The program will open with Netflix’s “Descendant,” a film produced by the Obamas’ company Higher Ground Productions. The documentary sees director Margaret Brown return to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama to document the search for The Clotilda, the last known ship to arrive in the United States, illegally carrying enslaved Africans, and the ramifications its discovery has on the community. What will follow is a showcase of 43 feature-length documentary films that are eligible for consideration for the upcoming Academy Awards; 20 films will be screened both in-person and online, and 35 will be available for virtual viewing only.
The films selected for the ACAI, a program meant to support independent filmmakers from historically excluded communities currently pursuing a film awards campaign, are: Beba | Dir. Rebeca Huntt | Prod: Sofia Geld, Rebeca Huntt | USA/Mexico Hidden Letters | Dir. Violet Du Feng, Zhao Qing | Violet Du Feng, Mette Cheng Munthe-Kaas, Jean Tsien, Su Kim I Didn’t See You There | Dir. Reid Davenport | Prod: Keith Wilson Lakota Nation vs. United States | Dir: Jesse Short Bull, Laura Tomaselli | Prod: Benjamin Hedin Let the Little Light Shine | Dir. Kevin Shaw | Prod: Kevin Shaw, Rachel Dickson Punch 9 for Harold Washington | Dir. Joe Winston | Prod: Joe Winston, Raymond Lambert, Sonya Jackson Sansón and Me | Dir. Rodrigo Reyes | Prod: Su Kim, Rodrigo Reyes Sirens | Dir. Rita Baghdadi | Prod: Rita Baghdadi, Camilla Hall What We Leave Behind | Dir. Iliana Sosa | Prod: Emma D. Miller, Iliana Sosa The 2022 IDA Screening Series will take place from September 9 through November 23 with in-person screenings in Los Angeles at the Chaplin Theater in Raleigh Studios and virtual screenings through IDA’s Eventive streaming platform. See the full program and schedule below.
IDA Screening Series 2022 Program & Schedule
Screening Date: 09/07/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: THE PRINCESS Dir: / Prod: Ed Perkins / Simon Chinn, Jonathan Chinn Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Warner Bros. Discovery/HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max Film Short Synopsis: Drawing solely from contemporaneous archival audio and video footage, The Princess is a visceral submersion into Princess Diana’s life in the constant and often intrusive glare of the media spotlight. Screening Date: 09/08/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: HALLELUJAH: LEONARD COHEN, A JOURNEY, A SONG Dir: Dan Geller & Dayna Goldfine / Prod: Dayna Goldfine, Dan Geller / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics Film Short Synopsis: This feature-length documentary explores the life of singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen as seen through the prism of his internationally renowned hymn, Hallelujah.
Screening Date: 09/13/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: DESCENDANT Dir: Margaret Brown / Prod: Kyle Martin, Essie Chambers / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Netflix Film Short Synopsis: Documentary filmmaker Margaret Brown returns to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama to document the search for and historic discovery of The Clotilda, the last known ship to arrive in the United States, illegally carrying enslaved Africans. After a century of secrecy and speculation, the 2019 discovery of the ship turns attention toward the descendant community of Africatown and presents a moving portrait of a community actively grappling with and fighting to preserve their heritage while examining what justice looks like today. Screening Date: 09/14/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: PUNCH 9 FOR HAROLD WASHINGTON Dir: / Prod: / Country: USA / Year: 2022 Film Short Synopsis: Punch 9 for Harold Washington tells, for the first time, the story of how Harold Washington, by becoming Chicago’s first Black mayor, changed American politics. The coalition he forged transformed the local and national Democratic Party and helped launch the career of the nations first Black President, Barack Obama. Screening Date: 09/15/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: NOTHING COMPARES Dir: Kathryn Ferguson / Prod: Eleanor Emptage, Michael Mallie / Country: UK/Ireland / Year: 2022 / Distributor: SHOWTIME Film Short Synopsis: NOTHING COMPARES is the story of Sinéad O’Connor’s phenomenal rise to worldwide fame and how her iconoclastic personality resulted in her exile from the pop. Screening Date: 09/16/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: NAVALNY Dir: Daniel Roher / Prod: Odessa Rae, Diane Becker, Melanie Miller, Shane Boris / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: CNN Films, HBO Max, Warner Bros. Pictures Film Short Synopsis: Alexei Navalny, Russia’s opposition leader, and Putin’s fiercest critic, was poisoned with a nerve agent on a flight from Siberia. Follow in real time as he and a team of investigative journalists crack the case, expose the brutality of Putin’s power, and show how one person can change history. Screening Date: 09/19/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: SIDNEY Dir: Reginald Hudlin / Prod: Oprah Winfrey, Derik Murray / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Apple Original Films Film Short Synopsis: From producer Oprah Winfrey, this revealing documentary, directed by Reginald Hudlin, honors the legendary Sidney Poitier and his legacy as an iconic actor, filmmaker and activist at the center of Hollywood and the Civil Rights Movement. Featuring candid interviews with Denzel Washington, Halle Berry, Robert Redford, Spike Lee and many more, the film is also produced by Derik Murray, in close collaboration with the Poitier family.
