Oscilloscope Laboratories (Firm)
1) Sirens
Pub. Date
2022.
Description
On the outskirts of Beirut, Lilas and her thrash metal bandmates, Shery, Maya, Alma, and Tatyana (Slave to Sirens), have big dreams but few opportunities. When the band’s appearance at a UK music festival isn’t the life-changer they had hoped for, Lilas comes home to Lebanon on the brink of collapse. At the same time, the complicated relationship between Lilas and her fellow guitarist Shery starts to fracture. The future of her band, her country,...
Pub. Date
2016.
Description
A mosaic of asphalt adventures, landscape photography, and some of the craziest stuff you’ve ever seen, this is a stunning compilation of video footage shot exclusively via the deluge of dashboard cameras that populate Russian roads. Nominated for Best Documentary at the **Nashville Film Festival**. "*Suspenseful and funny, occasionally poignant and often nearly unbelievable, it captures a certain sociological flavor while remaining universally...
Pub. Date
2008.
Description
Filmmaker and Beastie Boy Adam Yauch documents the lives and talent of some of America's most gifted high school basketball players as they prep for the first annual Elite 24 all-star game in 2006 at Harlem's famed Rucker Park. Wilt Chamberlain and Kareem Abdul-Jabar were groomed on that same court, and young hopefuls such as Jerryd Bayless, Michael Beasley, Tyreke Evans and Kevin Love hope to follow in their footsteps. "*A spunky, impassioned and...
Pub. Date
2018.
Description
An unvarnished perspective of the intensity and paradoxes of war shot by Marine Corps videographer Miles Lagoze. This ingeniously edited documentary is composed solely of footage the Corps did not intend for you to see. Nominated for the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Feature at the **Dallas International Film Festival.** *"...Lagoze detonates any lingering illusions of military heroism." - Lawrence Garcia, **AV Club*** *"An unfiltered tour-de-force...
5) The Proposal
Pub. Date
2018.
Description
This documentary follows conceptual artist Jill Magid as she develops a radical project to explore artistic legacy. At its heart is the work of the Pritzker Prize-winning Mexican architect Luis Barragán, which is aggressively “protected” and kept from the public by its copyright holders. By cultivating relationships with Barragán’s family, admirers, institutions, and the rights holders—including extensive correspondence with the director...
Pub. Date
2020.
Description
In the Kenyan bush, a small-time ivory dealer fights to stay on top while forces mobilize to destroy his trade. When he turns to his younger cousin, a conflicted wildlife ranger who hasn’t been paid in months, they both see a possible lifeline. The plummeting elephant population in Africa has captured the attention of the world, and as the government cracks down, both poachers and rangers face their own existential crises—what is the value of...
7) Pickle
Pub. Date
2016.
Description
A couple recounts the various animals they have adopted as pets over the course of their marriage, including a paraplegic possum and a fish that couldn’t swim. PICKLE explores the human capacity to care for all creatures throughout their sometimes greatly protracted lives until their occasionally sudden and unfortunate deaths. Winner of the Audience Award and Special Jury Prize for Best Documentary Short at the **Boston International Film Festival**....
Pub. Date
2015.
Description
Scattered across the vast reaches of America's Western desert, five eccentric exiles from modern civilization pursue their private obsessions in this offbeat and artfully filmed social documentary. Nominated for the Golden Frog in the Feature Documentary Films Competition at **Camerimage**. Nominated for Best Documentary Feature Film at the **Edinburgh International Film Festival**. Nominated for the Tiger Award at the **Rotterdam International Film...
9) Night School
Pub. Date
2017.
Description
Indianapolis has one of the lowest high school graduation rates in the country. Victims of circumstance and a broken system, Greg, Melissa, and Shynika are optimistic that they won't end up on the wrong side of statistics. Official Selection at the **Tribeca Film Festival**. Winner of the Grand Prize and Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature at the **Heartland Film Festival**. Winner of the Jury Prize for Best Directing at the **BendFilm Festival**....
10) God & Country
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
Christian nationalism is the belief that America should be defined as a Christian nation, with government adherence to this ideology. GOD & COUNTRY looks at the implications of Christian Nationalism and how it distorts not only our constitutional republic, but Christianity itself. Featuring prominent Christian thought leaders, GOD & COUNTRY asks this question: What happens when a faith built on love, sacrifice, and forgiveness grows political tentacles,...
Pub. Date
2010.
