On the morning of March 20, 1995, a deadly nerve gas attack in the Tokyo subway sent the nation and its people into chaos. This exploration of Aum Shinrikyo, the cult responsible for the attack, involves the participation of those who lived through the horror as it unfolded.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Ben Braun, Chiaki Yanagimoto)
World premiere
Bad Press
When the Muscogee Nation suddenly begins censoring its free press, a rogue reporter fights to expose her government's corruption in a historic battle that will have ramifications for all of Indian country.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Rebecca Landsberry-Baker, Joe Peeler)
Review preview for The Disappearance Of Shere Hite
This meticulously constructed film will leave you reflecting on the scale of that loss.
Shere Hite’s 1976 bestselling book, The Hite Report, liberated the female orgasm by revealing the most private experiences of thousands of anonymous survey respondents. Her findings rocked the American establishment and presaged current conversations about gender, sexuality, and bodily autonomy. So how did Shere Hite disappear?
Intimate vérité, archival footage, and visually innovative treatments of poetry take us on a journey through the dreamscape of poet Nikki Giovanni as she reflects on her life and legacy.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Joe Brewster, Michèle Stephenson)
World premiere
Going Varsity In Mariachi
In the competitive world of high school mariachi, the musicians from the South Texas borderlands reign supreme. Under the guidance of coach Abel Acuña, the teenage captains of Edinburg North High School’s acclaimed team must turn a shoestring budget and diverse crew of inexperienced musicians into state champions.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Alejandra Vasquez, Sam Osborn)
World premiere
Joonam
Spurred by a provocative family memory and a lifetime of separation from the country her mother left behind, a young filmmaker delves into her mother and grandmother's complicated pasts and her own fractured Iranian identity.
Review preview for Little Richard: I Am Everything
For all the debt owed to Sister Rosetta Tharpe the essence here is not translation uncovered but transgression buried. That makes the decision not to further explore these hidden histories all the more surprising.
This celebration of Little Richard reveals the Black queer origins of rock ’n’ roll, finally exploding the whitewashed canon of American pop music.
The quixotic journey of Nam June Paik, one of the most famous Asian artists of the 20th century, who revolutionised the use of technology as an artistic canvas and prophesied both the fascist tendencies and intercultural understanding that would arise from the interconnected metaverse of today's world.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Amanda Kim)
World premiere
A Still Small Voice
An aspiring hospital chaplain begins a yearlong residency in spiritual care, only to discover that to successfully tend to her patients, she must look deep within herself.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Luke Lorentzen)
World premiere
The Stroll
The history of New York’s Meatpacking District, told from the perspective of transgender sex workers who lived and worked there. Filmmaker Kristen Lovell, who walked The Stroll for a decade, reunites her community to recount the violence, policing, homelessness, and gentrification they overcame to build a movement for transgender rights.
(Country: US; Year: 2023; Director: Kristen Lovell, Zackary Drucker)
World premiere
Victim/Suspect
Investigative journalist Rae de Leon travels nationwide to uncover and examine a shocking pattern: Young women tell the police they’ve been sexually assaulted, but instead of finding justice, they’re charged with the crime of making a false report, arrested, and even imprisoned by the system they believed would protect them.
