Browse Movies : R : Documentary : A

Named by ArtReview as the most powerful artist in the world, Ai Weiwei is China's most celebrated contemporary artist, and its most outspoken domestic critic. In April 2011, when Ai disappeared into police custody for three months, he quickly became China's most famous missing person. First-time director Alison Klayman gained unprecedented access to the charismatic artist, as well as his family and others close to him, while working as a journalist in Beijing. In the years she filmed, government authorities shut down Ai's blog, beat him up, bulldozed his newly built studio, and held him in secret detention--while Time magazine named him a runner-up for 2011's Person of the Year.

Starting six months before the 2016 presidential election, director Jim Stern put his life on hold and — driven to understand what seemed incomprehensible at the time — traveled through red states to interview and spend time with Donald Trump supporters from different backgrounds. It was a search for insights and answers, for anything that could explain the billionaire’s surging appeal and why these voters remained untroubled by so many troubling things the candidate had said and done. This journey became his Heart of Darkness into the American body politic at a profoundly critical point in our history. And the film he returned with, American Chaos, sheds unique light on difficult issues roiling the nation — chronicling a cultural divide, still dangerously misunderstood, that continues to tear at the fabric of our democracy.

“Andy Irons: Kissed by God” chronicles the struggles of bipolar disorder and opioid addiction as seen through the life of three-time world champion surfer Andy Irons. Irons struggled with the same demons that millions of people worldwide battle with daily. He was an incredible presence on the surfing world stage as the “People’s Champion," the pride of Hawaii and revered around the world for his blue collar rise to fame and success. However, many were unaware of his internal battles that led to his demise.

The 1970s was an extraordinary time of rebellion, of questioning every accepted idea: political activism, hedonism, protests, the sexual revolution, the women's movement, the civil rights movement, the music revolution, rage and liberation. Every standard by which we set our social and cultural clocks was either turned inside out or thrown away completely and reinvented. For American cinema, the 1970s was an era during which a new generation of filmmakers created work for a new kind of audience--moviegoers who were hungry for stories that reflected their own experiences and who were turning their backs on aged old studio formulas. As a result, emerging filmmakers influenced by foreign directors such as Godard, Kurasowa and Fellini coupled with the social climate and a struggling studio system, converged to create a new kind of moviemaking. Through their choice of material, filmmakers such as Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Peter Bogdonovich, William Friedkin, Roger Corman and Paul Schrader revolutionized mainstream movies and for the first time personal visions were coming out of the studio system.

After Kris breaks up with his long-time girlfriend, anything seems possible and Warsaw is his playground. Along with best friend Michal, handsome and wide-eyed, they roam the metropolis at night, floating from party to party, dancing until dawn in makeshift clubs and city squares. With only instinct and desire as their guides, big ideas intermingle with drugs and sex and one thing seamlessly gives way to another. However, when Kris falls for Michal’s ex-girlfriend, the indomitable and alluring Eva, the relationship between the two best friends falls apart. Determined to find his true self Kris navigates between his memories and future hopes soon realizing that his crusade to understand life has starting to overshadow living it.