Hyman Bloom: The Beauty of All Things color, 57 minutes
Told with humor and irony, the career and passion of painter Hyman Bloom, a forefather of abstract art in America, is boldly conveyed. The film highlights a body of work that is a vibrant manifestation of Bloom’s imagination and his dedication to envision what others at the time didn’t dare to paint.

40 Years of Silence: An Indonesian Tragedy color, 86 minutes
40 Years of Silence is the first documentary to explore the personal effects of the 1965 mass-killings in Indonesia, in which estimates say more than 500 thousand people died. This story is told through the compelling testimonies of four individuals and their families as they break their silence for the first time.

Coffee Futures color, 22 minutes
Provocative and timely, Coffee Futures weaves individual fortunes with the story of Turkey’s decades-long attempts to become a member of the European Union. Promises and predictions made by politicians, both foreign and domestic, are juxtaposed with the rhetoric and practices of coffee fortune telling.

Returned: Child Soldiers of Nepal’s Maoist Army color, 57 minutes
In a newly released 57-minute extended version, Returned follows four Nepali children as they attempt to rebuild their lives after fighting in the Maoist revolution. For many of these children, the return home can be even more painful than the experience of war.

All My Babies: A Midwife’s Own Story w/ Palmour Street black & white, 54 minutes
George’s Stoney’s classic All My Babies is a training film about midwifery that transcends the form. The film is not only a profound portrait of midwife “Miss Mary” Coley, but also is a documentary record of the living conditions of African-American families in 1950s Georgia. As an extra, this DVD also includes Stoney’s film Palmour Street (1949), an open-ended discussion of family relations in Gainesville, Georgia.

Two Video Reports From China: Acupuncture and Herbal Medicine black & white, 54 minutes
This DVD contains two video reports made during the 1977 People-to-People China trip, during which, in response to an invitation from the Chinese government, American family planning workers from the fields of medicine, public health, media, and administration visited the People’s Republic of China to study its birth control, maternity, and child care methods and facilities.

Siaka, An African Musician color, 79 min (plus 18 min of extras)
This film presents a fascinating look at the world of urban African music through the lens of Siaka Diabaté, a talented and lovable young musician, while he performs on the cusp of a rising civil war in Bouaké, Côte d’Ivoire. This DVD includes the extras Interview with Soungalo Coulibaly (9 min), and Soungalo and His Group Playing for a Wedding (10 min).

An African Brass Band color, 74 minutes
Hugo Zemp’s film An African Brass Band offers a lively glimpse into the transformations of musical and cultural traditions in Côte d’Ivoire through its focus on the formation of a brass band who play traditional music at a wide variety of festivals, ceremonies, and celebrations. This DVD also includes the extra features Making of Palm Wine (3 min), and Rehearsal (7 min).

Funeral Chants from the Georgian Caucasus color, 21 minutes
Through documenting the distinctive vocal expressions of the Svans of northwestern Georgia, Funeral Chants from the Georgian Caucasus by renowned ethnomusicologist Hugo Zemp provides stunning insight into the issues of oral tradition, ritual and maintenance of traditional identities.

Masters of the Balafon Series color, 221 min (plus 54 min of extras) - In this remarkable series, director Hugo Zemp documents the balafon instrument, a xylophone with calabash resonators, which is emblematic of the Senufo people of the Côte d’Ivoire. Filmed with prodigious finesse and social integrity, this series has been referred to as “a major achievement in visual documentation”. The series is comprised of the following four films:

The Joy of Youth color, 70 min (plus 9 min of extras)
The Joy of Youth communicates the exceptional vitality of the balafon instrument throughout northern Côte d’Ivoire society, from its symbolic role in providing rhythm for fieldwork to energized dance nights and coming-of-age ceremonies. Apart of the Masters of Balafon Series.

Friend, Well Come! color, 27 min (plus 21 min of extras)
A part of the Masters of the Balafon series, Friend, Well Come! documents the use of the Balafon, an emblematic musical instrument in northern Côte d’Ivoire society, through the emotionally intense proceedment of a ceremonial burial ritual.

Funeral Festivities color, 80 min (plus 25 min of extras)
Employing unforgettable images, director Hugo Zemp engages in dialogues with master balafon players, giving phenomenal insight into the purpose of the balafon within northern Côte d’Ivoire funeral traditions. A part of the Masters of Balafon series.

The Wood and the Calabash color, 47 min
The Wood and the Calabash documents an experienced balafon maker manufacturing the musical instrument, which is a vital social device among the northern Côte d’Ivoire people. A part of the Masters of Balafon series.

Owners of the Water: Conflict and Collaboration Over Rivers color, 34 minutes
Owners of the Water is a compelling and unique collaboration between two indigenous filmmakers and an anthropologist, which explores the efforts of an indigenous campaign to protect a river from devastating effects of uncontrolled Amazonian soy cultivation.

