ARUSI Persian Wedding
A film by Marjan Tehrani
Iranian American filmmaker Marjan Tehrani chronicles her brother Alex’s return to Iran during the start of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, as he travels with his American wife Heather to have a traditional Persian wedding and explore his lost heritage — just as his own Iranian father and American mother did back when Iran and the U.S. were allies. More.

Club Native
A film by Tracey Deer
On the Mohawk reserve where director Tracey Deer grew up, there were two very firm but unspoken rules: Don’t marry a white person, and don’t have a child with one. The consequences of ignoring these rules were equally simple: Lose all status as a Native person, and have your children forfeit their status as Native people. Not only did breaking either of these rules deplete “the Nation,” but was a de facto betrayal of one’s community and family. More.

Documentary Film and Video
         Festival (DOXA), Colin Low Award for
         Best Canadian Documentary
First Peoples' Festival (Land InSights)
         Kodak-Vision Globale Award for Best
         Canadian Film

Courting Justice
A film created by Ruth Cowan, Directed by Jane Thandi Lipman
From tyranny to democracy. Fourteen years after the defeat of apartheid, South Africa’s fledgling democracy is acclaimed for its constitutional promise of comprehensive human rights and unprecedented judicial reform. But what is essential for transformation to succeed? COURTING JUSTICE profiles indomitable female judges charged with the task of guarding those rights and enacting transitional justice. More.

Encounters: South African International
       Documentary Festival
Durban International Film Festival

Ella es el Matador (She is the Matador)
A film by Gemma Cubero and
Celeste Carrasco
For Spaniards – and for the world – nothing has expressed the country’s traditionally rigid gender roles more powerfully than the image of the male matador. So sacred was the bullfighter’s masculinity to Spanish identity that a 1908 law barred women from the sport. ELLA ES EL MATADOR (SHE IS THE MATADOR) reveals the surprising history of the women who made such a law necessary, and offers fascinating profiles of two female matadors currently in the arena, the acclaimed Mari Paz Vega and neophyte Eva Florencia. These women are gender pioneers by necessity. But what emerges as their truest motivation is their sheer passion – for bullfighting and the pursuit of a dream.

Tribeca All Access,
       Creative Promise Award
AFI Silverdocs, U.S. Premiere

The Feminist Initiative
A film by Liv Weisberg, Produced by
Boris Jordan-Mirchev
THE FEMINIST INITIATIVE, by director Liv Weisberg, reveals the passion, pitfalls and promise of a diverse group of women working to establish the world’s first feminist political party in Sweden in the spring of 2005. Charting every step (and misstep) along the way, Weisberg follows an ex-party leader, a couple of ‘70s feminists, a group of homo-bi-transsexuals, and several enthusiastic younger women from their energetic start to the climatic moments of their inspiring, celebrity-supported rally. More.

In Sickness and In Health
A film by Pilar Prassas, Edited by
Peter Heacock
This bittersweet documentary captures gay rights activists and longtime partners Marilyn Maneely and Diane Marini when their battle to legalize same-sex marriage turns into a race against a deadly disease. Prassas lovingly captures a partner's heartbreak, the coming together of a community and the quest of five children to help their mother live her last days with dignity and purpose. More.

Philadelphia Int'l Gay and Lesbian
         Film Festival, Jury Award for Best
         Documentary & Festival Favorite
Southwest Gay and Lesbian Film
         Festival, Audience Award Best
         Documentary

License to Thrive: Title IX at 35
A film by Theresa Moore
Smart and highly-entertaining, this film explores and celebrates the unique history of the Title IX legislation and its critical role over the past 35 years in creating female leaders. Title IX provides educational access and opportunity for women and young girls throughout the United States, and no piece of legislation since the 19th Amendment has been more crucial to opening doors and creating leadership opportunities for women in all arenas from science and math, to arts and athletics. More.
 

