Saturday March 31st 2007
1pm-SHAME USA/Pakistan 96 min.
Mukhtaran Mai was gang-raped by a group of men while her father, uncle and a dozen other Pakistani men watched As punishment for an offence
her brother had committed. Instead of suffering in silence, she spoke out and changed the way the international community responds to sex crimes
3pm – FREEHELD - USA, 2006, 38 min.
Lieutenant Laurel Hester is dying, but her biggest battle isn’t against the disease that will eventually take her life, it’s against the elected officials of her New Jersey county who are denying her her dying wish: to provide for the woman she loves.
3pm - RECYCLED LIFE USA/Guatemala, 2006, 38 min.
This powerful Academy Award nominated documentary takes viewers tot the Guatemala City Garbage Dump, Central America's most toxic landfill and home to thousands of “guajeros” – indigenous men, women and children who live and work in the stifling heaps of trash.
5pm - HAVE YOU SEEN ANDY USA, 2006, 79 min.
Twenty two years after 10- yr old Andy Puglisi’s disappearance from city pool, childhood friend Melanie Perkins searches for his abductor.
7pm - ROW HARD NO EXCUSES USA, 2007, 88 min. Two men, 3000 miles, one 23-ft rowboat: the story of the only American entry in the Atlantic Rowing Challenge, the world’s toughest rowing race.
9pm - THREE COMRADES THE NETHERLANDS 2006, 99 min. Ruslan, Ramzan and Islam were typical college friends living in Grozny in the early 90’s. But the downfall of the Soviet Union and Chechnya’s subsequent struggle for independence altered their lives in ways they could never have imagined.
11pm - MANDA BALA (SEND A BULLET) USA, 2006, 85 min.
Jason Kohn, former research assistant to Errol Morris, launched his directing career in style when his kinetic and brutal tour of decadence, wealth and corruption in Brazil, Send a Bullet, won the Sundance Festival’s Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary and Best Cinematography.
Sunday April 1st 2007
11am - WELCOME TO POPTUN SPAIN / PERU/GUATEMALA, 2006, 11 min. This heartbreaking film follows the lives of three siblings in the village of Poptun in Guatemala. Each day they set out to make a living by shinning shoes on the city streets and are forced to bring what little money they make back to their alcoholic and abusive parents.
1pm - A LAWYER WALKS INTO A BAR…USA, 2007, 89 min. The California Bar exam is the hardest legal exam in the country with a 39% pass rate. At least two governors, an L.A. mayor and the dean of the Stanford Law School have failed – some numerous times. Yet ever y year thousands of recent grads approach this right of passage.
3pm - KING CORN USA, 2006, 92 min. When two college friends set out to plant and grow an acre of corn in Iowa they unearth some disturbing facts about how we eat and how we farm.
5pm - ORANGE REVOLUTION USA, 2007, 106 min.
The presidential candidate poisoned, the election stolen and the citizens outraged – filmmaker Steve York caught ever moment of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution on tape and presents it here in vivid and captivating detail.
730pm – FREEHELD USA, 2006, 38 min.
Lieutenant Laurel Hester is dying, but her biggest battle isn’t against the disease that will eventually take her life, it’s against the elected officials of her New Jersey county who are denying her her dying wish: to provide for the woman she loves.
730pm - RECYCLED LIFE USA/Guatemala, 2006, 38 min.
Academy nominated film views the Guatemala City Garbage Dump, Central America's most toxic landfill and home to thousands of “guajeros” .
9pm – DALE USA, 2005-2006, 100 min.
What lay behind Dale Eanrhardt’s dark glasses and wide-brimmed Stetson? This passionate doc uncovers the man behind the NASCAR legend.
Monday, April 2nd 2007
1pm - THE TEA BOY OF GAZA UK, 2006, 38 min. Twelve-year-old Mahmoud has a unique position from which to view the fighting between Palestinian factions. He spends his day selling tea to the patients and staff at Al Shifa, the biggest hospital in the Gaza Strip.
1pm – BLOCKADE RUSSIA, 2005, 52 min. A beautiful mosaic of archival footage re-creates life in Leningrad between 1941 and1944.
