Cinemafile

A SAD AND BEAUTIFUL WORLD is a sweeping love story that spans three decades of friendship, passion, heartbreak, and hope. Nino, an eternal optimist, and Yasmina, an impulsive pragmatist, drawn together by a magnetic relationship. Struggling with universal choices of adult life in the extraordinary circumstances of a country constantly ravaged by war, they are confronted with an impossible choice b...

Director Kerry Mondragon takes us deep in the dense jungles of the Yucatan, where the air hums and the ground seems alive. A film that is destined for Midnight Movie acclaim, WETIKO follows Aapo, a young Mayan man trying to survive the modern hustle without losing his roots. When he takes a quick-cash job for his family-owned pet store delivering hallucinogenic bufo toads to a remote jungle ceremo...

Director Ry Levey’s wildly entertaining documentary BOUTIQUE: TO PRESERVE AND COLLECT chronicles the remarkable resurgence of collectible Blu-ray culture and the specialty labels around the world dedicated to preserving, restoring, and reintroducing long-lost obscurities and cinematic landmarks to new generations of audiences. Featuring filmmakers, performers, label representatives, historians, co...

In the wake of yet another mass shooting, this time at The Covenant School in Nashville, Ketch Secor, lead singer of the popular country-bluegrass band Old Crow Medicine Show, decided it was time to speak out on gun reform. He wrote an op-ed in the New York Times entitled, “Country Music Can Lead America Out of Its Obsession with Guns.” It caught the attention of Ketch’s friend, David Greene, form...

Robert Goodwin wrote, produced, and directed this lost gem of American independent cinema. Opening during a tense meeting between members of an underground Black Power group that leads to a stunning foot chase, Goodwin’s film weaves past and present to tell the story of the social awakening of a character only referred to as “the drifter” (screen legend Bernie Casey in his first starring role!). S...

WELCOME SPACE BROTHERS is a feature documentary about The Unarius Academy of Science, an extraterrestrial-channeling spiritual school and self-healing community established in the 1970s in El Cajon, California that became a wildly prolific filmmaking collective under the direction of outlandish spiritual leader and filmmaker Ruth E. Norman, AKA “Archangel Uriel.” About the filmmaker - Jodi Wille i...

MIDDLE LIFE follows Andie, a perfectionist wedding planner in her mid-thirties and a new mother, who has meticulously crafted her life but still feels unfulfilled. Fresh off maternity leave, she saves Ryan, a blue-collar plumber, from a roadside accident. As their paths intertwine over the next year, her craving for change and his newfound perspective on life spark an unexpected connection, leadin...

What would happen if a captive-born owl with no survival skills tried to make it on his own in New York City? In WILD INSIDE, we discover the answer is more incredible, and more consequential, than we could have ever imagined. In February 2023, a Eurasian Eagle-Owl named Flaco escapes from the Central Park Zoo and sets off on a magical odyssey through the island of Manhattan. Flaco answers the cal...

Filmmaker Rustin Thompson journeys into the American West on a search for traces of what was once a center of small-town life: the movie theater. On the trip, he finds long abandoned and forgotten cinemas; movie houses that have fallen into disrepair; theaters recently closed, theaters struggling to hold on, and theaters that—thanks to their thoughtful caretakers—are not only surviving but thrivin...

American Pachuco: The Legend of Luis Valdez chronicles how writer /playwright / director Luis Valdez illuminated the Mexican American experience on stage and screen and transformed the American cultural landscape. Born in Delano, California in 1940, Valdez wrote his first plays in grammar school, had his first play produced when he was a student at San Jose State University, and created El Teatro...

Sia: Nostalgic for the Present is a bold, genre-defying experience that trades pop pageantry for pure artistry. Awe-inspiring vocals, breathtaking choreography, and iconic performances, captured cinematically and soundtracked by an unmatched catalog of hits. In 2016, Sia toured the world mirroring this film live on stage, frame for frame. Remastered for its tenth anniversary, it stands alone for t...

After her mother’s illness returns, 22-year-old Margarita, a young woman with autism, discovers the world of hobbyhorsing and sets out to prove her independence to her mother—stick horse and all. HORSEGIRLS stars breakout newcomer Lillian Carrier (“Everything's Gonna Be Okay”) and Gretchen Mol ( Millers In Marriage, American Gigolo ), who is featured in Taylor Sheridan’s hit Paramount+ drama serie...