The Left Eye of God: Caodaism Travels from Vietnam to California color, 58 minutes
Caodaists worship the left eye as an Asian synthesis of eastern and western traditions. In this film, they tell their stories of exile, anti-colonial struggle, and building immigrant congregations in California. Footage of rituals and temples, and archival images combine to provide a personal perspective on a largely unknown mystical tradition.

Horses of Life and Death color, 26 minutes
This film explores the gender-driven rituals and festivities during the New Year celebration in the Indonesian Island of Sumba. Within the celebration, the masculine fierceness and violence of the Pasola, a traditional jousting battle with hundreds of horses and riders, contrasts with the Sumbanese belief that fertility and life come from female spirits. Employing the both male and female narrators, Horses of Life and Death creates an objective look about the gendered perspective of traditional rituals.

The Feast in Dream Village color, 27 minutes
This engaging film documents a week-long ritual to restore fertility after a fire and famine has plagued a Sumbanese village. The film focuses on a challenge to the authority of the spirits and ancestors, offering insight into the transformations of Sumbanese society in the 1980s. This small-scale drama shows a pagan community feeling pressures which would eventually lead to an increased number of conversions to Christianity by the dawn of the 21st century.

Songs of a Sorrowful Man color, 35 minutes
A follow-up to the award-winning film Singing Pictures (2006), Songs of a Sorrowful Man continues to depict the dreams and influences of Dukhushyam, a charismatic painter, composer, singer, poet, and mystic, who has encouraged women to take up the traditional craft of scroll painting and musical composition, traditionally pursued almost exclusively by men in rural West Bengal.

Fully Awake: Black Mountain College color, 60 minutes
Hidden in the mountains of Western North Carolina, Black Mountain College (1933 - 1957) was an influential experiment in education that inspired and influenced many of America’s most important twentieth-century artists. Through probing the legacy of the experimental school, Fully Awake points to a progressive pedagogical model that can continue to inspire students today.

!Kung Short Films color/black & white, 161 minutes
Recently honored with entry into UNESCO’s prestigious Memory of the World Register, John Marshall’s intimate filmed portraits of the daily life and ritual life of Ju/’hoansi are considered as one of the seminal visual anthropology works of the twentieth century. UNESCO says the collection “…is unique in the world for the scope of its sustained audiovisual documentation of one cultural group,” and that these films are “an unparalleled historical record not only of an indigenous people’s traditional lifeways and ties to the land but of the transformation of these lifeways in the rapidly changing political and economic landscape…”. Rich in ethnographic detail, beauty and high emotional content, this collection combines fourteen of Marshall’s short !Kung films onto two newly remastered/re-authored DVDs, complete with a full-color booklet containing photos, writings, and additional information about the series.

How the Myth Was Made color/black & white, 45 minutes
Robert Flaherty’s 1934 classic Man of Aran chronicled fishermen’s struggle for existence on Ireland’s bleak Aran Islands. How the Myth Was Made explores the effects Flaherty’s film had on the island and its people. With Myth, George Stoney - an iconic director in his own right - digs into his own roots as an individual while simultaneously studying the work of his intellectual mentor as a producer of nonfiction films.

Southern Voices: A Composer’s Exploration with Sorrel Doris Hays color, 59 minutes
Southern Voices traces the development and premiere performance of an avant-garde symphonic work by Southern composer Sorrel Doris Hays. Commissioned by the Chattanooga Symphony Orchestra, Hays’ piece is based on the sounds and rhythms of Southern speech and musical traditions. Stoney combines analysis of her work with interviews in which Hays discusses her struggle with racism and paternalism of Southern culture.

Shepherd of the Night Flock black & white, 56 minutes
A documentary about a jazz ministry at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Manhattan which was led by Father John Garcia Gensel. Gensel started the Jazz Vespers for musicians who couldn’t make it to Sunday morning service after playing late Saturday night gigs. It became the church home for many musicians including Zoot Sims, Billy Strayhorn, and the legendary Duke Ellington, who called Pastor Gensel “the shepherd who watches over the night flock” and wrote a song with that title, from which this film derived its name.

Poto Mitan: Haitian Women, Pillars of the Global Economy color, 50 minutes
Told through compelling lives of five courageous Haitian women workers, Poto Mitan gives the global economy a human face. Each woman’s personal story explains neoliberal globalization, how it is gendered, and how it impacts Haiti. And while Poto Mitan offers in-depth understanding of Haiti, its focus on women’s subjugation, worker exploitation, poverty, and resistance demonstrates these are global struggles.

Movement (R)evolution Africa color, 65 minutes
Combining innovative narrative techniques and striking footage of dancers at work in the studio and on stage, Movement (R)evolution Africa explores an astonishing exposition of choreographic fomentation. Hailing from Senegal to South Africa, the perspectives and creative processes of these dancers and choreographers present fresh images of Africa, and bring to life the continent’s contemporary identity.