Screening Date: 09/20/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: RIOTSVILLE USA Dir: Sierra Pettengill / Prod: Sara Archambault, Jamila Wignot / Country:USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Magnolia Pictures Film Short Synopsis: Welcome to RIOTSVILLE, USA, a turning point in American history where the protest movements of the late 1960s came into conflict with increasingly militarized police departments. Screening Date: 09/21/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: JAZZ FEST: A NEW ORLEANS STORY Dir: Frank Marshall Ryan Suffern / Prod: Frank Marshall, Sean Stuart, Ryan Suffern / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics Film Short Synopsis: This soulful and heartfelt celebration of 50 years of the funky and fabulous New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival invites you to bliss out on New Orleans’ unique culture, featuring Jimmy Buffett, Bruce Springsteen, Katy Perry, Pitbull, Al Green, Herbie Hancock, Aaron Neville, Earth, Wind & Fire, and many others. Screening Date: 09/27/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: RETROGRADE Dir: Matthew Heineman / Prod: Matthew Heineman, Caitlin McNally / Country: / Year: / Distributor: National Geographic Documentary Films Film Short Synopsis: RETROGRADE is a deeply intimate account of the end of America’s longest war. Screening Date: 09/28/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: BEBA Dir: Rebeca Huntt / Prod: Sofia Geld, Rebeca Huntt / Country: USA/Mexico / Year: 2021 / Distributor: NEON Film Short Synopsis: A stunning self-portrait, tough, raw, stubborn, and powerful “Beba” stares down the curses of her ancestry, probing the psychic wounds she has inherited, while simultaneously embracing the vastness of her multitudes. Screening Date: 10/02/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: “SR.” Dir: Chris Smith / Prod: Robert Downey Jr., Susan Downey, Emily Barclay Ford, Kevin Ford / Country: USA / Year: 2022 A portrait of maverick filmmaker Robert Downey Sr. that quickly devolves into a meditation on art & life, father & sons. Screening Date: 10/03/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: CIVIL Dir: Nadia Hallgren / Prod: Kenya Barris (LA), Roger Ross Williams (NY), Lauren Cioffi (LA), Nadia Hallgren / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Netflix Film Short Synopsis: An intimate vérité look following the life of maverick civil rights attorney Ben Crump as he challenges America to come to terms with what it owes his clients — including the families of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. Screening Date: 10/05/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: THREE MINUTES: A LENGTHENING Dir: Bianca Stigter / Prod: Floor Onrust, Steve McQueen, Noortje Wilschut / Country: The Netherlands/ Year: 2021 / Distributor: SuperLTD Film Short Synopsis: A snippet of 16mm film offers an emotionally charged, meditative glimpse into the lives of the unsuspecting Jewish citizens of a small Polish village at the precipice of World War II.
