Abxang

The Light in Her Eyes

Houda al-Habash, a conservative Muslim preacher, founded a Qur'an school for girls in Damascus, Syria when she was just 17 years old. Every summer, her female students immerse themselves in a rigorous study of Islam, in addition to their secular schooling. A surprising cultural shift is underway-women are claiming space within the mosque, a place historically dominated by men. Challenging tradition, Houda insists education for women is a form of worship. Using Qur'anic teachings, she encourages her students to pursue higher education, jobs, and public lives, while remaining committed to an interpretation of Islam prioritizing women's role as wives and mothers. In a world rarely seen, The Light In Her Eyes tells the story of a leader who challenges the women of her community to live according to Islam, without giving up their dreams. Shot right before the uprising in Syria erupted, the film is an exclusive look at a social movement thriving in a country controlled by a repressive regime

Paycheck to Paycheck: The Life & Times of Katrina Gilbert

This is the story of a year in the life of one mother whose daily struggles illuminate the challenges faced by more than 42 million American women and the 28 million children who depend on them.

When the Mountains Tremble

A documentary on the war between the Guatemalan military and the Mayan population, with first hand accounts by Nobel Peace Prize winner Rigoberta Menchú.

Here One Day

When filmmaker Kathy Leichter moved back into her childhood home after her mother's suicide, she discovered a hidden box of audiotapes. Sixteen years passed before she had the courage to delve into this trove, unearthing details that her mother had recorded about every aspect of her life from the challenges of her marriage to a State Senator, to her son’s estrangement, to her struggles with bipolar disorder. HERE ONE DAY is a visually arresting, emotionally candid film about a woman coping with mental illness, her relationships with her family, and the ripple effects of her suicide on those she loved.

Deliver Us from Evil

Documentary filmmaker Amy Berg investigates the life of 30-year pedophile Father Oliver O'Grady and exposes the corruption inside the Catholic Church that allowed him to abuse countless children. Victims' stories and a disturbing interview with O'Grady offer a view into the troubled mind of the spiritual leader who moved from parish to parish gaining trust ... all the while betraying so many.

Angano... Angano... Tales from Madagascar

Venerable storytellers recount for the camera and their listeners the founding myths of Malagasy culture.

Kurosawa's Way

Eleven major film makers from Europe, America and Asia talk about Akira Kurosawa and discover surprising influences on their own work.

Scar Tissue

Scar Tissue by Su Friedrich is a filmic version of a white canvas or a silent music piece.The fact that Friedrich never really shows the whole body, but rather plays off of body parts could be read as a desire to show less of the people on the screen, so that the viewer's reading can be generalized. If the "characters" existed as people, the images would inevitably read to be telling a story about these people. The legs and torsos do not signify people; it is the experience of these body parts and the rhythm with which they are portrayed that constitute the work.

Germany in Autumn

Germany in Autumn does not have a plot per se; it mixes documentary footage, along with standard movie scenes, to give the audience the mood of Germany during the late 1970s. The movie covers the two month time period during 1977 when a businessman was kidnapped, and later murdered, by the left-wing terrorists known as the RAF-Rote Armee Fraktion (Red Army Fraction). The businessman had been kidnapped in an effort to secure the release of the orginal leaders of the RAF, also known as the Baader-Meinhof gang. When the kidnapping effort and a plane hijacking effort failed, the three most prominent leaders of the RAF, Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, and Jan-Carl Raspe, all committed suicide in prison. It has become an article of faith within the left-wing community that these three were actually murdered by the state.

France / Tour / Detour / Two / Children

In this astonishing twelve-part project for and about television — the title of which refers to a 19th-century French primer Le tour de la France par deux enfants — Godard and Miéville take a detour through the everyday lives of two children in contemporary France.

The Phantom of the Operator

The Phantom of the Operator is a poetic film collage that documents the construction and rise of female telephone operators and their eventual replacement with computerized communications systems.

Profilers: Gaze Into the Abyss

Documentary about the work of 6 criminal profilers around the world.

School of Babel

They just arrived in France. They are Irish, Serbs, Brazilians Tunisians, Chinese and Senegalese ... For a year, Julie Bertuccelli filmed talks, conflicts and joys of this group of students aged 11 to 15 years, together in the same class to learn French.

Alaska: Spirit of the Wild

Alaska... Here, in this vast and spectacularly beautiful land teeming with abundant wildlife, discover the "Spirit of the Wild." Experience it in the explosive calving of glaciers, the celestial fires of the Aurora Borealis. Witness it in the thundering stampede of caribou, the beauty of the polar bear and the stealthful, deadly hunt of the wolf pack.

Warrior of Light

A feature-length documentary on Yvonne Bezerra de Mello, award-winning artist and human-rights activist who has gained international recognition for her work with street children in Rio. The film recounts how a woman turned her back on a wealthy lifestyle, driven into action by the execution of 8 streetkids by military police in 1993. In subsequent years Yvonne's struggle to better the lives of endangered and abandoned children has led her to found "Projeto Uere" ("Children of Light") a radical project committed to protection and education of kids who live in the streets and slums of Rio which has brought her into conflict with Brazil's wealthy elite.