3pm - CHILDREN OF DARFUR DENMARK, 2006, 24 min.
Film shows largely ignored conflict in Darfur through eyes 15 year old Sumaya, forced to escape her village on foot after her school was attacked.
3pm - ON A TIGHTROPE NORWAY/CANADA, 2006, 58 min.
This warm and layered documentary follows a group of Uighur orphans, an ostracized Muslim minority in China, as they struggle to learn the ancient tradition of tightrope walking.
5pm - WHEN ADNAN COMES HOME USA, 2006, 74 min.
In 2003, Adnan a 17-year-old Iraqi was arrested and accused of stealing two metres of electrical cable, an Iraqi crime against the state. Adnan claims to have been asked to carry the cable with no intentions of stealing it, but nonetheless he was transferred to juvenile detention to await trial.
630pm - MYSTIC BALL CANADA/USA, 2006, 83 min.
What would drive a man to devote his life to chinlone, a back-breaking, and impossible to master ancient Burmese sport that no one else plays?
9pm - HAVE YOU SEEN ANDY USA, 2006, 79 min.
22 years after 10-year-old Andy Puglisi’s disappearance from his neighborhood pool, childhood friend Melanie Perkins searches for his abductor in this powerful documentary.
Tuesday, April 3rd 2007
1pm - ANGEL’S FIRE SPAIN / PERU/ GUATEMALA, 2006, 13 min.
Eight year old Angel works in a brick manufacturing plant all day long. Six days a week from dawn until dusk Angel hauls materials, forms bricks and keeps track of inventory – all in the open. These inhumane conditions are all he’s known since childhood and though he hopes for a better life, he knows it’s unlikely that his future holds anything other than hard labor.
1pm - BEST FRIENDS Sweden/Finland, 2006, 58 min.
The string friendship between 2 13-year-old girls is tested after they enter into a talent competition at their Siberian school.
3pm - CIVIL STATUS RUSSIA, 2006, 29 min. Welcome to the St. Petersburg civil registry office, where people’s destinies cross paths with cold and callous bureaucracy.
3pm - MY HUSBAND ANDREI SAKHAROV LATVIA/FRANCE, 2006, 52 min. How does an elite Russian physicist, father of the hydrogen bomb and the most prized mind of the Soviet Union become an outspoken advocate for human rights, winner of the 1975 Nobel Peace Prize and enemy of the Soviet regime? This revealing doc chronicles Andrei Sakharov’s journey from renowned pro-Soviet scientist to vocal anti-Soviet activist through the eyes of his adoring widow, Yelena Bonner.
5pm - CHILDREN OF DARFUR DENMARK, 2006, 24 min.
This arresting film shows the largely ignored conflict in Darfur through the eyes of 15 year old Sumaya, who was forced to escape her village on foot after her school was attacked.
5pm - ON A TIGHTROPE NORWAY/CANADA, 2006, 58 min.
This warm and layered documentary follows a group of Uighur orphans, an ostracized Muslim minority in China, as they struggle to learn the ancient tradition of tightrope walking.
7pm – SOUVENIRS ISRAEL, 2006, 75 min. Title of this road-trip doc refers to the children that the soldiers of the Jewish Brigade fathered and abandoned in the Netherlands after WWII.
9pm - LOSERS AND WINNERS Germany, 2006, 96 min.
A culture clash erupts as 400 Chinese workers descend on a German town to dismantle its life-blood, state of the art coke plant, and transport it back to China to be re-built.
Wednesday April 4th 2007
1pm - THE PORTRAITIST POLAND, 2005, 52 min. Prior to World War II, photography was Brasse's life passion. However, after being imprisoned in Auschwitz and forced to take photos of not only prisoners and SS officers, but also of victims of medical experiments, his creative passion was permanently altered.
1pm - THE MAN WHO SOLD EICHMANN AND MENGELE THE NETHERLANDS , 2005, 50 min. This exemplary documentary tells the story of a average-joe Dutchman who happened to befriend two notorious and wanted Nazi war criminals in Buenos Aires: Adolf Eichmann, the so-called architect of the Holocaust and Josef Mengele, known in the Nazi ranks as the angel of death. Willem Sassen, a volunteer Waffen SS during World War II, managed to escape from prison to start a new life as a journalist and businessman in Argentina.
