking story of loving parents who rocked the halls of psychiatry, changing how we understand schizophrenia. In the 1970s, a small group of parents rebelled against then-popular psychiatric theories blaming schizophrenia on bad parenting. Their activism helped revolutionize treatment forever and their stories reveal the origins of the tragic state of mental health care today.
- A documentary in which an ax fight breaks out during a dispute between tribes in a Yanomami village.
- Monir explores the life and practice of Iranian artist Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, one of the most innovative and influential artists working in the Middle East today.
- Heavy mist hangs over the towering Peruvian mountains as a young subsistence farmer, Feliciano, his wife Locrecia, and their small son Royer till their fertile land. Farming the fields above the Sacred Valley in southern Peru is all the indigenous people of Mullacas know - that and the taste of the local fermented corn beverage, chicha. Though theirs appears at first glance to be a peaceful life, isolation and lack of schooling have given rise to feelings of social inequality and an increase in alcoholism. So while he values the beauty of their surroundings, Feliciano wants his son, as his father wanted him, to move to the city so he can get an education and have a better life. Marking director Jason Burlage's feature debut, this moving documentary chronicles the young family's struggles through the planting season and Feliciano's more lucrative work as a porter along the Incan trails to Machu Picchu. These days, only a small percentage of indigenous Peruvians farm, as one in three members of the population now lives in Lima -sixty percent of whose residents occupy the slums. Yet among mountain communities, the belief that life is better in the city is widely held - and thus the traditions of "planting according to the stars," as their fathers and their fathers' fathers taught them, are slowly disappearing. The crucial practice known as ayni, for instance, or communal reciprocity in the form of such acts as plowing one another's fields, is being lost. Through such unsettling details, Burlage paints a vivid portrait of the complexities facing the future of rural communities throughout Peru.
- The film concerns female excision which has long been a practice in various African cultures and has taken a variety of forms. In those European countries and more recently in the United States, which has seen a rise in immigration from formerly inaccessible areas of Africa, the term "female genital mutilation" or "excision" and it's practice by newly transplanted Africans within the context of European and American society, culture and law, has become contested ground. Anthropologists, many of whom have long been aware of the practice, are finding themselves in the center of the debate. BINTOU IN PARIS is an excellent introduction to the theme as we are able to understand the complex mix of the pressure to adhere to tradition, while dealing with the desires of a younger generation infused with a sense of female emancipation to conform to the roles and demands of a new culture with new laws and protections. While the film is acted, the inter familial relationships ring true, as do the circumstances the film constructs. The film enhances our understanding of a volatile topic without resorting to horrific images or descriptions.
- Shot in the arid landscape of West Bali, Tajen follows multiple narrative threads of the ancient spectacle of the Balinese cockfight. Through attention to the blade, the rooster, and the cockfighter, the film conveys the intimacy, brutality, and festivity of the fight. The film, and its companion website Tajen: Interactive were conceptualized as a visual ethnography to complement Clifford Geertz's seminal piece, "Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight" and bring the study of the fight into the 21st century.
- 'Chaiqian' (demolition) is a portrait of urban space, migrant labor, and ephemeral relationships in the centre of Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province in western China. Attending first to the formal dimensions of the transforming work-site - including the demands of physical labor and the relationship between human and machine - the film shifts focus to the social dynamics of a group of thirty people who have come from the countryside to work in this ever-changing urban landscape. In exploring the various banal yet striking interactions between these members of China's 'floating population', the city's residents, and the film-maker, 'Chaiqian' simultaneously expresses and resists the fleeting nature of urban experience.
- Traditionally confined to the roles of life-givers, nurturers and homemakers, Boran women of Kenya are slowly realizing the importance of education and the difference it can make in their lives.
- Presents the most important relationships and events in the lives of the Nuer, Nilotic people in Sudan and on the Ethiopian border.
- This documentary made with an all native American crew by an indigenous Hopi director examines the representation of so called Indians in our films and in other media.
- This film, shot in 1955, focuses on a small band of /Gwi San living in the arid landscape of the central Kalahari Desert in present-day Botswana.
