Women Directors

From the directors of Marwencol, Spettacolo tells the story of a small town in Tuscany that came up with a remarkable way to confront their issues – they turned their lives into a play. Every summer for the past 50 years, their piazza has become their stage and residents of all ages play a part – the role of themselves.

With intimate access to the lives of women veterans, After Fire is an observational documentary that throws a spotlight on the human toll of military service - including military sexual trauma, combat injuries and bureaucratic dysfunction - examining the challenges faced by the fastest-growing group of American veterans: women

What impact does sound have on our lives? From classical music to a hummingbird flapping its wings to the Earth’s natural hum, this is a wondrous exploration of the psychology, sociology and economics of sound.

The widening gap between generations in China today is at the heart of this deeply resonant documentary about a son, recently returned from the city, trying to modernize his aging father’s beekeeping business.

The newest work to emerge from Harvard’s groundbreaking Sensory Ethnography Lab, Joana Pimenta’s An Aviation Field is a mesmerizing short film, a ghost story about buried cities, lost civilizations and Western colonialism.

The tormented romance between celebrated poets Paul Celan and Ingeborg Bachmann – a Holocaust survivor and a daughter of a Nazi party member – is the subject of this innovative documentary in which two actors read from their nearly two decades worth of correspondence.

Voiced and executive produced by Tilda Swinton, Letters from Baghdad is a visually rich, beautifully crafted documentary that tells the story of Gertrude Bell, who, more influential than her friend and colleague Lawrence of Arabia, shaped the modern Middle East in ways that still reverberate today.

One family's efforts to secure freedom for their father, a political dissident serving a life sentence in China, is a story of international intrigue, diplomatic maneuvering and immense personal sacrifice.

Sailing ships, angels and executioners, this classic documentary chronicles the vanishing practice and language of Russian criminal tattoos. Recalling the prison writings of Solzhenitsyn or Dostoevsky, Lambert's harrowingly beautiful and penetrating study served as inspiration for Cronenberg's Eastern Promises.

Academy Award winning filmmaker Ruby Yang’s My Voice, My Life follows a group of students from underprivileged families who are cast in a musical theater performance. A moving story about the importance of art education in our schools.

In recent years, the town of El Remolino in Chiapas, Mexico has suffered from some of the country's worst flooding. This lyrical documentary surveys the social and ecological impact, from schools that can't open to farms that can no longer operate.

This tender portrait of an Inupiaq Eskimo community who are living on an island that is disappearing into the sea is both an elegy to the indigenous cultures of the Arctic and a harrowing vision of climate change in America.

Drawing upon the rich mythology of Ghana, this magical short film combines semi-autobiographical elements with local folklore to tell the story of a young American woman who returns to West Africa for her father’s funeral, only to discover his hidden double identity.

Drawing on the work of German-Jewish ethnomusicologist Robert Lachmann (1892-1939), filmmaker Jumana Manna sets out in search of the musical diversity of historical Palestine in this magical documentary.

Filmmaker Deborah Stratman recounts eleven episodes in American history — from the violent eviction of the Cherokee to the invention of the nuclear reactor to the murder of Black Panther leader Fred Hampton — to consider how societies are shaped by belief and ideology.

This intimate, moving documentary follows young Lakota riders on a 300-mile trek on horseback through the South Dakota badlands, as they retrace the fateful journey of their ancestors that culminated at Wounded Knee.

An inspirational new documentary from Oscar-winner Ruby Yang (The Blood of Yingzhou District), a profile of the renowned Asian Youth Orchestra, founded 25 years ago with the aim of connecting the region’s young people through music.

From the director of Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, the remarkable story of Cuban-American artist Carmen Herrera, a pioneering abstract painter in the '40s and '50s who only found recognition as she approached her 100th birthday.

An essential documentary, this is an incisive and wide-ranging examination of the prison and its place – social, economic and psychological – in American society.

Capturing one year in the life of a historic garden, this magnificent documentary is an ode to nature and the delicate, interdependent relationship between man and the natural world.

Can one taste a color or see a sound? This fascinating short documentary explores the brain and a neuro-cognitive phenomenon known as synesthesia where multiples senses are blended together.

One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, a documentary about Robert Frank, the legendary photographer and filmmaker behind the seminal book “The Americans” and landmark films like Pull My Daisy.

A courageous profile of the LGBT community in Russia today - a film whose very existence places the lives of its filmmaker and subjects in danger.

With readings by John Berger, Taskafa offers a brilliantly incisive meditation on urban space and city life by investigating the complex history of Istanbul’s street dogs.

The struggles of a girls soccer team in a mostly hispanic, inner city neighborhood reveals the obstacles that low-income students face in their quest for higher education.

2016 Academy Award nominee, an extraordinary, animated documentary exploring some of the most pressing social issues of our day - racial bias, veteran’s care, mental health and criminal justice.

The rich and essential history of Latino immigrants in the military, specifically during the Vietnam War.

An ordinary couple who amassed a world class art collection on their modest salaries and then gave it all away – donating fifty works of art to one museum in each state.

The extraordinary story of an ordinary couple who managed to build one of the most important contemporary art collections in history.

The utopian dream of public housing is explored in this incandescent, artful documentary.

A singular portrait of a nomadic goat herding family whose livelihood and traditions are being threatened by an increasingly urbanized world.

The mysterious work of Nicola Costantino, one of Latin America’s most controversial and admired artists.