Directed by Beadie Finzi • Documentary • 2009 • 78 minutes
This feel-good documentary follows Irlan and Isabela, two teenagers from the violent favelas of Rio de Janeiro, as they pursue their dreams of becoming professional ballet dancers. This inspiring story takes us from Rio - where their communities must raise the funds to support their ambitions - to exhilarating ballet competitions in New York and Switzerland. It's a film about their determination to dance, and the price one must pay for talent, ambition and success.
Directed by Karina Epperlein • Documentary • 2006 • 22 minutes
A heroic journey of transformation and healing, Phoenix Dance challenges our expectations of what it means to be 'disabled.' In March, 2001, renowned dancer Homer Avila discovered that the pain in his hip was cancer. A month later, h...
Directed by Claire Denis • Documentary • With Mathilde Monnier • 2004 • 84 minutes
Emphasizing raw physicality, craft, and in-the-moment fervor over exposition, Towards Mathilde, from filmmaker Claire Denis (Beau Travail, 35 Shots of Rum, Let the Sunshine In), is a documentary portrait par excel...
Directed by Nguyễn Thị Thấm • Documentary • 2014 • 87 minutes
A former monk who left monastic life because 'I saw beautiful fags praying, and felt like running away,' Madam Phung is a canny businesswoman who got her start as a singer, and saved her money in the form of gold bars she would bury i...