- In 1938, noted anthropologist John Adair travelled to the Navajo reservation in Pine Springs, Arizona with a 16mm hand wind motion picture camera. There, Adair met and filmed the Burnside family, creating a visual record of Navajo life in the 1930's. Adair's previously unseen historical footage is juxtaposed with contemporary scenes and in-depth interviews with the family 50 years later. As their story evolves, the clash between past and present surfaces, documenting four generations of change in one Navajo family. This rich and telling film of the Burnside history becomes a complex microcosm of Navajo culture in transition and raises questions about the survival of ethnicity in 20th century America.
- Young Arabs takes viewers inside an elite preparatory school in heart of Cairo, Egypt. The film offers a quiet encounter with a collection of students as they reflect on God, America, terrorism, marriage, the Middle East, and more.
- This is one of the few ethnographic films in which the anthropologist appears as one of the subjects, and as such it is a lively introduction to the nature of fieldwork. Napoleon Chagnon, who lived among the Yanomamö for 36 months over a period of eight years, is shown in various roles as "fieldworker": entering a village armed with arrows and adorned with feathers; sharing coffee with the shaman Dedeheiwa who recounts the myth of fire; dispensing eyedrops to a baby and accepting in turn a shaman's cure for his own illness; collecting voluminous genealogies; making tapes, maps, Polaroid photos; and attempting to analyze such patterns as village fission, migration, and aggression. The commentary touches on the problems of the fieldworker (all the genealogies compiled in the first year were based on false data, and had to be discarded). Between the image and the commentary we also glimpse some of the ambiguities of the anthropologist's role and his relation to the subjects of his study, for example in the tension between mutual exploitation and reciprocity. The film complements Chagnon's book on his fieldwork, Studying the Yanomamö.
- This is a documentary which both shows the ancient traditional art form of healing but tries to capture the essence of being a traditional healer in an ever changing environment. Traditional healers are shown collecting, preparing and administering herbal remedies that they have passed down from generation to generation. Healers discuss where, why and how they gained their knowledge and why they choose to carry on age old customs and practices despite he fact that Tonga is becoming a nation increasingly dependent on western medicine. Tonga's traditional healers are adapting to niches such as prenatal care and physical therapy. Interspersed throughout the film are beautiful scenes of water, agriculture, rainforest and people which comprise current island life in the Kingdom of Tonga.
- Two Yanomami tribes join together for a feast.
- Standing Silent Nation tells the story of a Lakota Indian family's struggle to assert their tribal sovereignty and maintain their values through the development of an industrial hemp-based economy.
- Ben Thresher's mill is one of the few water-powered woodworking mills left in the United States. Operating in rural Vermont, he makes water tubs by hand.
- A loving daughter documents her reunion with her mentally-unstable mother in this heartfelt and decidedly personal documentary from filmmaker Tara Wray. When Wray was just a child, her mother was her entire life. A young girl with no father figure to speak of, Wray and her mother became so close that it was nearly impossible to distinguish where daughter ended and mother began. It was during those years, as the pair did their best to elude demons both real and imagined, that Wray first began to see signs of the powerful psychosis that would gradually cloud her mother's mind to the point of total insanity. After loving and protecting her increasingly unstable mother to the best of her abilities, Wray left home at the age of nineteen - when her mother threatened to kill her. Now, five years after that fateful threat, Wray returns to Manhattan, Kansas to re-establish her bond with her mentally disturbed mother, and perhaps help the ailing abstract artist locate the geographic center of the United States - a curious location that just may hold the secret to establishing world peace.
- Shot in a variety of locations all over Turkey, Those Who Are In Love successfully conveys the emotion and beauty of traditional Anatolian village culture as it struggles with the process of modernization and change.
- In rural Nicaragua, Dulce Maria and her brother Francisco are Deaf adults who know no language at all--spoken, written or signed--until Tomasa, a Deaf sign-language teacher, arrives determined to teach them their first words.
- For the people of Mandak region, New Ireland,the most dramatic and complex ceremonial events are those surrounding death. The creation and presentation of the Malangan Labadama with its carved figures, masked dancers and feasting is the final tribute by three brothers to a deceased clansman and former leader.
- The colorful and culturally-significant Jankunu dance tradition of the Garifuna people of Belize is presented. The Garifuna are a Central American people of West African and Native American descent. In addition to discussions of the dance and music styles involved, the Jankunu raises valuable issues of syncretism, colonial history, performance and embodiment of culture and experience, and cultural survival. One of their most popular rituals is wanaragua, a three-fold system of masked Christmas processionals commonly called Jankunú. This ritual is a unique blend of African, European, and Native American (Arawak and Carib) art traditions in which social and cultural identities are expressed through music, dance, and costume.