Thirty years ago, Gail Ritchey, a young woman from a conservative Christian community in rural Ohio, gave birth alone and left her newborn in the woods. Now a devoted mother of three, her quiet suburban life shatters when DNA evidence links her to the infamous cold case of “Geauga’s Child. ” Arrested for murder and vilified in the media, authorities dismiss her claim that the baby was stillborn. F...

Director Andy Mundy-Castle's Shoot The People is an intimate documentary capturing photographer and activist Misan Harriman’s journey documenting global protest movements that drive social change. Following Harriman as he highlights the resilience of grassroots activists fighting for equality, civil rights, and social justice, the film showcases the intersectionality of these movements and their c...

Each summer they bring together over 3,000 attendees to watch movies under the stars through their Free Summer Series at Ojai’s iconic Libbey Bowl, making it one of the largest free event series. For nearly four decades, the Ojai Film Society (OFS) has presented Free Summer Series with quality independent, foreign, documentary, and classic films to the Ojai Valley, making us one of the largest fre...

Color Congress is an ecosystem-builder that is committed to organizations led by people of color that serve nonfiction filmmakers, leaders, and audiences of color across the United States and US islands. We are a membership organization that includes film festivals, artist support and narrative change entities, micro cinemas, filmmaker collectives, and public media. We serve this ecosystem by supp...

After the death of her son, Amanda Bellaconda seeks the help of Dr Jack Forteo to understand why teenagers are suddenly taking their own lives after taking a medication for acne. Carinaderm is the goose that keeps laying golden eggs, an acne medication bringing in a billion dollars a year for the Renzon Pharmaceutical Company. When Dr. Forteo sees a potentially lethal side effect of their blockbus...

Sherman’s March - Director Ross McElwee - Armed with a 16mm camera and a grant to make a documentary about the lingering aftermath of William Tecumseh Sherman’s 1864 march to the sea, Ross McElwee gets sidetracked. After his girlfriend breaks up with him, Ross shifts his attention from the historical to the personal, to the battlefield of modern love, and embarks on a sociological chronicle that d...

If poetry had a pop icon, Mary Oliver would be it. Celebrated bestseller, Pulitzer Prize winner, lover of dogs and long walks in the woods, openly queer but intensely private, Oliver was America’s unlikely contemporary mystic, stalking the ponds and forests of Cape Cod for nearly 50 years in order to open herself – and her readers – to the known and unknowable world. Featuring interviews with her...

For the first time, band members Boy George, Roy Hay, Mikey Craig, and Jon Moss come together to share their complete story, offering candid insights into their creative process, personal relationships, and the cultural impact that defined a generation. At the heart of the documentary is the previously unexplored love story between George and Moss — a relationship that inspired some of the band’s...

Director Advik Beni's winsome and unconventional narrative drama "mother, you have not died yet. but you will. and when you do, you will finally be alive again" takes place in Cato Manor, Durban, where Lishana has spent over two decades caring for her elderly mother, Leela. Their lives unfold through ordinary rituals: preparing meals, tending the garden, watching television, praying before bed, fe...

THE LAST PLACE ON EARTH is a thrilling, nine-year journey into the heart of Sumatra’s Leuser Ecosystem—a 2.6-million-hectare rainforest where tigers, elephants, rhinos, and orangutans still roam free. Filmed by a dedicated mostly Indonesian crew, this investigative documentary follows a group of extraordinary wildlife activists as they risk everything to save one of Earth’s last untouched wilderne...

THE WELCOME TABLE, directed by Academy Award®-nominated filmmaker Josh Fox (“Gasland”), tells the story of climate refugees across six continents, celebrating the voices and experiences of people living at the forefront of the climate crisis, displaced from their homes by climate disasters. Featuring John Boutté, John Cameron Mitchell, and celebrated New Orleans musicians, the film weaves together...

When Alabama's Supreme Court declares IVF embryos are legally children, the immediate fallout devastates families. For acclaimed reproductive journalist and visual artist Abbey Crain, this ruling disrupts half a decade of fertility treatments, placing her dreams of motherhood — and her embryos — in constitutional crossfire. But Crain refuses to surrender her creative power. With a pen and paintbru...

In this light-and-dark comedy, HONEYJOON, June and her Persian-British mother Lela travel to the romantic Azores islands for a grief anniversary, with contrasting ways of coping. A charming surfer takes them on a tour as we surf the waves of life, loss, flirting… an unforgettable ride. A surprisingly sexy, darkly funny, emotional rollercoaster. We are joined in conversation with Director, Producer...