Film-Forward

Documentary

A Fragile Trust

Directed by Samantha Grant Produced by Grant and Brittney Shepherd Released by Gush Productions/ITVS USA. 76 min. Not rated In the age of punditry dominating 24/7 cable TV news and Internet bloggers, tweeters, and infotainment gossip, it still matters that The New York Times, “The Great Gray Lady” founded as a counter to the 19th-century […]

The New Black

Directed by Yoruba Riche Written by Ms. Richen and Erin Casper Produced by Richen and Yvonne Welbon USA. 75 min. Not rated The New Black film poses the question, are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) issues the new black? Is the struggle for marriage equality the forefront of civil rights in America today? The […]

Flex Is Kings

Directed by Deidre Schoo and Michael Beach Nichols Produced by Schoo, Nichols, and Christopher K. Walker Released by Baxter Brothers Film Releasing USA. 86 min. Not rated In Brooklyn, there’s a dance style known as flexing. Its practitioners claim there are “no rules and no boundaries.” They use everything they can think of—costumes, stunts, masks, […]

The Galapagos Affair

Directed by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller Produced by Geller, Goldfine and Celeste Schaefer Snyder Released by Zeitgeist Films USA. 120 min. Not rated With the voices of Cate Blanchett, Sebastian Koch, Thomas Kretschmann, Diane Kruger, Connie Neilsen and Josh Radnor It’s rare that filmmakers stumbles onto a true story with all the elements of […]

The Unknown Known

Directed by Errol Morris Produced by Morris, Amanda Branson Gill and Robert Fernandez Released by RADIUS-TWC USA. 102 min. Rated PG-13 The Unknown Known gives you a front seat to recent history through the calculated point of view of one man who, astonishingly, was at the right hand of Republican power for almost 50 years. […]

New Directors/New Films 2014: Witches & War

Two films in this year’s New Directors/New Films program represent the breed of hybrid blending of fact and fiction that both of its sponsoring institutions are also championing in separate annual series, the Museum of Modern Art in its just completed Documentary Fortnight International Festival of Nonfiction Film and Media and the Film Society of […]

The Missing Picture

Directed by Rithy Panh Produced by Catherine Dussart Written by Panh and Christophe Bataille French with English subtitles Released by Strand Releasing Cambodia/France. 92 min. Not rated The Missing Picture creatively relives the Cambodian holocaust and surmounts the storytelling problem intrinsic to retelling such horrors. Time inexorably passes, evidence disappears, and the last witnesses grow […]

Finding Vivian Maier

Written, Produced and Directed by John Maloof and Charlie Siskel Released by Sundance Selects USA. 83 min. Not rated If you put aside the deep knowledge Finding Vivian Maier imparts about an undeniably powerful contributor to photography, and the stark sense of the wildly eccentric character behind the images, you are left with one of […]

Mistaken for Strangers

Directed by Tom Berninger Released by Abramorama Entertainment USA. 74 min. Not rated Matt Berninger, the lead singer of the indie rock band the National, is a very self-possessed individual. He is slim and handsome with steel blue gimlet eyes. When his band’s concerts begin, he strolls on stage with a glass of red wine […]