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Biography

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  • Lead Belly: The Man Who Invented Rock & Roll

    Directed by Curt Hahn • Documentary • With Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, B.B. King, Harry Belafonte • 2025 • 79 minutes

    George Harrison famously claimed, "No Lead Belly, no Beatles." Revered by countless musicians - the 1st record Janis Joplin ever bought was Lead Belly. The definitive b...

  • I Talk to Animals

    Directed by Peter Friedman • Documentary • With Samantha Khury • 1990 • 54 minutes

    Samantha is an "animal therapist and psychic" who has convinced skeptical pet owners, zoo keepers, and race horse trainers that she really can "talk" to their animals. Here we see her at work counselling race hors...

  • John Berger (three films)

    3 items

    Three very different documentaries feature British art critic and poet, John Berger (1926-2017). Working on an astonishing range of topics and art-forms, his groundbreaking insights on seeing shaped the public for decades.

    Realized as a portrait in works and collaborations, JOHN BERGER OR THE AR...

  • Howard Zinn (two films)

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    OVID is proud to present two films about the writer and activist Howard Zinn, who passed away in 2010. HOWARD ZINN: YOU CAN'T BE NEUTRAL ON A MOVING TRAIN (2011) is an acclaimed film that looks at his amazing life. Following his early days as a shipyard labor organizer and bombardier in World War...

  • American Socialist: Eugene Debs

    Directed by Yale Strom • Documentary • With Eugene Victor Debs, Amy Madigan, Richard Wolff, Dr. Frances Fox Piven, Dr. Nick Salvatore • 2018 • 97 minutes

    Bernie Sanders inspired a generation – but who inspired him? Yale Strom's new documentary traces the history of American populism by exploring...

  • Alumination

    Directed by Eric Bricker • Documentary • With Patrick Dempsey, Kate Pierson • 2021 • 86 minutes

    For nearly a century, the image of the Airstream travel trailer, with sunlight gleaming off the aluminum of its sleek silver-bullet body, has evoked the romance of escape and the mystique of a world w...

  • Beatrix Farrand's American Landscapes

    Directed by Stephen Ives • Documentary • 2020 • 62 minutes

    BEATRIX FARRAND'S AMERICAN LANDSCAPES follows award-winning public garden designer Lynden B. Miller as she sets off to explore the remarkable life and career of America's first female landscape architect, Beatrix Farrand. Farrand was res...

  • Mrs. B., A North Korean Woman

    Directed by Jero Yun • Documentary • 2016 • 71 minutes

    "There are five kinds of families that buy us," says Mrs. B over dinner and drinks with fellow North Korean exiles living in China. "The first type, either the father or the mother is missing and the son can't get married. Then there are the...

  • John Berger or The Art of Looking

    Directed by Cordelia Dvorák • Documentary • 2016 • 55 minutes

    Art, politics and motorcycles: on the occasion of his 90th birthday, JOHN BERGER OR THE ART OF LOOKING is an intimate portrait of the writer and art-critic whose groundbreaking insights on seeing have shaped us for already five decade...

  • Eames: The Architect & The Painter

    Directed by Jason Cohn & Bill Jersey • Documentary • 2011 • 84 minutes

    Design history was born in a cavernous warehouse on a gritty street in Venice Beach, California, where Charles and Ray Eames set up their Renaissance-style studio in the optimistic flush of American victory during World War I...

  • Ronnie's

    Directed by Oliver Murray • Documentary • With Ronnie Scott, Dizzy Gillespie, Jimi Hendrix, Ella Fitzgerald, Nina Simone, Van Morrison, Chet Baker, Quincy Jones • 2020 • 102 minutes

    Ronnie’s chronicles the life of saxophonist Ronnie Scott, a poor, Jewish kid growing up in 1940s East End, London ...

  • Nelson Algren (two films)

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    OVID presets two in-depth documentaries about the writer, Nelson Algren. Algren (2021) is a new feature documentary which is a journey through the gritty world, brilliant mind, and noble heart of Nelson Algren. Exploding onto the national scene in 1950 after winning the first-ever National Book A...

