By Domi Eka, VIMooZ
Celebrating its 15th edition, the 2024 DOC NYC will screen over 110 feature-length documentaries from November 13-21, 2024 at IFC Center, SVA Theatre, and Village East by Angelika in New York City, continuing online until December 1, 2024.
Opening the festival is the U.S. premiere of Sinead O’Shea’s inspiring portrait Blue Road–The Edna O’Brien Story, that honors the legendary Irish writer, who passed away just a few months ago at the age of 93.
The festival’s Centerpiece screening is the World premiere of Ondi Timoner’s All God’s Children,a chronicle of a Brooklyn rabbi and Baptist pastor who join forces to create greater unity between their two communities, against all odds.
Closing the festival will be the world premiere of Peter Yost and Michael Rohatyn’s Drop Dead City–New York on the Brink in 1975, a look back at the circumstances and players involved in NYC’s mid-70s financial crisis.
Among films making their world premieres are stories of survivors from some of the most heavily war-scarred regions of our world. Miriam Guttmann’s Front Row, executive produced by Sarah Jessica Parker, features a group of Ukrainian ballet dancers in exile who embrace a front-line soldier into a new ballet. Joel Akachukwu Benson’s Mothers of Chibok presents us with a community of women in Nigeria who struggle to persevere while grieving for daughters kidnapped by Boko Haram. In Yalla Parkour, filmmaker Areeb Zuaiter explores memories of her childhood in Gaza through a video connection with a young man practicing parkour in Nablus, and Sarah McCarthy’s After the Rain: Putin’s Stolen Children Come Home focuses on a group of Ukrainian children who had been abducted by the Russian army.
The Special Presentations section of the festival includes the World premiere of Reiner Holzemer’s Thom Browne: The Man Who Tailors Dreams, a definitive look at the American superstar designer (who is expected to attend the screening in person), known for his reconceptualization of the classic men’s suit and dramatic runway presentations.
Domestic stories from New York City and the U.S. make up many of this year’s World premieres. Dawn Porter will present two episodes of her forthcoming series The Sing Sing Chronicles, a jaw-dropping look at an epidemic of wrongful imprisonment cases. DOC NYC’s 2015 Audience Award-winning filmmaker Justin Schien, co-directing with Robert Edwards, returns to the festival with Death & Taxes, about economic inequality issues. Wendy Lobel’s Anxiety Club looks at anxiety through the lens of contemporary stand-up comedians, and Molly Bernstein and Philip Dolin’s Art Spiegelman: Disaster is My Muse profiles the legendary Queens-born artist. Ricki Stern and Jesse Sweet examine the nuances of our parole system in Nature of the Crime, and in the “What Comes After Hope?” episode of Eyes on the Prize III: We Who Believe in Freedom Cannot Rest, the forthcoming second sequel to Henry Hampton’s legendary series, director Asako Gladsjo focuses on the evolution of a new generation of activists.
The festival’s popular Sonic Cinema section of music documentaries includes world premieres of Harley Flanagan: Wired for Chaos, about the founder of the punk band Cro-Mags; Janis Ian: Breaking Silence, a look at the fearless singer-songwriter who sings for generations of women; and Yacht Rock: A Dockumentary, which traces the evolution of a genre that rocks–but not too hard.
World premieres exploring topical issues include Surveilled, which follows journalist Ronan Farrow as he uncovers the various ways our lives are surveilled by the State; Isla Familia, Abraham Jimenez Enoa and Claudia Calviño’s intimate look at family under emotional siege by the repressive Cuban government; and Spacewoman, a look at what it took for NASA astronaut Eileen Collins to become the first woman to pilot and command the Space Shuttle.
“DOC NYC is honored to connect superb documentary art and artists with an appreciative public in New York City and across the U.S. in our virtual theater,” said the festival’s artistic director Jaie Laplante. “The filmmakers of this year’s official selection have gifted us with engaging, vigorous work that provides us with new ways of looking at our world.”