Miss Margaret color, 53 minutes
Miss Margaret is a documentary about Grand Midwife, Margaret Charles Smith of Eutaw, Alabama, who delivered over 3,500 babies in homes between 1949 and 1981 without ever losing a mother. In 1976, the Granny Midwives were outlawed by the state in favor of Medicaid funded private contractors. Since then, the vast wisdom of the grannies has been fading and women in Alabama can no longer choose to give birth at home.

Breaking the Cycle color, 52 minutes
The state-funded Woodlands Country Primary School in Gillingham, Kent, UK had been subjected to years of neglect, predisposing its underachieving students to move on to a life of mediocrity. Years of hard work and commitment from staff, governors and parents transformed Woodlands into one of the best schools in the country. Breaking the Cycle can be used as a tool for inspiring those interested in implementing change in their own school communities.

When Medicine Got it Wrong color, 53 minutes
The groundbreaking story of loving parents who rocked the halls of psychiatry, changing how we understand schizophrenia. In the 1970s, a small group of parents rebelled against then-popular psychiatric theories blaming schizophrenia on bad parenting. Their activism helped revolutionize treatment forever and their stories reveal the origins of the tragic state of mental health care today.

Tubali: Hausa Architecture in Northern Nigeria color, 45 minutes
A film on Hausa architecture featuring various phases of construction from mud, as well as social, political, and religious aspects of these structures, whose history, aesthetics, and economics are explained by builders, architects, and a museum curator.

Owu: Chidi Joins the Okoroshi Secret Society color, 60 minutes
Filmed in an Igbo town of Southeastern Nigeria, Owu illustrates the connectedness of life, myth, religion and art evidenced in an annual festival and masquerade sponsored by a men’s secret society.

Mammy Water: In Search of the Water Spirits in Nigeria color, 60 minutes
Mammy Water is a Pidgin English name for local water deities in Southeastern Nigeria. The film documents their worship. The Water Goddess is believed to give wealth and children; She compensates for hardship and is sought in times of illness and need, especially by women, led predominantly by priestesses.

Skull Art in Papua New Guinea color, 30 minutes
Adam, an elderly man from Papua New Guinea, uses clay over a painted human skull, to remodel a traditional skull portrait. He supplements an ancient technique with some contemporary materials. A rare documentation of an art form that was formerly associated with commemorating the deceased, but also with head hunting among the Iatmul people of the East Sepik province.

Postcards from Tora Bora color, 87 minutes Armed only with rapidly fading memories, a young Afghan-American woman returns to her childhood home on a personal journey and recruits some unlikely and reluctant guides to put together the pieces of her past. On the road, she frequently finds herself at a strange intersection where cultures clash, identities are mistaken, and the past violently collides with the present.

They Turned Our Desert Into Fire color, 88 minutes
Documentary photographer and filmmaker Mark Brecke shares his images and first-hand experience of the crisis in Darfur with passengers journeying eastward on a three day trip train to Washington D.C. Interwoven with facts and expert opinion, the passengers’ reactions underscore the film’s central question - Why does the public not understand the severity of this crisis and how can the world continue to do nothing?

For Our Street Family color, 34 minutes Revolving around a teen drop-in center called Planet Youth, For Our Street Family explores the pain of stereotypes, the importance of peer support, and the ambivalence towards identity experience by a group of First Nations teens in Prince Rupert, British Columbia.

The Professional Foreigner color, 60 minutes
In a series of talks with filmmaker Rolf Husmann, renowned anthropologist and ethnographic filmmaker Asen Balikci visits different locations to show and discuss his life and work, including his recent work among the Bulgarian Pomak and in Sikkim (India). The Professional Foreigner is not only the portrait of a famous expert in Visual Ethnography, but also more generally touches upon vital issues of ethnographic filmmaking.

Yindabad color, 55 minutes
The Adivasi people of central India have struggled for 20 years against the Narmada Valley Development Project, a plan to construct hundreds of large to mid-size dams on the River Narmada. Over 2.5 million people have been displaced by the flooding of forests, cultivateable land, and villages. The situation in Narmada Valley is an example of one of the biggest wars of the 21st century: water management and control of natural resources.

Stories from Myanmar color, 188 minutes
Stories from Myanmar showcases films made by participants of Yangon Film School workshops in Myanmar 2007. These talented young Burmese filmmakers strive to create challenging work in an environment notorious for discouraging independent media. Their films provide a hitherto unseen window on the lives of ordinary people in Myanmar.

The Al Hadji and His Wives color, 55 minutes The Al-Hadji and His Wives is a film portrait of a Mbororo Fulani patriarch, Al-Hadji Isa, his savvy wives, and their rebellious daughters. The documentary provides a glimpse into their everyday lives, religious and moral practices, as well as the political opinions the Al-Hadji has to offer from his particular corner of the world.