Mrs. Goundo's Daughter
A film by Barbara Attie and Janet Goldwater
Mrs. Goundo is on a quest to keep her baby daughter healthy and whole. Having fled drought and ethnic conflict in their native Mali, Mrs.Goundo and her husband moved to Philadelphia to raise three children, including two year old Djenebou who holds natural citizenship having been born in the U.S. But the Goundos are at risk of deportation, as Mrs. Goundo has to convince a immigration judge that Djenebou will suffer genital excision if they are sent back to Mali. Hearing from both Malian activists fighting to end the practice and traditionalists who defend it, this film  reveals the complexity and passion around  protecting a daughter's future.

AFI Silverdocs, World Premiere
Human Rights Watch Int'l Film
        Festival, New York
  

My Israel – Revisiting the Trilogy
A film by Yulie Cohen
In My Israel – Revisiting the Trilogy, Tel Aviv-born Yulie Cohen revisits her acclaimed works My Terrorist (2002), My Land Zion (2004), and My Brother (2007) with new footage, fresh perspective, and her trademark sensitivity to Israeli-Palestinian relations. Embarking on a difficult and emotional journey, she attempts to free the surviving terrorist who attacked her, to question the myths of the state that she grew up in, and to reconcile with her ultra-orthodox brother after 25 years of estrangement. It is an account of remarkable courage and understanding that combines Cohen’s 10-year oeuvre in an incisive and refreshing new way. More.
 

Nollywood Lady
A film by Dorothee Wenner
Sharing her vision for transforming preconceptions about Africa and African images, “Nollywood Lady” Anyiam-Fibresima, producer, filmmaker, and founder of the African Academy of Motion Pictures, takes viewers on an all-access tour to film locations, markets, and sit-downs with Nollywood professionals in the vibrant production hub of Lagos. This vibrant documentary is an insider’s primer to Nollywood’s dynamic $250 million industry, interspersed with clips from the more than 1,500 direct-to-video, mostly low budget, culturally distinct, and immensely popular films Nollywood produces each year. More.

Toronto Int’l Film Festival
Berlin Int’l Film Festival

Patsy Mink: Ahead of the Majority
A film by Kimberlee Bassford
PATSY MINK: AHEAD OF THE MAJORITY explores the remarkable political story of Patsy Takemoto Mink, an Asian American woman who battled racism and sexism – and redefined American politics. Small in stature but giant in vision, in 1965 she became the first woman of color in the United States Congress. Seven years later, she ran for the U.S. presidency and co-authored Title IX, the landmark legislation that opened up higher education and athletics to America’s women. Pioneer, patriot and outcast, Mink’s endlessly intriguing story embodies the very history, ideals and spirit of America.

San Francisco Int'l Asian American
        Film Festival, Comcast Audience Award
        for Best Documentary Feature
Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film
        Festival, Grand Jury Award for
        Best Documentary

Rough Aunties
A film by Kim Longinotto
Fearless, feisty and resolute, the "Rough Aunties" are a remarkable group of women unwavering in their stand to protect and care for the abused, neglected and forgotten children of Durban, South Africa. This newest documentary by internationally acclaimed director Kim Longinotto (SISTERS IN LAW, DIVORCE IRANIAN STYLE) follows the outspoken, multiracial cadre of Thuli, Mildred, Sdudla, Eureka and Jackie, as they wage a daily battle against systemic apathy, corruption, and greed to help the most vulnerable and disenfranchised of their communities. More.

Sundance Film Festival, World Cinema
        Jury Prize in Documentary
Big Sky Documentary Film Festival,
        Best Feature
 

Salata Baladi (An Egyptian Salad)
A film by Nadia Kamel
Award-winning Egyptian filmmaker Nadia Kamel’s heritage is a complex blend of religions and cultures. Her mother is a half-Jewish, half-Italian Christian who converted to Islam when she married Nadia’s half-Turkish, half-Ukrainian father. Prompted by the realization that her 10-year-old nephew Nabeel is growing up in an Egyptian society where talk of culture clashes is all too common, she urges her feminist, pacifist, activist mother, Mary Rosenthal, to share their diverse family history. More.