Description
This potent documentary uses a long-lost film reel to illustrate how the Nazis controlled images of Jewish life during World War II. Though the Nazis made a propaganda movie of contented Jews in the Warsaw ghetto, the missing spool exposes the truth. Nominated for Outstanding Historical Programming - Long Form at the **News & Documentary Emmy Awards**. Winner of the Editing Award and nominated for the Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema - Documentary...
12) Gods of Mexico
Pub. Date
2022.
Description
With visually stunning landscapes and immersive sound, GODS OF MEXICO is a poetic survey of the vast landscapes and rich diversity of several communities of rural Mexico. Using richly saturated color and hypnotic black-and-white interludes, filmmaker Helmut Dosantos takes viewers through salt pans, deserts, highlands, jungle, and underground mines—paying tribute to those who fight to preserve their cultural identity amidst the shadows of modernization....
Pub. Date
2020.
Description
When the Taliban puts a bounty on Afghan director Hassan Fazili’s head, he is forced to flee the country with his wife and two young daughters. Capturing the family’s uncertain journey firsthand, Fazili documents their harrowing trek across numerous borders revealing the danger and uncertainty facing refugees seeking asylum juxtaposed with the unbreakable love shared amongst the family on the run. Winner at the **Sundance Film Festival**, **Berlin...
Pub. Date
2021.
Description
Growing up in a loving home, brothers Peter and Matthew are crazy about each other, but also constantly at each other’s throats. Displaying their individual idiosyncrasies—Peter is obsessed with the TV show Survivor, while younger brother Matthew struggles to overcome his intense fear of dogs—the brothers spend one formative summer in their suburban Maryland neighborhood. Ben Mullinkosson’s revealing and endearing film DON’T BE A DICK ABOUT...
15) Dark Days
Pub. Date
2000.
Description
This acclaimed documentary explores the surprisingly domestic subterranean world of a homeless community living in a train tunnel beneath NYC. Through stories heartbreaking and hilarious, tunnel dwellers reveal their reasons for taking refuge and their struggle to survive underground. With a hypnotic soundtrack by legendary DJ Shadow, DARK DAYS is still an enduring classic, more than fifteen years after its initial release. Winner of the Cinematography...
Pub. Date
2017.
Description
The National Pyrotechnic Festival in Tultepec, Mexico is a site of festivity unlike any other in the world. In celebration of San Juan de Dios, patron saint of firework makers, revelry engulfs the town for ten days. Artisans show off their technical virtuosity, up-and-comers create their own rowdy, lo-fi combustibles, and dozens of teams build larger-than- life papier-mâché bulls to parade into the town square, adorned with fireworks that blow...
17) Claydream
Pub. Date
2022.
Description
Known as the “Father of Claymation,” Will Vinton revolutionized the animation business during the 1980s and 90s, creating such iconic characters as the California Raisins and Domino’s The Noid. But after thirty years of being the unheralded king of clay, Vinton’s carefully sculpted American dream came crumbling down. Structured around interviews with this charismatic pioneer and his close collaborators, along with a treasure trove of clips...
18) Jay Myself
Pub. Date
2021.
Description
JAY MYSELF documents the monumental move of renowned photographer and artist, Jay Maisel, who, in February 2015 after forty-eight years, begrudgingly sold his home—the 36,000 square-foot, 100-year-old landmark building in Manhattan known simply as “The Bank.” Through the intimate lens of filmmaker and Jay’s protégé, noted artist and photographer Stephen Wilkes, the viewer is taken on a remarkable journey through Jay’s life as an artist,...
19) Wrestle
Pub. Date
2018.
Description
*Hoop Dreams* goes to the mat in this intimate, coming-of-age documentary about four members of a high-school wrestling team at Huntsville’s J.O. Johnson High School, a longstanding entry on Alabama’s list of failing schools. Coached by teacher Chris Scribner, teammates Jailen, Jamario, Teague, and Jaquan each face challenges far beyond a shot at the State Championship: splintered family lives, drug use, teenage pregnancy, mental health struggles,...
Pub. Date
2018.
Description
This unique film revisits the rich bounty of 16-mm-shot footage of the left-handed tennis star John McEnroe, at the time the world’s top-ranked player, as he competes in the French Open in 1984. Close-ups and slow motion sequences of McEnroe competing, as well as instances of his notorious temper tantrums, highlight a ”man who played on the edge of his senses.” Far from a traditional documentary, Faraut probes the archival film to unpack both...