The nature of the documentary itself gives a clue: It's the result of years of effort, traveling across the country interviewing gay men and their mothers, exploring the profound effect this relationship has in the lives of these men. Gay boys often grow up with some trauma, but when they have the support and acceptance of their mothers, the traumatic effects can be mitigated.
I could hear it in his voice, says Polsky on a recent video call, recalling DeLuca's hesitation to bring up his idea. He's like, This is kind of weird, and I don't know why I thought of you, but would you be open to hearing this really strange story that came across my desk?' Polsky, whose past film projects include documentary and feature films with collaborators such as Nicolas Cage, Wayne Gretzky and Werner Herzog, said yes.
George Orwell was dying when he wrote 1984 in the late 1940s on the desolate Isle of Jura in Scotland's Inner Hebrides. Tuberculosis ravaged his body, and typing thousands of words a day only weakened him further. His skin flaked off. Blisters burst across his throat. Feverish and emaciated, he endured painful procedures to support his failing lungs, but the treatments were too late. Eventually, in 1950, Orwell succumbed to the disease.
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging. At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground.
Going from 10 years ago when people didn't understand who trans people were to now where people have a lot of misconceptions and they think they know who trans people are but they still don't-I'm really invested in trying to show a more approachable and real and hopefully relatable side of that,
In her critically acclaimed short documentary A Move, the London-based director Elahe Esmaili returns to her hometown of Mashhad, Iran, to help her parents relocate for the first time in four decades. Esmaili's husband, the Iranian documentary producer Hossein Behboudi Rad, captures the trip as moments of familial tenderness and friction unfold. Inspired by Iran's 'Woman, Life, Freedom' movement, which was sparked by the death
The short documentary IntranQu'îllités is a rich tour of Haiti and its arts scene, guided by some of the country's most celebrated contemporary artists. Tethered together by evocative narration from the Haitian poet James Noël, the film presents an eclectic array of writers, musicians and visual artists who grapple with questions of personal and national identity, challenging stereotypes about the small Caribbean nation and its people in the process.
" The only people who see me are people who hope I disappear... " "He was just trying to sleep." Shawn O'Malley, one of the houseless leaders from the Vallejo Homeless Union spoke to POOR Magazine's RoofLessRadio after the tragic death at a sweep of James Edward Oakley. James is just one of the ancestors of the violent war on the poor I wrote about in the new movie Crushing Wheelchairs.
Curating, for me, is about expanding the circles around the artist. It is a process of cultural production centered on translation, extending from the nucleus and into the cellular system. Curating travels from the studio to the gallery or museum and to the communication or information networks through which the art will inevitably pass, intersecting with other social and cultural phenomena.
The best of the three is a movie that wasn't on many radars before Venice but became a must-see at TIFF after it emotionally devastated Italian audiences. Kaouther Ben Hania's " Four Daughters" was a breakthrough for the Tunisian filmmaker, earning her an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary Feature. She uses her skills with non-fiction filmmaking to emotional effect with the crushing "The Voice of Hind Rajab," a recounting of the events of January 29, 2024, much of which played out on social media.
"I remember coming out of the theater and feeling upset and needing to decompress and grab a drink," Chakarova said. "That's when Randall West, the same firefighter I met a year before walked into the same place I was. Randall said: 'You want to do a documentary of unrecognized heroes? You've got to talk to Wellington. You've got to do a documentary about the kids who are in his program'."
The Shorenstein Center announced today the Fall 2025 cohort of Documentary Film Fellows, who will be working closely with the Documentary Film in the Public Interest (DFPI) initiative. Through the Fellows' projects, the Shorenstein Center will engage in examinations of public impact and media policy. Shorenstein Center Director Nancy Gibbs said in a press release, "We are eager to welcome these exceptional leaders into our research community. Prof. Aufderheide's groundbreaking work on ethical practice, and Jax DeLuca's on the civic power of documentary, could not be more timely at this critical moment for the field."
Musician Frank Benbini is most probably known best as the drummer from Fun Lovin' Criminals and a latter incarnation of UB40, although as this documentary (which Benbini executive produced) reveals, he's got a lot of different irons on the proverbial fire; these include a beat combo called Uncle Frank and a reggae group called Radio Riddler. There are other side projects as well, musical and music-adjacent the occasional bit of barbering with an old friend from Leicester with whom he co-owns a salon,
After setting out to follow a family in Ukraine for an independent film the brothers were producing, Brent and Arredondo were gunned down by Russian soldiers on 13 March 2022. Arredondo was heavily wounded; Brent was shot in the neck and did not survive. According to the driver, [the ambush] wasn't more than five minutes, said Arredondo. But for me, it just felt an eternity.
In 1953, when Godard's mother, Odile, sent him to work as a labourer on the construction of the Grande Dixence dam in the canton of Valais, Switzerland, it represented a desperate last throw of the dice for her wayward 22-year-old kleptomaniac son. Godard had returned to Switzerland to avoid being drafted into the Indochina war, but quickly found himself in trouble again.