Mumbai Int'l Film Festival, Golden
       Conch, Best Long Documentary, & Special
       Prize, Int'l Critics Jury FIPRESCI
San Francisco Arab Film Festival, Noor
       Award, Outstanding Documentary

The Sari Soldiers
A film by Julie Bridgham
Filmed over three years during the most historic and pivotal time in Nepal’s modern history, THE SARI SOLDIERS is an extraordinary story of six women’s courageous efforts to shape Nepal’s future in the midst of an escalating civil war against Maoist insurgents, and the King’s crackdown on civil liberties. More.

Human Rights Watch Film Festival,
       New York, Nestor Almendros Prize
Rencontres Int’l du Documentaire de
       Montréal (RIDM), “Camera as Activist”
       prize: best socio-political film
 

Say My Name
A film by Nirit Peled
Sisters, mothers, businesswomen, music artists—in a hip hop and R’n’B industry world by men and noted for misogyny, the unstoppable female lyricists of SAY MY NAME speak candidly about class, race, and gender in pursuing their passions as female MCs. From hip hop’s birthplace in the Bronx to grime on London’s Eastside, emerging artists to world renowned stars like MC Lyte and Monie Love, these are women turning adversity into art. More.

AFI Dallas Int'l Film Festival
South by Southwest Film Festival

Searching 4 Sandeep
A film by Poppy Stockell
Single, frustrated and lonely in the middle of Sydney’s thriving gay community, director Poppy Stockell decides to “research” a light-hearted look at the lesbian Internet-dating scene. To her surprise and delight, she forges a deep online connection with an English woman, Sandeep Virdi. When their innocent flirtation turns into true attachment, Poppy sends Sandeep a camcorder and viewers watch as Poppy and Sandeep’s virtual relationship blooms into a poignant love complicated by the reality that Sandeep is Sikh, lives at home with her conservative family, and has kept her sexuality a secret. More.

Sydney Film Festival,
       World Movies Channel Audience Award
WOW Film Festival, Best Documentary
       & Audience Award
 

Shooting Women
A film by Alexis Krasilovsky
Shot over a period of six years and featuring more than 50 camerawomen from around the world, including Ellen Kuras, Sandi Sissel and Agnès Varda, Shooting Women celebrates the amazing talent and unflinching spirit of image-making women from the sets of Hollywood and Bollywood to the war zones of Afghanistan. Broaching the persistent issues of the glass ceiling, sexual harassment, and childcare for professional camerawomen around the globe, this film offers viewers a compelling glimpse of how women behind the camera are changing the world. More.

San Francisco Women’s Film Festival,
         Best Women in Cinema Award &
         Tribute Award
Female Eye Film Festival,
         Best Documentary Film

Suffragettes in the Silent Cinema
A film by Kay Sloan
In the days before movies could talk, silent films spoke clearly of sexual politics. This rare and wonderful assemblage of silent era footage opens a historic window on how filmmakers on both sides of the women’s suffrage issue used the exciting new medium to create powerful propaganda and images about women. Through clips from films like A Lively Affair (1912), A Busy Day (1914) and What 80 Million Women Want (1913), the film raises key issues about the struggle for gender equality and the portrayal of women in the media, which remain as fascinating, engaging, and relevant today as yesterday. More.

Miami Int'l Film Festival
 

Tiger Spirit
Directed by Min Sook Lee
Korea is a divided nation. Millions of families were split apart in the 1950s and few ever imagined their good-byes would be forever. Korean-Canadian director Min Sook Lee’s search for both the real and symbolic “Tiger Spirit” of Korea leads her on an amazing journey along the Koreas’ border and into the lives of families dreaming of the day they can once again see their lost loved ones. With unprecedented access and never before seen footage of North Korea’s industrial zone and state-sanctioned reunification centers, Lee brings us an emotionally-charged journey into Korea’s broken heart, exploring the rhetoric and realism of reunification through the extraordinary stories of ordinary families. More.

Hot Docs Int’l Documentary
         Film Festival
Rencontres Internationales du
         Documentaire de Montréal (RIDM)
 

We Want Roses Too
A film by Alina Marazzi
Skillfully utilizing interviews and television footage, advertisements and animation, diary entries and photo stories, award-winning Italian documentarian Alina Marrazi creates a kaleidoscopic, funny and absorbing story of sexual liberation and revolutionary struggle in Italy during the '60s and '70s. More.