  • Ursula von Rydingsvard: Into Her Own

    Directed by Daniel Traub • Documentary • 2020 • 57 minutes

    URSULA VON RYDINGSVARD: INTO HER OWN is an artistic biography of one of the few women in the world working in monumental sculpture. Von Rydingsvard’s work has been featured in the Venice Biennale and is held in the collections of some of...

  • Devi

    Directed by Subina Shrestha • Documentary • 2024 • 82 minutes

    Devi is a rebel warrior, mother, and sexual violence survivor – for her, Nepal's Civil War did not end in 2006. As those in power try to erase rape from the history of the war, Devi has to battle her own demons before she can begin to...

  • Celluloid Underground

    Directed by Ehsan Khoshbakht • Documentary • 2023 • 80 minutes

    Celluloid Underground is an autobiographical feature-length documentary by Iranian filmmaker, writer and curator Ehsan Khoshbakht, about his experience of growing up in Iran after the 1979 revolution, when his love of cinema became t...

  • The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg

    Directed by Jerry Aronson • Documentary • With Joan Baez, William F. Buckley, William S. Burroughs • 2005 • 84 minutes

    This documentary chronicles the life of American beat poet Allen Ginsberg. Born and raised in New Jersey, Ginsberg attends Columbia University alongside fellow beats Jack Keroua...

  • Phil Ochs: There But For Fortune

    Directed by Kenneth Bowser • Documentary • With Joan Baez, Billy Bragg, Tom Hayden, Christopher Hitchens, Sean Penn, Pete Seeger, Peter Yarrow • 2010 • 97 minutes

    As our country continues to embroil itself in foreign wars, PHIL OCHS: THERE BUT FOR FORTUNE is a timely and relevant tribute to an u...

  • Jump Shot: The Kenny Sailors Story

    Directed by Jacob Hamilton • Documentary • With Kenny Sailors, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant • 2022 • 79 minutes

    From EP Stephen Curry, the award-winning film Jump Shot celebrates the true story of Kenny Sailors, the forgotten basketball legend who introduced the jumpshot, became a 2-time collegia...

  • The Upsetter: The Life and Music of Lee Scratch Perry

    Directed by Adam Bhala Lough, Ethan Higbee • Documentary • With Lee “Scratch” Perry, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Paul McCartney, The Clash, Bunny Wailer, Marcus Garvey, Carl Bradshaw, Eve, Benicio Del Toro • 2008 • 95 minutes

    THE UPSETTER tells the wild, weed-fueled story of Lee “Scratch” Perry — a ...

  • Blood Ties: The Life and Work of Sally Mann

    Directed by Steven Cantor and Peter Spirer • Documentary • With Sally Mann • 1994 • 30 minutes

    BLOOD TIES artfully explores the world of the prominent and controversial photographer, Sally Mann. With her own children as subjects, Mann has been exploring the subtle truths of childhood in an ongoi...

  • The Edge of Nature

    Directed by Josh Fox • Documentary • 2025 • 108 minutes

    What is humankind's role in nature? Is there such a thing as Nature? What does the word mean? Are human beings simply destroyers of biodiversity and balance or do we have another purpose? In The Edge of Nature, Oscar-Nominated, Emmy-Winning...

  • Jane by Charlotte

    Directed by Charlotte Gainsbourg • Documentary • With Jane Birkin, Charlotte Gainsbourg • 2021 • 92 minutes

    In creating a documentary portrait of a parent, as actor Charlotte Gainsbourg does in her directorial debut, one could overly flatter the subject or iron out the tough creases. Gainsbourg ...

  • Looking for Robert

    Movie

    Robert Kramer’s politics were as a radical as his approach to making films. A founder of the leftist Newsreel collective, he went on to direct documentaries and dramas, and films that blended both. Disgusted with the politics of the United States, he lived for decades in self-imposed exile in Fra...

  • Bettie Page Reveals All

    Directed by Mark Mori • Documentary • With Bettie Page, Hugh Heffner, Dita Von Teese • 2013 • 101 minutes

    Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Mark Mori’s Bettie Page Reveals All is an intimate look at one of the world’s most recognized sex symbols, told in her own words for the first time. In Mori...