Screening Date: 10/10/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: 2ND CHANCE Dir: Ramin Bahrani / Prod: Charles Dorfman, Ramin Bahrani, Jacob Grodnik, Daniel Turcan, Johnny Galvin / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: SHOWTIME Film Short Synopsis: A documentary chronicling the life of Richard Davis, the man who invented the concealable bulletproof vest – shooting himself 196 times in the course of his career to prove the effectiveness of his vests. Screening Date: 10/11/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: LOUIS ARMSTRONG’S BLACK & BLUES Dir: Sacha Jenkins / Prod: Justin Wilkes, Sara Bernstein, Julie Anderson / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Apple Film Short Synopsis: The film offers a definitive look at the master musician’s life and legacy as a founding father of jazz, the first pop star, and a cultural ambassador of the United States. He was loved by millions worldwide but often mischaracterized for not doing enough to support the civil rights movement. In reality, his fight for social justice was fueled by his celebrity and his willingness to break his silence on issues of segregation and patriotism. With the full support of the Louis Armstrong Educational Foundation, the filmmakers have access to a treasure trove of never-before-seen archival materials, including hundreds of hours of audio recordings, film footage, photographs, personal diaries, and a life’s worth of ephemera for exclusive use in the first significant documentary dedicated entirely to his life. Screening Date: 10/12/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: AFTERSHOCK Dir: Paula Eiselt, Tonya Lee Lewis /Exec Prod: Dawn Porter, Jenny Raskin, Geralyn White Dreyfous, Patty Quillen, Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros, Tegan Acton, Emma Pompetti, Janet Tittiger, Davis Guggenheim, Rahdi Taylor / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Onyx Collective Film Short Synopsis: Following the deaths of two young women due to childbirth complications, two bereaved families galvanize activists, birth workers, and physicians to reckon with one of the most pressing American crises today: the US maternal health crisis. Screening Date: 10/13/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: LET ME BE ME Dir: Dan Crane, Katie Taber / Prod: Joe Plummer / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Greenwich Entertainment Film Short Synopsis: Let Me Be Me reveals what happens when a boy who used fabric as his shield to hide himself grows up to become a fashion designer.
Screening Date: 10/14/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: HIDDEN LETTERS Dir: Violet Du Feng, Zhao Qing / Prod: Violet Du Feng, Mette Cheng Munthe-Kaas, Jean Tsien, Su Kim Country: China Distributor: Cargo Film & Releasing Film Short Synopsis: Two Chinese millennial women must save an ancient secret treasure from falling into the wrong hands, but don’t expect it will save them too. Screening Date: 10/17/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: LAST FLIGHT HOME Dir: Ondi Timoner / Prod: Ondi Timoner, David Turner, Jenny Hochberg / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: MTV Documentary Films Film Short Synopsis: On an unremarkable suburban street, we find Eli Timoner in his final days and discover an extraordinary life, one filled with wild achievements, tragic loss and above all, enduring love from his incredibly close-knit family. LAST FLIGHT HOME shares an unforgettable and stunning verité account of a family courageously facing both life and death. Screening Date: 10/18/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: FIRE OF LOVE Dir: Sara Dosa / Prod: Shane Boris, Ina Fichman / Country: USA / Year: 2022 Film Short Synopsis: From National Geographic Documentary Films comes the extraordinary love story of intrepid French scientists Katia and Maurice Krafft, who died just as explosively as they lived — capturing the most spectacular imagery ever recorded of their greatest passion: volcanoes. Screening Date: 10/19/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: BAD AXE Dir: David Siev / Prod: Diane Quon, Jude Harris, Katarina Vasquez, David Siev / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: IFC Films Film Short Synopsis: A real-time portrait of 2020 unfolds as an Asian-American family in Trump’s rural America fights to keep their restaurant and American dream alive in the face of a pandemic, Neo-Nazis, and generational scars from the Cambodian Killing Fields. Screening Date: 10/20/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: THE RETURN OF TANYA TUCKER FEATURING BRANDI CARLILE Dir: Kathlyn Horan / Prod: Julie Goldman Christopher Clements Carolyn Hepburn Kathlyn Horan / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics Film Short Synopsis: Trailblazing, hell-raising country music legend Tanya Tucker defied the standards of how a woman in country music was supposed to behave. Decades after Tanya slipped from the spotlight, rising Americana music star Brandi Carlile takes it upon herself to write an entire album for her hero based on Tanya’s extraordinary life, spurring the greatest comeback in country music history. Screening Date: 10/25/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: FREE CHOL SOO LEE Dir: Julie Ha, Eugene Yi / Prod: Su Kim, Jean Tsien, Sona Jo / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: MUBI In 1970s San Francisco, 20-year-old Korean immigrant Chol Soo Lee is racially profiled and convicted of a Chinatown gang murder.
