Hennessy: Maurice Ashley, the Grandmaster

Documentary about emigration between the Canary Islands and Cuba during the late 19th century and early 20th century.

Pushed to his breaking point, a master welder in a small town at the foot of the Rocky Mountains quietly fortifies a bulldozer with 30 tons of concrete and steel and seeks to destroy those he believes have wronged him.

Sarah Kamya is a school counselor in New York City. She began the project Little Diverse Libraries on June 3rd and has already raised over $13,000, supported black owned bookstores, and has distributed 775 books to Little Free Libraries across all 50 states. Sarah is helping educate communities while most importantly amplifying and empowering black voices.

In 1916, twenty-year-old Marion Wong wrote and directed The Curse of Quon Gwon, the earliest example of an Asian American film. What initially appears to be a story about a Chinese family cursed for allowing Western influence through the door, proves to be an illuminating examination of cultural diaspora years ahead of its time.Sandwiched between two global pandemics, this documentary follows the Wong family descendents as they secure The Curse of Quon Gwon its place in film history and new revelations rise to the surface.

"Get a never-before-seen look behind the scenes of the making of the sexy and swinging sci-fi Cult classic, Barbarella, in Barbarella Forever. In Barbarella, sixties icon Jane Fonda starred as the saucy astronaut from the 41st century sent to stop an evil scientist and Barbarella Forever features footage of Fonda at work and play during shooting. Gain an insight into the creation of the film’s legendary hand-to-hand sex scene, as well as Fonda and co-star David Hemmings’ processes and working relationship, plus, an insight into the film’s suave French director Roger Vadim. This candid featurette is a snapshot of on and off-set life in groovy 1967 and an unforgettable time capsule capturing a film, and way of filmmaking, that they don’t make like this anymore!"

In 2013, online clay animator Robert Benfer scammed hundreds of fans out of thousands of dollars and has continued to become less of the independent film icon he used to be, though his unique influence on video creators remains to this day. This film not only sheds light on how Benfer's films impacted young filmmakers, but also how a talented independent artist can fall from grace no matter how obscure they are.

Under the tutelage of anthropologist Franz Boas (her former Columbia professor) and Harlem Renaissance arts patron Charlotte Osgood Mason, Zora Neale Hurston spent nearly two years, from 1927 to 1929, studying the folkloric customs, work songs, spirituals, and vernacular language of African American communities along the River Road and from New Orleans to Florida.

A Paul Joyce documentary on the American independent film scene.

This short documentary follows historian Kate Taylor as she recounts John Wilkes Booth's final attempt to escape across the Potomac River.