- A film about the music dance and spirit possession practices of the Ojtiherero language-speaking groups of north-western Namibia and south-western Angola.
- Follows archaeologists as they seek clues to the origins and achievements of ancient Polynesian seafarers.
- The students of England's only free school defend themselves before Parliament, as it attempts to shut down their school.
- Educational film that provides insights into the challenges and opportunities faced by families in three contrasting communities in Costa Rica. Engaging personalities bring to life key community economic development issues, highlighting both sources of hope and of frustration. DVD includes Seven Special Features.
- Shooting for Democracy brings together voices of students in the world's smallest emerging democracy with those in its most established. The film is a vibrant portrayal of two nations as seen through the youth in each country. Inspired by the coincidence of Bhutan's first democratic elections taking place during a US presidential election year, Shooting for Democracy follows high school students as they participate in a video education program. The result is a unique juxtaposition that examines youth perspectives on democracy during the 2008 elections. Combining professionally produced footage with excerpts from the students' work, the film follows personal experiences of the students while also exploring the social and political contexts of these distinct nations, now linked by their use of a democratic system.
- The shaman Dedeheiwä bathes nine of his children and grandchildren in the river.
- Birds of Passage presents a lyrical journey through the everyday lives of two young Uruguayan songwriters. Ernesto and Yisela have moved to the capital, leaving behind their respective hometowns on the borders of Brazil and Argentina. After many years of composing songs that reflect their origins, both decide to explore new horizons and each seeks to fulfill the dream of recording a first album. While Yisela struggles to reconcile the emerging possibilities of a career in Uruguay with her plans to move to Argentina, Ernesto confronts personal conflicts that threaten to sabotage his creative passion. The film fuses the arts of documentary film and music, interweaving the songs and stories of these two young composers. With vérité cinematography and an unforgettable soundtrack, Birds of Passage explores the challenges of being a young artist, and the art of searching, inside and outside of oneself.
- This documentary gives voice to women and children not often represented in stories about Sudan. Told through interwoven first-person accounts by the few Sudanese women and children who have made the journey from Egypt to Israel, "Through the Negev" is a short documentary that encapsulates the refugees' struggle for home and safety. The women's intimate stories uncover the amazing strength and resiliency of women who just want a home.
- For generations, Patua (Chitrakar) communities of West Bengal, India have been painters and singers of stories depicted in scrolls. In the past they used to receive food or money for their recital of Muslim and Hindu stories and folk myths. Unfortunately, competition from other media significantly eroded this way of life. In response to this cultural crisis and as a way to make extra money, a group of women from Naya formed a scroll painters' collaborative. They candidly discuss issues of Islam and birth control, victimization of women, female education, poverty and work, religious tolerance and intolerance, and depict some of these ideas in the scrolls. Their stories attest to what it means to be a woman in Bengal and India today, demonstrating how a small group of determined women can empower themselves by adapting an ancient art to new conditions.
- The lyrical story of a community of Jamaican migrant farmers working the tobacco harvest in rural Massachusetts. Subtle and touching, the film rises above the political to focus on the often-overlooked human face of migrant work.
- Shangri-La to hell in ten years: How did Nepal, a peaceful landlocked country, become home to the most dramatic Maoist insurgency in modern history? Returned: Child Soldiers of Nepal's Maoist Army tells the personal story of Nepali boys and girls as they attempt to rebuild their lives after fighting a Maoist revolution. Through the voices of former child soldiers, the film examines why these children joined the Maoists and explores the prevention of future recruitment. The children describe their dramatic recruitment and participation in the Maoist People's Liberation Army during the eleven-year civil war between the Maoist insurgents and the Hindu monarch of Nepal. The girls' stories demonstrate how voluntarily joining the violent Maoist struggle became their only option to escape the gender discrimination and sexual violence of traditional Hindu culture in Nepal. With the major conflict ended and the Maoists in control of the government, these children are now discarded by the Maoist leadership and forced to return home to communities and families that want nothing to do with them. For many of the children of Nepal's Maoist Army, the return home can be even more painful than the experience of war.