The documentary “#sugarwater” provides a revealing behind-the-scenes look at the groundbreaking Graeae (pronounced Grey Eye) Theater Company, whose mission emphasizes the integration of deaf and disabled performers into its productions. The documentary records... Read more
Women in Film Spotlight
Films that are made by women or address women’s issues.
42 Seconds Of Happiness
Friday, November 11 at 7:00pm
A circle of friends reunite for a weekend away to celebrate the same-sex wedding of a member of their group. Despite their best efforts to behave, a series of surprise plans, unexpected arrivals, and exposed secrets lead to an explosion of drama that cannot be... Read more
Agents of Change
Friday, November 4 at 7:30pm
As the civil-rights, Black Power, and anti-Vietnam War movements made national headlines in the late 1960s, another, less-known struggle for inclusion was taking place on college campuses. Exemplified by protests at San Francisco State and Cornell University (with... Read more
Beijing, New York
Friday, November 4 at 6:30pm
Saturday, November 5 at 6:00pm
“Beijing, New York” is the stunningly beautiful directorial debut of renowned Chinese cinematographer Rain Li, who has shot films for Gus Van Sant (“Paranoid Park”), Scott McGehee and David Siegel (“Uncertainty”), and Stanley Kwan (“Showtime”). Named one of the “... Read more
Blush
Tuesday, November 8 at 5:00pm
Sunday, November 13 at 1:30pm
Naama (Sivan Noam Shimon), a high-school student living outside of Tel Aviv, has a difficult family life. Her overbearing father has a hair-trigger temper and rails incessantly about the Palestinians, and her mother obsesses about older sister Liora, a soldier who... Read more
Body
Thursday, November 10 at 12:10pm
Saturday, November 12 at 2:30pm
A dark and gruesomely funny cocktail, “Body” mixes unsettling observation, surreal imagery, and grim humor to create a potent concoction that will leave audiences shaken and stirred. When a suicide victim he finds hanging in the park gets up and walks away,... Read more
The Children of the Noon
Saturday, November 5 at 4:00pm
“The Children of the Noon” begins as a beautifully shot and composed observational work that quietly documents the goings-on at an orphanage in the Kenyan village of Nchiru. During its gentle first half, the film provides a discreet look into the orphans’ lives... Read more
Creedmoria
Saturday, November 12 at 7:00pm
Loosely based on filmmaker Alicia Slimmer’s life growing up in 1980s Queens, “Creedmoria” chronicles the attempts of 17-year-old Candy (Stef Dawson) to inject some “fun” into her dysfunctional life. Given her crazy-making troubles, the proximity of Candy’s home to... Read more
Daughters of the Dust
Sunday, November 13 at 8:00pm
As a nod to our past on SLIFF’s 25th anniversary, the fest spotlights a freshly restored edition of “Daughters of the Dust.” Julie Dash’s widely hailed classic — the inspiration for Beyoncé’s “Lemonade” — helped inaugurate the fest in memorably grand fashion... Read more
Despite the Falling Snow
Saturday, November 12 at 5:45pm
A lushly photographed love story — which the director adapts from her own novel — “Despite the Falling Snow” brings a rare female perspective to the Cold War. In 1950s Moscow, Katya (“Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation’s” Rebecca Ferguson) secretly spies for the... Read more
The Eagle Huntress
Thursday, November 10 at 6:45pm
In “The Eagle Huntress,” 13-year-old Aisholpan trains to become the first girl in 12 generations of her Kazakh family to become an eagle hunter. Many old Kazakh eagle hunters vehemently reject the idea of a woman taking part in their ancient tradition, but... Read more
Enlighten Us: The Rise and Fall of James Arthur Ray
Saturday, November 5 at 3:00pm
“Enlighten Us” relates the cautionary tale of motivational star James Arthur Ray, tracing his meteoric rise and fall, and focusing on his return to the lucrative world of self-help after a negligent-homicide conviction. At his career’s height, Ray was overwhelmed... Read more
Feral Love
Friday, November 11 at 7:30pm
World-class violist Dorian Rence, who has performed with the New York Philharmonic for 40 years, has devoted her life to playing music, but she’s just as passionately committed to caring for a small colony of feral cats in the railroad tunnels of New York City.... Read more
Free Cece!