Screening Date: 10/26/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: THE JANES Dir: Tia Lessin and Emma Pildes / Prod: Emma Pildes, Daniel Arcana, and Jessica Levin / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor:Warner Bros. Discovery/HBO Documentary Films/HBO Max Film Short Synopsis: The Story Of An Underground Network Of Abortion Activists Pre-Roe V. Wade Screening Date: 10/27/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: ALL THAT BREATHES Dir: Shaunak Sen / Prod: Aman Mann, Shaunak Sen, Teddy Leifer / Country: India/USA/UK / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Sideshow, Submarine Deluxe, HBO Documentary Films Film Short Synopsis: ALL THAT BREATHES follows two brothers who run a bird hospital dedicated to rescuing injured black kites, a staple in the skies of New Delhi, India. In one of the world’s most populated cities, where cows, rats, monkeys, frogs, and hogs jostle cheek-by-jowl with people, the “kite brothers” care for thousands of these mesmerizing creatures that drop daily from New Delhi’s smog-choked skies. As environmental toxicity and civil unrest escalate, the relationship between this family and the neglected kites forms a poetic chronicle of the city’s collapsing ecology and deepening social fault lines. Screening Date: 10/31/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED Dir: Laura Poitras / Prod: Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Nan Goldin, Yoni Golijov, Laura Poitras Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: NEON Film Short Synopsis: Directed by Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras, All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is an epic, emotional and interconnected story about internationally renowned artist and activist Nan Goldin told through her slideshows, intimate interviews, ground-breaking photography, and rare footage of her personal fight to hold the Sackler family accountable for the overdose crisis. Screening Date: 11/01/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: IN HER HANDS Dir: Marcel Mettlesiefen, Tamana Ayazi / Prod: Juan Camilo Cruz, Jonathan Schaerf / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Netflix Film Short Synopsis: IN HER HANDS takes an unflinching look at the turmoil in Afghanistan through the eyes of one of its first and its youngest female Mayor, Zarifa Ghafari. With the U.S. and Western forces withdrawing from the region, the Afghan government is in complete chaos. Screening Date: 11/02/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: SIRENS Dir: Rita Baghdadi / Prod: Rita Baghdadi, Camilla Hall / Country: Lebanon, United States / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Oscilloscope Laboratories Film Short Synopsis: Lilas and Shery, co-founders and guitarists of the Middle East’s first all-female metal band, wrestle with friendship, sexuality and destruction in their pursuit of becoming thrash metal rock stars.
