North Philadelphia, PA – Kev, El and Andy are three men united by one struggle: they are trying to defy gravity. As part of the 700,000 prisoners released into society every year, they find themselves faced with a chilling outlook: 67% of ex-offenders re-offend within three years. What explains this invisible force that keeps former inmates in a seemingly unending cycle of incarceration? Filmed on the street over the course of two years, Pull of Gravity is an intimate portrait of these three men that confronts head-on the gritty details of lives cut short by poverty and drugs, where dealing is seen as the only route to economic prosperity, where using offers an escape from powerlessness, and where prison is too often the next stop. The film’s unfiltered lense captures its subjects as they lay bare their stories, fears, and tentative dreams.
North Philadelphia, PA – Kev, El and Andy are three men united by one struggle: they are trying to defy gravity. As part of the 700,000 prisoners released into society every year, they find themselves faced with a chilling outlook: 67% of ex-offenders re-offend within three years. What explains this invisible force that keeps former inmates in a seemingly unending cycle of incarceration? Filmed on the street over the course of two years, Pull of Gravity is an intimate portrait of these three men that confronts head-on the gritty details of lives cut short by poverty and drugs, where dealing is seen as the only route to economic prosperity, where using offers an escape from powerlessness, and where prison is too often the next stop. The film’s unfiltered lense captures its subjects as they lay bare their stories, fears, and tentative dreams.
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700,000 prisoners are released each year in the U.S. What happens to them when they come home?
From 1955 to 1975, the US Army used its own soldiers as human guinea pigs in research involving powerful, mind-altering drugs. Told through exclusive footage and first-hand accounts, this is the true story of one of the darkest chapters in US history.
The documentary, " Death and the Judge", revolves around Iran's most famous criminal judge, Azizmohammadi. He served as a criminal judge for 45 years and issued about 4500 death sentences; a record in not only Iran, but also the world. This documentary looks into his personal and professional life as he is followed within his home with his family, in the court of law, and in his retirement days. The ultimate purpose of the documentary is to deduce the role of death in the judge's life as he either takes life away from criminals or death comes to his loved ones. During his retirement, he is once again given the choice between the life and death of a person, despite no longer being a judge.
A poetic look at the life and legacy of legendary author Philip K. Dick (1928-1982), who wrote over over a hundred short stories and 44 novels of mind-bending sci-fi, exploring themes of authority, drugs, theology, mental illness and much more.
This refreshingly frank and impartial study of the discovery and development of the notorious hallucinogenic drug is notably free of moral judgmental, and features contributions from such legendary heroes of psychedelia as Albert Hoffman - the Swiss scientist who discovered the drug - Aldous Huxley - author of 'The Doors of Perception' - Ken Kesey - author of 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
An Alabama corrections officer falls in love with a man awaiting trial for murder and risks it all to help him escape.
Throughout the Islamic world, each year hundreds of women are shot, stabbed, strangled or burned to death by male relatives because they are thought to have “dishonoured” their families. They may have lost their virginity, refused an arranged marriage or left an abusive husband. Even if a woman is raped or merely the victim of gossip, she must pay the price. Crimes of Honour documents the terrible reality of femicide – the belief that a girl’s body is the property of the family, and any suggestion of sexual impropriety must be cleansed with her blood. We meet women in hiding from their families, a brother who describes his reasons for killing the sister he loved, and a handful of women who have committed themselves to the protection of young women in danger of losing their lives.
The Big One is an investigative documentary from director Michael Moore who goes around the country asking why big American corporations produce their product abroad where labor is cheaper while so many Americans are unemployed, losing their jobs, and would happily be hired by such companies as Nike.
A documentary on the once promising American rock bands The Brian Jonestown Massacre and The Dandy Warhols. The friendship between respective founders, Anton Newcombe and Courtney Taylor, escalated into bitter rivalry as the Dandy Warhols garnered major international success while the Brian Jonestown Massacre imploded in a haze of drugs.
Filmmaker Alain Resnais documents the atrocities behind the walls of Hitler's concentration camps.
Four-time Emmy winner John Kastner was granted unprecedented access to the Brockville facility for 18 months, allowing 46 patients and 75 staff to share their experiences with stunning frankness. The result is two remarkable documentaries: the first, NCR: Not Criminally Responsible, premiered at Hot Docs in the spring of 2013 and follows the story of a violent patient released into the community. The second film, Out of Mind, Out of Sight, returns to the Brockville Mental Health Centre to profile four patients, two men and two women, as they struggle to gain control over their lives so they can return to a society that often fears and demonizes them.
A look at the prison breakout of Richard Matt and David Sweat from Clinton Correctional facility, as well as a look back at some of the most daring and ingenious prison breaks in American history.
Rosa is a Mexican woman who, at the age of 17, migrated illegally to Austin, Texas. Some years later, she was jailed under suspicion of murder and then taken to trial. This film demonstrates how the judicial process, the verdict, the separation from her family, and the helplessness of being imprisoned in a foreign country make Rosa’s story an example of the hard life of Mexican migrants in the United States.
Is the story of a generation of thieves who achieved their greatest victories in the sixties; their distinctive code of ethics, the various categories of delinquents inhabiting the citys streets, their alliances with high ranking police officials that allowed them to operate, the betrayals that followed, and the price they ended up paying.
Cocaine has always gotten a bad rap, and for a reason. It is a drug used by the rich and the poor legally and illegally, Mexican cartels fought over it with Colombia once associated with the brutal cocaine wars, and a source of tension between the American and Mexican borders on the people who are illicitly bringing in cocaine from one side of the border to another and will do anything to do it. So it can be surprising at times to the viewer throughout the course of the documentary special, that it was never always like this.
On August 7th 1974, French tightrope walker Philippe Petit stepped out on a high wire, illegally rigged between New York's World Trade Center twin towers, then the world's tallest buildings. After nearly an hour of performing on the wire, 1,350 feet above the sidewalks of Manhattan, he was arrested. This fun and spellbinding documentary chronicles Philippe Petit's "highest" achievement.
Narrated by Uncle Jack Charles and seen through the eyes of Indigenous prisoners at Victoria’s Fulham Correctional Centre, this documentary explores how art and culture can empower Australia's First Nations people to transcend their unjust cycles of imprisonment.
From its beginning during the Reagan years through current times, the War on Drugs has left many victims stranded in the prison system. PRISONERS OF THE WAR ON DRUGS reveals life behind bars in the nation’s prisons. Each prisoner has his or her own story, but for most, the story is predictably similar; they have been criminalized for drugs or drug related offenses, locked up with easy access to substances, and given little opportunity for rehabilitation. This film provides an inside look at the prison system, its prisoners and a war on drugs we do not seem to be winning.
This film from Bill Moyers is the first documentary to focus exclusively on people formerly detained in New York City’s notorious Rikers Island Jail. They tell their compelling stories direct to the camera, revealing the violent arc of the Rikers experience – from the trauma of entry to extortion and control by inmates, to oppressive corrections officers, violence and solitary confinement.