Saturday, November 12 at 2:30pm
On her way to the store with a group of friends, trans African-American woman Chrishaun Reed “CeCe” McDonald was verbally insulted — with both racial and trans-phobic slurs — and then brutally attacked outside a bar. In the altercation that followed, a man was... Read more
Germans & Jews
Sunday, November 13 at 2:30pm
Provocative and enlightening, “Germans & Jews” offers a new perspective on a complex history. Today, Europe’s fastest-growing Jewish population is in Berlin. Germany is considered one of the most democratic societies in the world, assuming the position of... Read more
Girl on Girl
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:30pm
“Girl on Girl” provides an illuminating group portrait of six women struggling with feminine-lesbian invisibility. Indistinguishable from straight women, feminine lesbians find that their day-to-day experience is plagued by interrogation and by society’s... Read more
Gold Balls
Tuesday, November 8 at 4:30pm
Tennis has long been associated with high-profile stars and young phenoms, but a growing number of active senior tennis players continue to compete long after athletes in other sports have hung up their cleats. For players age 80 and older, this is the world of... Read more
Hotel Dallas
Friday, November 11 at 7:00pm
By turns ethereal, meditative, and surreal, “Hotel Dallas” — a frequently funny, consistently experimental hybrid of fiction and nonfiction — premiered at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival. Blurring the lines between memoir, documentary re-enactment,... Read more
The Importance of Doubting Tom
Tuesday, November 8 at 7:00pm
Local actress and filmmaker Vanessa Roman’s years-in-the-making feature debut provides a screwball-comedy take on Oscar Wilde’s classic play “The Importance of Being Earnest.” The film gives the story a distinctly modern twist by setting it in the world of darts,... Read more
Indivisible
Sunday, November 13 at 6:00pm
Providing moving proof that love knows no borders, “Indivisible” chronicles the very real plight of the people at the heart of our nation’s immigration debate. Renata, Evelyn, and Antonio were young children when their parents brought them to the U.S. in search of... Read more
The Last Laugh
Sunday, November 13 at 3:00pm
Offering fresh insights into a frequently examined subject, “The Last Laugh” asks a deliberately provocative question: Is the Holocaust an absolutely off-limits topic for comedy? History shows that the victims of the Nazi concentration camps used humor as a means... Read more
Legs: A Big Issue in a Small Town
Friday, November 4 at 7:30pm
Set in Sag Harbor, a small, frozen-in-time village in the tony Hamptons, “Legs” recounts the controversy that results when a local gallery installs Larry Rivers’ large sculpture of a woman’s legs. Because the artwork is attached to the side of a building, local... Read more
The Liberators
Monday, November 7 at 7:30pm
Medieval art treasures seized by the Nazis go missing at the end of World War II. Were they destroyed in the chaos of the final battles? Or were these 1,000-year-old masterpieces — worth an estimated $350 million — stolen by advancing American troops? For more... Read more
The Man Who Saw Too Much
Saturday, November 12 at 3:30pm
“The Man Who Saw Too Much” provides a compelling portrait of Mexican photographer Enrique Metinides, who’s increasingly recognized as the contemporary equivalent of Weegee. For most of his career, Metinides worked for downscale, sensationalist newspapers, shooting... Read more
Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:30pm
“Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise” is the first feature documentary about the world-renowned writer, performer, and activist. This richly textured film provides a comprehensive look at Angelou’s life and work, including her St. Louis roots, her years in Ghana during... Read more
My Life as a Film
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:00pm
When Eva Vitija came of age, her father gave her a feature-length film about her life. Far from pleasing Eva, the film infuriated her. Her father, filmmaker Joschy Scheidegger, documented his family obsessively, and his daughter had vainly attempted to get away... Read more
Nana
Sunday, November 6 at 12:30pm
At 22, filmmaker Serena Dykman had always known that her maternal grandmother, Maryla Michalowski-Dyamant, was an Auschwitz survivor, but she never dared or cared to inquire more about the Nana she had lost at 11. But after witnessing the terrorist attacks in... Read more
Narrative Shorts: HerStory
Wednesday, November 9 at 9:20pm
The New Classmate
Thursday, November 10 at 4:15pm
Friday, November 11 at 7:00pm
“The New Classmate” —director Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari’s debut — is a heartwarming story about being courageous enough to dream. On her first day of school, Appu has no desire to get out of the bed she shares with her single mother, Chanda. She would much rather spend... Read more
The Nine
Saturday, November 12 at 6:30pm
“The Nine” is an intimate and unflinching portrait of a ravaged community living on Modesto's South Ninth Street — "The Nine” — a barren, forgotten street in California’s Great Central Valley (the setting for “The Grapes of Wrath” and Dorothea Lange’s “Migrant... Read more
Olympic Pride, American Prejudice
Sunday, November 6 at 2:45pm
In 1936, 18 African-American athletes — dubbed the “black auxiliary” by Hitler — participated in the Berlin Olympic Games, defying Nazi Aryan supremacy and Jim Crow racism. Despite their achievements, history forgot all except one, Jesse Owens. “Olympic Pride,... Read more
Other People’s Footage: Copyright & Fair Use
Saturday, November 5 at 10:00am
The centerpiece of a free master class on fair use and copyright, “Other People’s Footage” explores the three questions crucial to determining fair-use exemptions. The film presents helpful illustrative examples from nonfiction, fiction, and experimental films... Read more
