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From The Negro Soldier, 1944. USA. Directed by Stuart Heisler
Lists
May, 26, 2017

Memorial Day: Docs That Capture the Human Experience of War

Sean Axmaker in Lists

There is no shortage of documentaries on war. The subject fascinates us as history, as sociology, and as drama. Some documentaries chronicle history in great detail, some grapple with the issues and forces behind the conflicts, and some flat-out propagandize.…
Beyond the Films
May, 17, 2017

Teachers Beat the “Macho Culture” in Prisons through Art Programs

826chi in Beyond the Films

In the early 2000s, Hollywood invested in the urban fairy tale where a teacher is called into the principal’s office of a school in a low-income, broken part of town and is requested to help “build character and morale.” (Think…
The Last Laugh filmmaker Ferne Pearlstein with director/writer/comedian Mel Brooks
Interviews
April, 20, 2017

Ferne Pearlstein Asks Comedians and Survivors: What Is Off-Limits in Comedy?

Craig Phillips in Interviews

“Somebody once said, ‘Tragedy plus time equals comedy.’ And I always felt, why wait?” - Comedian Gilbert Gottfried, in The Last Laugh There have been many films about the Holocaust, many good and important and extremely necessary films, but The…
The Ovas bike brigade pose with bikes in front of a warehouse in East Los Angeles
Beyond the Films
March, 27, 2017

Girl Power: The Original #SquadGoals (and Just #Goals in General)

826chi in Beyond the Films

In the Independent Lens documentary Ovarian Psycos, we're introduced to The Ovas — a chicanx (xicanx) feminist group who bike through the streets of East L.A. in honor of sisterhood. While bike riding in solidarity is definitely an underground movement, womxn…
Maya Angelou headscarf at fence headscarf, credit: Wayne Miller/Magnum
Lists
March, 22, 2017

Nine Great Documentaries About Women Activists

Sharon Knolle in Lists

As Women’s History Month continues, we’re shining the spotlight on women activists who faced down injustice, pioneered paths for other women and girls, or have fought heroically trying to save the world. Although the women on this list focused on…
Elle in full uniform in The Invisible War stands at the Vietnam War Memorial
Film History
March, 8, 2017

Meet the Trailblazers of Documentary Activism

Sean Axmaker in Film History

We think of the cinema of activism in documentary filmmaking as a relatively modern phenomenon, something first awakened in the 1960s and 1970s and popularized by the likes of Michael Moore and Laura Poitras and Alex Gibney. But the success…
They Call Us Monsters trio of youths in juvenile pen posing for the camera; with Audience Award graphic added
February, 27, 2017

They Call Us Monsters

Independent Lens

They Call Us Monsters goes behind the walls of the Compound, a high-security facility where Los Angeles houses its most violent juvenile criminals. To their advocates, they’re kids. To the system, they’re adults. To their victims, they’re monsters.   The…
Fallen bicycle after shooting at UT Austin, as animated in the film TOWER
Lists
February, 14, 2017

10 Great Animated Documentaries

Noel Murray in Lists

Keith Maitland’s animated documentary TOWER has left critics and awards-voting bodies alike flummoxed as to how best to categorize it. This is a visionary work, no doubt, that uses voice-actors and vintage audio to reconstruct what happened back in 1966 when…
Interviews
February, 13, 2017

Keith Maitland Goes Back to 1966 to Tell Story of Victims and Heroes of Texas Shooting

Craig Phillips in Interviews

Keith Maitland's previous film The Eyes of Me, the moving story of a group of blind teenagers making their way in Austin, aired on Independent Lens and was nominated for an Emmy for Graphic Design and Art Direction. For TOWER, Maitland tells…
Craig Staggs (right) at work with colorist Nathan Bayless at Minnow Mountain, hard at work on TOWER animation
Behind the Films
February, 10, 2017

Paying Homage to UT Tower Mass Shooting Victims with Life Affirming Animation

Craig Phillips in Behind the Films

Craig Staggs is the lead animator for the little animation studio based in Austin, Texas, also the home base of filmmaker Keith Maitland. Staggs' company did the brilliantly layered animation for Maitland's film TOWER. Of that film which tells the story…
Silhouetted image of William M. Trotter speaking in protest about Birth of a Nation, from Birth of a Movement
Interviews
February, 2, 2017

Filmmakers Tell Story of William Trotter’s Fight Against Racist Silent Blockbuster

Craig Phillips in Interviews

Birth of a Movement, based on Dick Lehr's book, captures the backdrop to a prescient clash between human rights, freedom of speech, and a changing media landscape — that happened in 1915. It is essentially the story of legendary film director D.W.…
Still from Birth of a Movement, of DW Griffith on set directing a film with megaphone
Film History
February, 1, 2017

The Offspring of Birth of a Nation

Sean Axmaker in Film History

D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation is inarguably one of the landmarks of American cinema. The distillation of the storytelling techniques, editing ideas, framing and visual composition, and nuanced approaches to performance that Griffith spent years exploring and experimenting…