3pm - ORANGE REVOLUTION USA, 2007, 106 min.
The presidential candidate poisoned, the election stolen and the citizens outraged – filmmaker Steve York caught ever moment of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution on tape and presents it here in vivid and captivating detail.
5pm - THE BLOOD OF YINGZHOU DISTRICT * 2006 Academy Award Winner * USA/CHINA, 2006, 39 min. Follow Gao Jun, an HIV infected orphan, as he searches for a home in a community that has ostracized him.
5pm - RETURN TO THE BORDER France, 2005, 56min. Drawing on first-hand experience, from his boyhood in Communist China to his visit to North Korea, filmmaker Zhao Liang explores the reality of living with communist and socialist ideals, past and present.
7pm - PUPUSERA: A TALE FROM MY KITCHEN Australia, 2006, 17 min.
In this inspiring work, filmmaker Tanya Curnow uses the preparation of pupusas, the traditional dish of El Salvador, as a metaphor for the self-sufficiency émigré Edith Recinos ultimately achieved in her journey from her homeland to Canberra, Australia.
7pm - CHILDREN OF THE WAR USA/ UK, 2007, 81 min.
This history of Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), the world’s largest and most violent street gang, addresses the causes and circumstances that have fueled the group’s ominous rise to power.
9pm - WAR/DANCE USA, 2007, 105 min.
This breathtaking doc chronicles the courageous journey of three children who have been orphaned and abducted by rebel armies in war torn Patongo to the finals of Uganda’s music and dance competition.
Thursday, April 5th 2007
1pm - A HEBREW LESSON ISRAEL, 2006, 120 min. Examining the immigrant experience through the eyes of multiethnic students in a language immersion class in Tel Aviv, this prize-winning and engrossing documentary brings a fresh take on how non-natives cope with life in a new culture.
3pm - BRITAIN’S FIRST SUICIDE BOMBERS UK, 2006, 89 min.
Omar Khan Sharif spent time at public school, won a place at university and lived in an ordinary suburban terrace house. What made someone this successful and “normal” turn into a human bomb?
5pm - WORLD WAR IV USA, 2006, 75 min. Travel beyond the hype of Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, past the news media’s sensationalized portrait of the war in Iraq to grounded and provocative insights on the legitimacy of America’s War on Terror - with a Conservative bend.
7pm - THE BIG SELLOUT GERMANY, 2006, 94 min.,
This compelling doc unearths the conflicting message of privatization through the gripping portrayal of human beings around the world directly affected by these often inhuman and misguided efforts to boost economic growth.
9pm - THE STONE SILENCE Poland, 2007, 60 min.
On 4/23/05 a 29 year-old woman publicly stoned for adultery in Afghan village of Spin Gaw. This story begins five years before, and follows Amina who was given away by her family to be married to Muhammad. In Afghanistan these ‘arranged marriages’ – are a common tradition.
1030pm - MANDA BALA (SEND A BULLET) USA, 2006, 85 min.
Jason Kohn, former research assistant to Errol Morris, launched his directing career in style when his kinetic and brutal tour of decadence, wealth and corruption in Brazil, Send a Bullet, won the Sundance Festival’s Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary and Best Cinematography.
Friday, April 6th 2007
1pm - EXCELLENT CADAVERS Italy, 2005, 92 min.
This intense and engrossing film examines the relationship between the Mafia and Italian politics, a system of power that still exists in Italy today.
3pm - ANGEL’S FIRE SPAIN / PERU/ GUATEMALA, 2006, 13 min.
Eight year old Angel works in brick manufacturing plant all day, 6-days/wk. Angel hauls materials, forms bricks and keeps track of inventory. These inhumane conditions are all he’s known since childhood. He hopes for a better life, knows it’s unlikely that his future holds anything but hard labor.
3pm - BEST FRIENDS Sweden/Finland, 2006, 58 min.
The string friendship between 2 13-year-old girls is tested after they enter into a talent competition at their Siberian school.
5pm - A STORY OF PEOPLE IN WAR AND PEACE ARMENIA, 2006, 70 min.