Screening Date: 11/03/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: MIJA Dir: Isabel Castro / Prod: Isabel Castro, Tabitha Breese, Yesenia Tlahuel / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Disney Original Documentary Film Short Synopsis: Disney Original Documentary’s Mija follows Doris Muñoz and Jacks Haupt, two daughters of immigrants from Mexico, navigating their careers in the music industry. A moving love letter to immigrants and their children, this intimate debut feature by Isabel Castro captures the emotional and complex stories of Doris and Jacks,f for whom “making it” isn’t just a dream, it’s a necessity. Screening Date: 11/07/2022 | Virtual only Film Title: SANSÓN AND ME Dir: Rodrigo Reyes / Prod: Su Kim, Rodrigo Reyes / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Cinema Guild Film Short Synopsis: Two Mexican migrants, a young man serving a life sentence in prison and a filmmaker who was his court interpreter, become intertwined through life and cinema. Screening Date: 11/08/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: THE VOLCANO: RESCUE FROM WHAKAARI Dir: Rory Kennedy / Prod: Mark Bailey / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Netflix Film Short Synopsis: On December 9th, 2019, a group of tourists made way for New Zealand’s Whakaari White Island to visit an active volcano that has attracted hundreds of thousands since the early 1990s. It was supposed to be a routine, six-hour tour with one major highlight: a quick hike into the island’s otherworldly caldera. Then, at 2:11pm, the volcano erupted. At the time, 47 people were on the island: 24 Australians, 9 American, 5 New Zealanders, 4 Germans, 2 Brits, 2 Chinese, and 1 Malaysian. Of those 47, 21 would lose their lives. Screening Date: 11/09/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: LET THE LITTLE LIGHT SHINE Dir: Kevin Shaw / Prod: Kevin Shaw, Rachel Dickson / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Argot Pictures Film Short Synopsis: A high-achieving elementary school near downtown Chicago is a lifeline for Black children – until gentrification threatens its closure. Screening Date: 11/10/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: WHAT WE LEAVE BEHIND Dir: Iliana Sosa / Prod: Emma D. Miller, Iliana Sosa / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: ARRAY Releasing Film Short Synopsis: After a lifetime of bus rides to the US to visit his children, Julián quietly starts building a house in rural Mexico. In filming his work, his granddaughter crafts a personal and poetic love letter to him and his homeland. Screening Date: 11/14/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: IS THAT BLACK ENOUGH FOR YOU?!? Dir: Elvis Mitchell / Prod: Steven Soderbergh, David Fincher, Angus Wall, Ciara Leina’ala Lacy / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Netflix Film Short Synopsis: From celebrated writer and film historian Elvis Mitchell, IS THAT BLACK ENOUGH FOR YOU?!? is both a documentary and deeply personal essay. The film examines the craft and power of cinema from a perspective often overlooked: the African American contribution to films released from the landmark era of the 70s.
Screening Date: 11/15/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: MOONAGE DAYDREAM Dir: Brett Morgen / Prod: Brett Morgen / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: NEON Film Short Synopsis: A cinematic odyssey exploring David Bowie’s creative and musical journey. From visionary filmmaker Brett Morgen, and sanctioned by the Bowie estate. Screening Date: 11/16/2022 | Virtual Only Film Title: TURN EVERY PAGE Dir: Lizzie Gottlieb / Prod: Lizzie Gottlieb, Joanne Nerenberg, Jen Small / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics Film Short Synopsis: Turn Every Page explores the remarkable fifty-year relationship between two literary legends, writer Robert Caro and his longtime editor Robert Gottlieb. Now 86, Caro is working to complete the final volume of his masterwork, The Years of Lyndon Johnson; Gottlieb, 91, waits to edit it. The task of finishing their life’s work looms before them. Screening Date: 11/17/2022 | In-person + Virtual Film Title: NOTHING LASTS FOREVER Dir: Jason Kohn / Prod: Amanda Branson Gill, Jared Ian Goldman / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: SHOWTIME Film Short Synopsis: Illusions and reality merge, where authenticity and imagination overlap, and questions arise about the value we place on the goods around us. Screening Date: 11/21/2022 | Virtual only Film Title: I DIDN’T SEE YOU THERE Dir: Reid Davenport / Prod: Keith Wilson / Country: USA / Year: 2022 / Distributor: POV Film Short Synopsis: Spurred by the spectacle of a circus tent that goes up outside his Oakland apartment, a disabled filmmaker launches into an unflinching meditation on spectacle, (in)visibility, and the corrosive legacy of the Freak Show. Screening Date: TBA | Virtual Only Film Title: LAKOTA NATION VS. UNITED STATES / Dir: Jesse Short Bull, Laura Tomaselli / Prod: Benjamin Hedin Country: USA Film Short Synopsis: Lakota Nation vs. the United States chronicles the Lakota Indians’ century-long quest to reclaim the Black Hills, sacred land that was stolen in violation of treaty agreements.
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