Int’l Doc Fest Amsterdam (IDFA)
Locarno Int'l Film Festival

Who’s Afraid of Kathy Acker?
A film by Barbara Caspar
A multi-layered work featuring animation, archival footage and interviews with the likes of William Burroughs, Carolee Schneemann and Richard Hell, this is a thoughtful biography/essay on the late outlaw writer and punk icon, whose formally inventive novels, published from the ’70s through the mid-’90s, appropriated texts from Great White Male writers and challenged assumptions about gender roles, sexuality, and the literary canon. This film captures the essence of both Acker the writer and Acker the person, while celebrating the avant-garde legacy of an artist who forever expanded the limits of self-expression. More.

Rotterdam Film Festival
Karlovy Vary Int’l Film Festival

3 Times Divorced
A film by Ibtisam Salh Mara'ana
Produced by Timna Goldstein Hattab & Gon
When Gaza-born Khitam’s abusive Arab Israeli husband divorces her and gains custody of her six children, she suddenly finds herself fighting two heartbreaking battles: against the Sharia Muslim court to get her children back, and against the state of Israel, which considers her an illegal resident and denies her protection that could literally save her life. More.

Hot Docs Int'l Documentary Festival
DOK Leipzig

 

Bloodlines
A film by Cynthia Connop
A moving meditation on guilt and reconciliation, this film explores the unwritten cost of war and genocide on future generations – of both victims and perpetrators. Bettina Goering, descendent of Nazi war criminal Herman Goering, comes to Australia to meet Ruth Rich, artist and the daughter of Holocaust survivors. With astonishing honesty and courage, both women attempt to reconcile the traumas in their bloodlines. More.

 

The Education of Shelby Knox
A film by Marion Lipschutz & Rose Rosenblatt
Shelby Knox is a devout Baptist teenager who has pledged abstinence until marriage. When her interest in politics leads to her involvement in a campaign for comprehensive sex education in her town's public schools, and then to a fight for a gay-straight alliance, she must make a choice: Stand by and let others be hurt, or go against her parents, her pastor, and her peers to do what she knows is right. More.

Sundance Film Festival,
        Excellence in Cinematography
South by Southwest, Audience Award

Finding Dawn
A film by Christine Welsh
FINDING DAWN puts a human face on a tragedy that has received precious little attention – and one which is surprisingly similar to the situation in Ciudad Juárez, on the other side of the U.S. border. Acclaimed Métis filmmaker Christine Welsh embarks on an epic journey to shed light on these murders and disappearances of the estimated 500 Aboriginal women who have gone missing or been murdered in Canada over the past 30 years that remain unresolved to this day. More.

Amnesty Int’l Film Festival Vancouver,
         Gold Audience Award
Seattle Human Rights Film Festival

 

Four Wives – One Man
A film by Nahid Persson
Produced by Setareh Persson & Nahid Persson
From Nahid Persson, the filmmaker of the award-winning PROSTITUTION BEHIND THE VEIL, comes an intimate portrait of a polygamist family in a rural Iranian village. Persson reveals the intricacies of the relationships between the four wives, their husband, their astoundingly free-spoken mother-in-law and their numerous children. More.

Locarno Int'l Film Festival, Critic's
        Week
AFI Silverdocs
 

Girl Inside
A film by Maya Gallus
Produced by Justine Pimlott and Maya Gallus
Following Madison during three years of her transition from male to female, heartwarming GIRL INSIDE highlights Madison’s loving relationship with her glamorous 80-year-old grandmother. Their conversations raise profound issues about the nature of gender, femininity, and sexuality. Sometimes funny, sometimes painful, this sweet coming of age story is both a portrait and an exploration of what it means to be a woman. More.

The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo
A film by Lisa F. Jackson
Shot in the war zones of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), this extraordinary film shatters the silence that surrounds the shocking plight of women and girls who, caught in this country’s intractable conflict, are being systematically kidnapped, raped, mutilated and tortured by soldiers from both foreign militias and the Congolese army. More.

