New American Documentaries

Dan Cohen, founder of the nonprofit organization Music & Memory, fights against a broken healthcare system to demonstrate music's ability to combat memory loss and restore a deep sense of self to those suffering from it.

THE AMERICAN NURSE is a heart-warming film that explores some of the biggest issues facing America - aging, war, poverty, prisons - through the work and lives of nurses. It is an examination of real people that will change how we think about nurses and how we wrestle with the challenges of healing America. THE AMERICAN NURSE is an important contribution to America's ongoing conversation about what it means to care. The film follows the paths of five nurses in various practice specialties including Jason Short as he drives up a rugged creek to reach a home-bound cancer patient in Appalachia. Tonia Faust, who runs a prison hospice program where inmates serving life sentences care for their fellow inmates as they're dying. Naomi Cross, as she coaches an ovarian cancer survivor through the Caesarean delivery of her son. Sister Stephen, a nun who runs a nursing home filled with goats, sheep, llamas and chickens, where the entire nursing staff comes together to sing for a dying resident. And Brian McMillion, an Army veteran and former medic, rehabilitating wounded soldiers returning from war.

Feature-length documentary about the greatest diver of all time. Four-time Olympic champion Greg Louganis has faced more than his share of challenges. In 2011, he is far from the public eye and struggling to pay his mortgage. Now, the openly gay, HIV+ world-class athlete returns to diving to mentor the USA Olympic hopefuls. This may be his best chance to regain the notoriety -- and financial stability -- he enjoyed at the height of his career.

A group of men and women with disabilities come together to star in a unique new western film in which they have the leading roles.

Beginning With the End takes viewers on a profound, and profoundly moving, journey with a group of high school seniors working as trained hospice volunteers -- a story of beginnings and endings in a year of self-discovery and awakening.

Big Dream follows the intimate stories of seven young women who are breaking barriers and overcoming personal challenges to follow their passion in science, math, computing & engineering.

A behind-the-scenes look inside the case to overturn California's ban on same-sex marriage. Shot over five years, the film follows the unlikely team that took the first federal marriage equality lawsuit to the U.S. Supreme Court.

When men in a prison art class agree to collaborate with victims of crime to design a mural about healing, their views on punishment, remorse, and forgiveness collide. At times the divide seems too wide to bridge. But as the participants begin to work together, mistrust gives way to genuine moments of human contact and shared purpose. Their struggle to find creative common ground raises challenging questions about punishment, justice and reconciliation -- the insights gained are reflected in the art they produce.

Tens years after robbing a Bank of America, filmmaker Darius Monroe returns home to examine how his actions affected the lives of family, friends...and victims.

Three homeless teenagers brave Chicago winters, the pressures of high school, and life alone on the streets to build a brighter future.

Sometimes the rockiest roads lead to the highest peaks.

A documentary that follows jazz legend Clark Terry over four years to document the mentorship between Terry and 23-year-old blind piano prodigy Justin Kauflin as the young man prepares to compete in an elite, international competition.

With the rapid emergence of digital devices, an unstoppable, invisible force is changing human lives in ways from the microscopic to the gargantuan: Big Data, a word that was barely used a few years ago but now governs the day for many of us from the moment we awaken to the extinguishing of the final late-evening light bulb. This massive gathering and analyzing of data in real time is allowing us to not only address some of humanity biggest challenges but is also helping create a new kind of planetary nervous system. Yet as Edward Snowden and the release of the Prism documents have shown, the accessibility of all these data comes at a steep price. The Human Face of Big Data captures the promise and peril of this extraordinary knowledge revolution.

Two journalists and two veterans examine war.

Biographical documentary shining a spotlight on the leadership role Comanche LaDonna Harris has had in Native and American and international civil rights since the 1960s.

Paper Tigers follows a year in the life of a high school that has radically changed it's approach to disciplining its students, becoming a model for how to break the cycles of poverty, violence and disease that affects families.

The Story of Michael Heizer's Monolithic Sculpture.

Oklahoma Cop Deanna was kidnapped by Robbie, her estranged husband, and beaten in the cab of his truck over a harrowing four-day journey. They were pulled over by police and she was taken to the hospital. In spite of Deanna's devastating injuries, Robbie was not arrested. Private Violence, a feature-length documentary, follows Deanna's journey as she rebuilds her life and fights to place Robbie behind bars. Accompanying Deanna is Kit Gruelle, a domestic violence victim turned advocate who navigates the complex world of domestic violence courts, shelters, and law enforcement.

A film about denial, race, family secrets and a search for identity.

SEEDS OF TIME follows agriculture pioneer Cary Fowler's global journey to save the eroding foundation of our food supply in a new era of climate change.

Broken, desperate men chase their dreams and run from their demons in the North Dakota oil fields. A local Pastor risks everything to help them.

SlingShot focuses on noted Segway inventor Dean Kamen and his work to solve the world's water crisis. An eccentric genius with a provocative world view, Kamen is an inspiration for future scientists. His inventions help people in need and ease suffering. SlingShot is about an indomitable man who just might have enough passion and innovative thinking to create a solution for a crisis affecting billions. Kamen lives in a house with secret passages, a closet full of denim and a helicopter garage. His latest passion: the SlingShot water purification system created to obliterate half of human illness on the planet. Kamen reminisces about improving home dialysis technology and choosing to forgo parenthood while lamenting he has only one lifetime for inventing. SlingShot is both an inspirational character study and a look at Kamen's vapor compression distiller from its earliest development through recent trials in rural Ghana and beyond.

Follows the people racing to bring the hot new 3D printing technology to your home, documenting the "Macintosh Moment" of this revolution and exploring what it takes to live the American Dream.

Three teenagers' quest to qualify for the 2012 US Olympic table tennis team.

A documentary on the annual three-day "pop-up" medical clinic organized by the non-profit Remote Area Medical (RAM) in Bristol, Tennessee's NASCAR speedway.