The award-winning documentary Quiet Storm: The Ron Artest Story, directed by Johnny Sweet, and based on the turbulent life of one of the NBA’s most controversial figures will premiere on SHOWTIME during Mental Health Awareness Month on Friday, May 31 at 10 p.m. ET/PT.
Renegade Dreamers, a new feature documentary by acclaimed filmmaker Karen Kramer (The Jolo Serpent Handlers, The Ballad of Greenwich Village), is a window into the New York spoken word poets and folk singers of today who use their art for social change, interwoven with the Beat poets and radical protest singers of the legendary Greenwich Village coffee house scene of the ‘60s that started it all. This timely film will enjoy a week-long theatrical release starting May 31 at Cinema Village, in the heart of the Village’s vibrant creative community.
Jeanie Finlay’s Seahorse, that follows a gay transgender man who decides to carry his own baby, released the first trailer ahead of its World Premiere at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday, April 27th.
Gay Chorus Deep South, the powerful new documentary feature chronicling The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus’ life-changing Lavender Pen Tour through five southern states in the fall of 2017, will make its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on Monday, April 29, 2019 followed by a special performance from members of The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus.
Yang Sun and S. Leo Chiang’s OUR TIME MACHINE is an intimate look at Chinese artist Maleonn(Ma Liang) as he sets out to stage an ambitious performance piece about time and memory when his father, the former artistic director of the Shanghai Chinese Opera Theater, is diagnosed with dementia. Maleonn hopes the work will bring the them together artistically and personally but as time goes on, and his father’s condition deteriorates, he is torn between the original goal to honor his father and the pressure of finding commercial success.
Now in its third year, the 2019 edition of DocLands Documentary Film Festival kicks off Thursday, May 2 with the World Premiere of RUNNER; director Bill Gallagher and film subject Guor Marial will be in attendance. The four-day festival will showcase 44 films from 14 countries, with 36 filmmakers in attendance. The Closing Night Film will be the Bay Area Premiere of THE WEIGHT OF WATER with Emmy Award winning director Michael Brown and film subject Erik Weihenmayer attending.
The feature length documentary film Ai Weiwei: Yours Truly, directed by Cheryl Haines, has its World Premiere special Marquee Presentation screening during the San Francisco International Film Festival 2019, on Sunday, April 14th at the Castro Theatre.
The documentary, Buddha in Africa by South African filmmaker, Nicole Schafer, will World Premiere at the 2019 Hot Docs Canadian International Festival taking place April 25 to May 5. The film will be presented in competition in the International Spectrum program. The winner of the Hot Docs Best International Feature Documentary Award will qualify for consideration for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The documentary Instant Dreams, which explores the impact, rise and popularity of Polaroid film, follows three people with a deep love for Polaroid and along with archival footage delves into the chemistry, artistry and history behind the technological behemoth of the 20th century. The film directed by Willem Baptist will be released in theaters across the US via Synergetic Distribution on April 19th.
The 2019 American Documentary Film Festival and Film Fund (AmDocs) in Palm Springs announced a slate of approximately 200 documentary and animated works from around the world. Among the works being exhibited are films focused on indigenous people’s rights, women’s equity in society, environmental trends, celebrity and historical biopics, cutting edge and socially relevant topics.
Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am, an artful and uplifting documentary on the life and works of the legendary storyteller and Nobel prize-winner will open in theaters on June 21. Directed by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders (The Black List, Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart), a friend of Toni Morrison’s for over 35 years, the film premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival.
This Women’s History Month, the trailer is released for Stephanie Wang-Breal’s Blowin’ Up, a documentary about a team of courageous women in Queens, New York, who try to create a safe space for women condemned by a legal system where sex work and prostitution are criminalized. Blowin’ Up opens April 5th in NY, and April 12th in LA.