Out of Innocence
Saturday, November 12 at 3:00pm
Based on true events at the turn of the 20th century, the Irish social drama “Out of Innocence” tells the story of a woman falsely accused. When a newborn baby washes up on a beach, it’s shocking enough, but the child was also stabbed before being tossed into the... Read more
Ovarian Psycos
Thursday, November 10 at 7:30pm
The Ovarian Psycos gear up and ride out into the night, fanning out in pairs of two, four, and six. In constant motion, cruising up and down the storied streets of Boyle Heights, East Los Angeles, and Lincoln Heights, they call out to new riders to join them in a... Read more
The Prison in Twelve Landscapes
Saturday, November 12 at 4:30pm
An essential documentary, Brett Story’s incisive and wide-ranging “The Prison in Twelve Landscapes” critically examines the prison system and its place — social, economic, and psychological — in American society. More people are imprisoned in the United States... Read more
Raising Bertie
Friday, November 11 at 7:30pm
“Raising Bertie” is an intimate portrait of three African-American boys coming of age in rural North Carolina. Set in Bertie County, a rural African-American-led community in Eastern North Carolina, the documentary takes audiences deep into the emotional lives of... Read more
Requiem for a Running Back
Saturday, November 5 at 7:30pm
Director Rebecca Carpenter’s father, Lew Carpenter, was a world-championship running back for Vince Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers. When he dies, her family receives a surprise call from Boston University’s brain bank, which asks for Lew’s brain for study. BU’s... Read more
Robert Shaw: Man of Many Voices
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:30pm
Largely self-taught, with only scant formal musical training, the remarkable Robert Shaw defied expectations by emerging from the world of pop music to achieve near-godlike status as a maker of choral music and to establish himself as a major conductor with the... Read more
The Sand Box
Friday, November 11 at 6:30pm
In commemoration of Veterans’ Day, SLIFF offers a double bill of films — a narrative and a documentary — that address the devastating effects of PTSD on returning soldiers and their families. Told through the eyes of 10-year-old Finn (Sayeed Shahidi), “The Sand... Read more
Screenagers
Saturday, November 12 at 4:15pm
Today’s children and teens, with their rapid-fire thumbs and six-second attention spans, sometimes appear to be scrolling through life. Recognizing the symptoms in her own kids, physician and filmmaker Delaney Ruston researched the problem and discovered that the... Read more
She Started It
Tuesday, November 8 at 7:30pm
Following five women over two years as they pitch venture capitalists, build teams, bring products to market, fail, and start again, “She Started It” takes viewers on a global roller-coaster ride from San Francisco to Mississippi, from France to Vietnam. Along the... Read more
Sonita
Sunday, November 13 at 1:00pm
Two-time Sundance Film Festival award winner “Sonita” tells the inspiring story of Sonita Alizadeh, an 18-year-old Afghan refugee in Iran, who thinks of Michael Jackson and Rihanna as her spiritual parents and dreams of becoming a big-name rapper. For the time... Read more
Southern Rites
Saturday, November 12 at 12:00pm
“Southern Rites” highlights the entrenched racial divides and vestiges of racism that stubbornly persist in Montgomery County, Ga. The film follows filmmaker Gillian Laub as she returns to Mount Vernon, where she once photographed the town’s segregated proms. When... Read more
To Keep the Light
Saturday, November 12 at 2:15pm
In 1876 Maine, Abbie (writer-director Erica Fae) tends the lighthouse on a remote island for her ailing husband. When a mysterious stranger washes up on shore, secrets buried in deep waters come to light, and Abbie is forced to navigate an unforgiving new world... Read more
Toni Erdmann
Wednesday, November 9 at 7:00pm
Winfried (Peter Simonischek) doesn’t see much of his working daughter Ines (Sandra Hüller). The suddenly student-less music teacher decides to surprise her with a visit after the death of his old dog. It’s an awkward move because serious career woman Ines is... Read more
Two
Sunday, November 6 at 6:00pm
Monday, November 7 at 9:30pm
The directorial debut of Iranian actress Soheila Golestani, the quietly powerful “Two” is loosely adapted from American author Bernard Malamud’s short story “Maid’s Shoes.” Pari (Mahtab Nasirpour), a lonely, middle-aged chambermaid, is hired by visiting expat... Read more
Waiting for B.
Friday, November 11 at 7:00pm
The charming “Waiting for B.” explores the outer reaches of fandom, profiling a hyper-devoted group of Beyoncé worshipers. Lacking the money to buy primo seats to a stadium concert in Sao Paulo, these Queen B. super-fans camp out for two months to edge as close as... Read more
Who Is Lydia Loveless?
Sunday, November 13 at 6:00pm
Gorman Bechard’s entertaining documentary profile “Who Is Lydia Loveless?” thoroughly explores the titular question. Is she a singer/songwriter, an alt-country queen, a cow punk, or a hard rocker? The second coming of Hank Williams or Patti Smith? Or just a... Read more
Wild Prairie Rose
Sunday, November 13 at 5:30pm
In 1952, Rose Miller returns to her rural hometown of Beresford, S.D., to care for her ailing mother. Once there, she falls in love with a deaf man and must decide if she has the courage to follow her heart. “Wild Prairie Rose” explores the changing roles of women... Read more
The Yatzkans
Sunday, November 13 at 12:00pm
Viewing great historical events from a highly personal perspective, “The Yatzkans” traces the journey of the film’s eponymous family across war-torn 20th-century Europe. When Anna-Célia Kendall’s mother dies, the filmmaker must deal with the remaining personal... Read more