Sundance Film Festival, Special Jury
       Prize: Documentary
London Human Rights Watch Film
       Festival, Best of Fest

 

Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go
A film by Kim Longinotto
Acclaimed filmmaker Kim Longinotto has once again turned her compassionate lens onto people living in extraordinary circumstances. This time, she sensitively captures the struggles of emotionally traumatized children who attend Oxford boarding school Mulberry Bush – their last chance to try to turn their lives around. More.

Int’l Doc Fest Amsterdam (IDFA),       
       Special Jury Prize  
Britdoc, Best British Feature
       Documentary       
 

 

Iron Ladies of Liberia
A film by Siatta Scott Johnson and Daniel Junge Produced by Henry Ansbacher &
Jonathan Stack
After surviving a 14-year civil war and a government riddled with corruption, Liberia is ready for change. On January 16, 2006, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was inaugurated President – the first freely elected female head of state in Africa. As the filmmakers explore a historic transition from authoritarianism to democracy, the viewer is treated to a joyous, inspirational testimony of the political power of women's leadership and diplomacy. More.

AFI Dallas Int'l Film Festival,
         Target Ten Filmmaker Award: Best Doc
Int’l Doc Fest Amsterdam (IDFA)

 

Motherland
Cuba Korea USA
A film by Dai Sil Kim-Gibson
How do we decide where is home? For millions of immigrants, loyalties are divided between the land of their birth and the country in which in they choose to live. Feeling increasingly isolated in her adopted homeland of the United States, pioneering documentarian Dai Sil Kim-Gibson travels to Cuba to discover stories from a relatively unknown group in the Asian diaspora – Korean Cubans. More.

Pusan Int’l Film Festival, South Korea
San Francisco Int’l Asian-American
         Film Festival
 

My Daughter the Terrorist
A film by Beate Arnestad
Produced by Morten Daae
An exceedingly rare, inside look at an organization most of the world has blacklisted as a terrorist group, this fascinating documentary was made by the first foreign film crew given access to the Tamil Tigers (LTTE) of Sri Lanka. Following two women who are part of LTTE’s elite force, this sobering and timely film offers important insights into the psychology and motivations of people who are firmly committed to doing what many find unthinkable. More.

DOCNZ Int’l Doc Film Festival,
        Special Mention
Message to Man Int’l Film Festival,
         Best Feature-Length Doc

 

My Home - Your War
A film by Kylie Grey
Produced by Denoux Films Productions
MY HOME - YOUR WAR offers an exceptional look at the effect of the Iraq war through the eyes of an ordinary Iraqi woman. Shot in Baghdad over three years that span the time before, during and after the invasion of Iraq, this profoundly moving film brings a perspective that – until now – has rarely been available to U.S. audiences. The film vividly portrays how the Iraq war has created a situation where the rise of fundamentalism is putting women’s rights increasingly at risk. More.

Gold World Medal, Best Doc in NY
European Independent Film Festival,
       Best Int’l Documentary

 

Tillie Olsen - A Heart in Action
A film by Ann Hershey
This revelatory documentary is an inspiring homage to Tillie Lerner Olsen – a renegade, revolutionary, distinguished fiction and non-fiction writer, feminist, humanist, labor organizer and social activist. Politically active, class conscious, deeply joined to the world, Tillie countered the very core of American writing by immortalizing the lives of working class women and single mothers. More.

 

To See If I’m Smiling
A film by Tamar Yarom
Winner of both the Audience Award and the Silver Wolf Award at the International Documentary Film Festival, Amsterdam (IDFA), TO SEE IF I’M SMILING powerfully explores the darker side of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict through the testimonies of six female soldiers about their compulsory military service in the Occupied Territories. More.

Int’l Doc Fest Amsterdam (IDFA),
        Silver Wolf Award & Audience Award
Hot Docs, Special Jury Prize

 

The Women's Kingdom
Xiaoli Zhou, Produced by Xiaoli Zhou & Brent E. Huffman
Keepers of the last matriarchal societies in the world, Mosuo women in a remote area of China enjoy great freedoms and carry heavy responsibilities. This film is fascinating portrait of a society of powerful women whose future is on the brink of change. More.

Student Academy Award, Silver Medal
San Francisco Women’s Film Festival,
        Best Editing