The Long Breakup

An in-depth investigation into the private world of the American writer J. D. Salinger (1919-2010), who lived most of his life behind the impenetrable wall of a self-imposed seclusion: how his dramatic experiences during World War II influenced his life and work, his relationships with very young women, his obsessive writing methods, his many literary secrets.

In an intimate and joyful story of love in the face of loss, celebrated poets Andrea Gibson and Megan Falley find strength—and unexpected hilarity—in what might be their final year together.

In June 2013, Laura Poitras and reporter Glenn Greenwald flew to Hong Kong for the first of many meetings with Edward Snowden. She brought her camera with her.

Amid the failing counteroffensive, a journalist follows a Ukrainian platoon on their mission to traverse one mile of heavily fortified forest and liberate a strategic village from Russian occupation. But the farther they advance through their destroyed homeland, the more they realize that this war may never end.

Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.

He's devoted his career to uncovering stories the powerful want buried. From My Lai to Abu Ghraib, dig into the life's work of journalist Seymour Hersh.

As a visually radical memoir, CAMERAPERSON draws on the remarkable footage that filmmaker Kirsten Johnson has shot and reframes it in ways that illuminate moments and situations that have personally affected her. What emerges is an elegant meditation on the relationship between truth and the camera frame, as Johnson transforms scenes that have been presented on Festival screens as one kind of truth into another kind of story—one about personal journey, craft, and direct human connection.

Thirty-four days before she's sent to prison, notorious Silicon Valley founder Elizabeth Holmes invites a skeptical film crew to document her every move. What begins as an intimate portrait of an enigmatic felon becomes a mind-bending three-year journey into the abyss.

Penetrating the insular world of New York's Hasidic community, focusing on three individuals driven to break away despite threats of retaliation.

BBC Arena's documentary on the Dames of British Theatre and film featuring Maggie Smith, Eileen Atkins, Judi Dench and Joan Plowright on screen together for the first time as they reminisce over a long summer weekend in a house Joan once shared with Sir Laurence Olivier.

Director Michael Apted revisits the same group of British-born adults after a 7 year wait. The subjects are interviewed as to the changes that have occurred in their lives during the last seven years.

A string of threatening emails escalates into a revenge plot involving a newly married US marshal and his ex-girlfriend.

A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab’s life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. Her camera captures incredible stories of loss, laughter and survival as Waad wrestles with an impossible choice– whether or not to flee the city to protect her daughter’s life, when leaving means abandoning the struggle for freedom for which she has already sacrificed so much.

In August, 2014, a video of the public execution of American photojournalist James Foley rippled across the globe. Foley wore an orange jumpsuit as he knelt beside an ISIS militant dressed in black. That image challenged the world to deal with a new face of terror. And it tested one American family. Seen through the lens of filmmaker Brian Oakes, Foley’s close childhood friend, Jim takes us from small-town New England to the adrenaline-fueled front lines of Libya and Syria, where Foley pushed the limits of danger to report on the plight of civilians impacted by war.

Over 93 days in Ukraine, what started as peaceful student demonstrations became a violent revolution and full-fledged civil rights movement.

When journalist Kim Wall disappears after boarding inventor Peter Madsen's submarine, his changing story about her fate masks a terrifying truth.

Experience the events of September 11, 2001 through the eyes of President Bush and his closest advisors as they personally detail the crucial hours and key decisions from that historic day.

Performance artist Marina Abramovic prepares for a major retrospective of her work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Cameramen and women discuss the craft and art of cinematography and of the "DP" (the director of photography), illustrating their points with clips from 100 films, from Birth of a Nation to Do the Right Thing. Themes: the DP tells people where to look; changes in movies (the arrival of sound, color, and wide screens) required creative responses from DPs; and, these artisans constantly invent new equipment and try new things, with wonderful results. The narration takes us through the identifiable studio styles of the 30s, the emergence of noir, the New York look, and the impact of Europeans. Citizen Kane, The Conformist, and Gordon Willis get special attention.

Documentary about the art of film editing. Clips are shown from many groundbreaking films with innovative editing styles.