A journalism cum soldier sets out to find the men and women he shared a trench with during the Karabakh War and in the process uncovers the truth about the impact of ethnic conflict.
630pm - CHEAT YOU FAIR: THE STORY OF MAXWELL STREET - USA, 2006, 100 min.
This intimate doc follows the rise and fall of Chicago’s Maxwell Street, a cultural and ethnic milieu that garnered the name “The Ellis Island of the Midwest.”
9pm - IN THE SHADOW OF THE MOON UK, 2006, 100 min.
The magnificence of science merges with the compelling drama of the human quest for advancement in this compelling and visually stunning meditation on the Apollo space program.
Saturday, April 7th 2007
1pm - SENIOR YEAR CHINA, 2005, 95 min.
For Chinese boarding school students preparing for the college entrance exams, failure is not an option. Their tuition is paid for by the blood, sweat and tears of their parents and the pressure to succeed can be stifling.
3pm - LIMA’S STREETS Spain / Peru/ Guatemala, 2006, 13 min.
Begging, stealing and fighting are everyday realities for Lima Peru street kids. Early they are taught to approach tourists and beg often learning key words like “please” and “hungry” in English. Amidst neon lights and traffic these kids struggle for survival in “a Mecca of crime.”
3pm - MERCHANTS OF MIRACLES Belgium, 2005, 52 min.
In a country without hope, torn apart by war, poverty and disease, it seems that everyone is on the lookout for a miracle. Luckily Congo is full of “prophets” who claim to cure AIDS and resurrect the dead and salvation is just a donation away.
430pm - THE C NUMBER USA, 2007, 32 min.
Theodore Bacino has applied for parole 24 times. Each year denied. Will try number 25 prove successful for the 71-year old convicted cop-killer?
430pm - GHOSTS OF ABU GHRAIB USA/Turkey, 2007, 78 min.
What would compel one person to humiliate and torture another? This provocative doc attempts to examine how the soldiers sent to guard and protect prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison ended up becoming their worst tormentors
7pm - CRAZY SEXY CANCER USA, 2007, 89 min. The story of 31-year-old Kris Carr, a NYC aspiring actress diagnosed with a rare and incurable stage IV vascular cancer. Carr decides to film her treatment search resulting in a funny, touching and honest film about living with a terminal disease when life is just beginning.
9pm - KILL THE MESSENGER FRANCE, 2006, 84 min.
The story of “inconvenient patriot” Sibel Edmonds, whose work as an FBI language specialist exposed her to one of America’s best kept secrets” a spy ring, involved in narco-trafficking and nuclear smuggling activities, has infiltrated the higher echelons of U.S. government.
Sunday, April 8th 2007
1pm - THE WISE CAT CATCHES MICES ITALY, 2006, 85 min.
Take a journey off-the-beaten-path, through a lush Chinese countryside that can barely provide for its impoverished inhabitants.
3pm - SECOND SPRING CHINA, 2006, 60 min.
Academy Award nominated filmmaker Christine Choy’s latest offers a fascinating and funny look at the lives of a busy group of Shanghai retirees.
5pm - DREAM HAVANA USA, 2006, 81 min.
In August 1994, more than 33,000 Cubans try to escape the island by sea. Two writers, friends since adolescence, are faced with a choice-continue struggling with the hardships of the island or brave the open water on a homemade raft. Ernesto Santan chooses Cuba, Jorge Mota chooses sea.
7pm - THE NANJING MASSACRE: MEMORY AND OBLIVION FRANCE, 2006, 52 min.
This engrossing doc recreates the atrocities of the 1937 Nanking Massacre through survivor testimony, archive materials and historical evidence
7pm - THEY CHOSE CHINA CANADA/USA, 2005, 52 min.
In January 1954 21 American soldiers who fought in the Korean War decided to cut ties with the US and make their home in China. Were they driven away by McCarthyism or were they the victims of communist indoctrination?
9pm - MANDA BALA (SEND A BULLET) USA, 2006, 85 min.
Jason Kohn, former research assistant to Errol Morris, launched his directing career in style when his kinetic and brutal tour of decadence, wealth and corruption in Brazil, Send a Bullet, won the Sundance Festival’s Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary and Best Cinematography.
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