THE PERFUMED GARDEN is an exploration of the myths and realities of sensuality and sexuality in Arab society, a world of taboos and of erotic literature. Through interviews with men and women of all ages, classes, and sexual orientation, the film lifts a corner of the veil that usually shrouds discussion of this subject in the Arab world. Made by an Algerian-French woman director, the film begins by looking at the record of a more permissive history, and ends with the experiences of contemporary lovers from mixed backgrounds. It examines the personal issues raised by the desire for pleasure, amidst societal pressures for chastity and virginity. The film discusses pre-marital sex, courtship and marriage, familial pressures, private vs. public spaces, social taboos (and the desire to break them), and issues of language.

Based on the Edith Wharton classic of the same name, Undine Spragg, a fiercely ambitious woman from the Midwest, strives for the social heights of turn of the century New York. Armed with beauty, daring/hustle and sheer force of will/unwavering ambition, Undine battles an entrenched elite, fearlessly courting controversy, until love and fortune align.

A tribute to the controversial black activist and leader of the struggle for black liberation. He hit bottom during his imprisonment in the '50s, he became a Black Muslim and then a leader in the Nation of Islam. His assassination in 1965 left a legacy of self-determination and racial pride.

Thirty years after the Chernobyl disaster, which occurred on the night of April 26, 1986, its causes and consequences are examined. In addition, a report on efforts to strengthen the structures covering the core of the nuclear plant in order to better protect the population and the environment is offered.

During the Second World War, women were for the first time allowed to work as war correspondents. Based on reports, letters and diary excerpts, filmmaker Luzia Schmid sketches a personal portrait of three fearless women and their unique attempts to report on the war.

As Russian writer Boris Pasternak (1890-1960) thinks it is impossible that his novel Doctor Zhivago is published in the Soviet Union, because it supposedly shows a critical view of the October Revolution, he decides to smuggle several copies of the manuscript out of the country. It is first published in 1957 in Italia and the author receives the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1958, which has consequences.

Kristina, a self-named Hungarian female lion tamer, arrives in New York to become a dance choreographer. Kristina, now a middle-class NYC artist concerned about the environment, has a sailor lover named Raoul. The film, a collage work, an essay film, a fictional narrative and a documentary all rolled into one, is one of the most important independent American feminists films made during the 1970's.

The life of boxer Jake LaMotta, whose violence and temper that led him to the top in the ring destroyed his life outside of it.

A dying man in his forties recalls his childhood, his mother, the war and personal moments that tell of and juxtapose pivotal moments in Soviet history with daily life.

A short film about ties and gaps between a child and a parent. The author rediscovers letters her dad used to write her from prison. That love seems to be gone now. She decides to write back in hope to find the connection again. She puts in writing what could not be said: blaming him for family´s break-up but also trying to understand.

Discover Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo (The Trocks), an all-male company that for 45 years has offered audiences their passion for ballet classics mixed with exuberant comedy. With every step they poke fun at their strictly gendered art form.

An examination of the life of great Russian author Leo Tolstoy, who penned the 1877 novel Anna Karenina.

New York in the 1920s. Max Perkins, a literary editor is the first to sign such subsequent literary greats as Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When a sprawling, chaotic 1,000-page manuscript by an unknown writer falls into his hands, Perkins is convinced he has discovered a literary genius.

The brief life of Jean Michel Basquiat, a world renowned New York street artist struggling with fame, drugs and his identity.

The views and thoughts of Canadian writer Margaret Atwood have never been more relevant than today. Readers turn to her work for answers as they confront the rise of authoritarian leaders, deal with increasingly intrusive technologies, and discuss climate change. Her books are useful as survival tools for hard times. But few know her private life. Who is the woman behind the stories? How does she always seem to know what is coming?

New York City's beloved Ukrainian restaurant Veselka is best known for its borscht and varenyky, but it has become a beacon of hope for Ukraine. As the second-generation owner Tom Birchard reluctantly retires after 54 years, his son Jason faces the pressures of stepping into his father’s shoes as the war in Ukraine impacts his family and staff.

New York Times reporters Megan Twohey and Jodi Kantor break one of the most important stories in a generation — a story that helped launch the #MeToo movement and shattered decades of silence around the subject of sexual assault in Hollywood.

Taken in 1896 on the Boulevard (upper Broadway) on the occasion of a bicycle parade in the heyday of the wheeling craze. Old-fashioned horse cars lend interest to the scene.

Dubbed New York's "Queen of the Night," proto–club kid Susanne Bartsch has been throwing unforgettable parties for over 30 years and is still going strong.