The New Americans is a seven-hour American documentary, produced by Kartemquin Films, which was originally broadcast on American television over three nights on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in late March 2004.
Independent Lens is a weekly television series airing on PBS featuring documentary films made by independent filmmakers. Past seasons of Independent Lens were hosted by Angela Bassett, Don Cheadle, Susan Sarandon, Edie Falco, Terrence Howard, Maggie Gyllenhaal, America Ferrera, Mary-Louise Parker, and Stanley Tucci, who served two stints as host from 2012-2014.
ITVS is a service in the United States which funds and presents documentaries on public television through distribution by PBS and American Public Television, new media projects on the Internet, and the weekly series Independent Lens on PBS. Aside from Independent Lens, ITVS funded and produced films for more than 40 television hours per year on the PBS series POV, Frontline, American Masters and American Experience. Some ITVS programs are produced along with organizations like Latino Public Broadcasting and KQED.
Kartemquin Films is a four-time Oscar-nominated 501(c)3 non-profit production company located in Chicago, Illinois, that produces a wide range of documentary films. It is the documentary filmmaking home of acclaimed producers such as Gordon Quinn, Steve James, Peter Gilbert, Maria Finitzo, Joanna Rudnick, Bing Liu, Aaron Wickenden, and Ashley O’Shay (Unapologetic).
Chicago 10: Speak Your Peace is a 2007 American animated documentary written and directed by Brett Morgen that tells the story of the Chicago Eight. The Chicago Eight were charged by the United States federal government with conspiracy, crossing state lines with intent to incite a riot, and other charges related to anti-Vietnam War and countercultural protests in Chicago, Illinois during the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Byron Patrick Hurt is an American activist, lecturer, writer, and award-winning documentary filmmaker. In 2010, he hosted the Emmy-nominated television show, Reel Works with Byron Hurt. His documentary Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival and broadcast nationally on PBS in 2007. His film Soul Food Junkies received the Best Documentary Award at the 2012 American Black Film Festival and aired on PBS' Independent Lens in January 2013.
A Good Man is a 2011 documentary film about Tony Award-winning dance choreographer, Bill T. Jones, and his efforts to create the dance-theatre piece, "Fondly Do We Hope...Fervently Do We Pray", a salute to Abraham Lincoln for Chicago's Ravinia Festival. A Good Man details Jones's personal struggles with race and coming to grips with the legacy of the Lincoln Presidency and the American Civil War. From the initial pre-production to the show's final performance, the documentary follows Jones as he attempts to connect with his dancers and convey the spirit of the civil rights movement that has inspired him as an artist.
Milking the Rhino is a 2009 documentary film, produced by Kartemquin Films, that examines the relationship between the indigenous African wildlife, the villagers who live amongst this wildlife and conservationists who look to keep tourism dollars coming in. Both the Maasai of Kenya and the Ovahimba of Namibia have spent centuries as cattle farmers. With their lands being turned into protected game reserves, these ancient tribes have turned to tourism as a means of survival.
Margaret Brown is an American film director who has directed four feature length documentaries. Her film Descendant, about the descendants of survivors of the last ship to carry enslaved Africans into the United States, was shortlisted for the 2023 Academy Awards.
Malika Zouhali-Worrall is a British-Moroccan film director and editor.
America ReFramed is a weekly independent documentary series broadcast on World Channel. Since 2012, America ReFramed has broadcast over 120 films by independent filmmakers. The series is co-produced by American Documentary, Inc. and the WORLD Channel. America ReFramed films feature personal stories that have a strong social-issue focus.
The Homestretch is a 2014 American documentary film produced and directed by Anne de Mare and Kirsten Kelly. De Mare and Kelly intended the film to serve as a challenge to the negative stereotypes of youth homelessness. The film premiered at the 2014 HotDocs Film Festival on April 26, 2014. It went on to play at the 2014 AFI Docs Film Festival and the 2014 Human Rights Watch Film Festival.
Brent Edward Huffman is an American director, writer, and cinematographer of documentaries and television programs, including Saving Mes Aynak (2015). His work has been featured on Netflix, Discovery Channel, The National Geographic Channel, VICE, NBC, CNN, PBS, Time, The New York Times, Al Jazeera America and Al Jazeera English and premiered at International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), and many other U.S. and international film festivals. He is also a professor at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University where he teaches documentary production and theory.
David Osit is an American documentary filmmaker, editor and composer. His documentaries include Predators, Mayor and Thank You for Playing.
Vivian Kleiman is a Peabody Award-winning documentary filmmaker. Other honors include a National Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Research and an Academy Award nomination for Documentary Short.
Julia Bell Reichert was an American Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker, activist, and feminist. She was a co-founder of New Day Films. Reichert's filmmaking career spanned over 50 years as a director and producer of documentaries.
Marilyn Ness is a documentary film producer and director based in New York City who made the social justice documentaries Bad Blood: A Cautionary Tale (2010), Cameraperson (2016), and Charm City (2018). More recent projects include the Netflix Original documentary Becoming with Michelle Obama, which was nominated for four Primetime Emmy awards and Netflix Original documentary Dick Johnson is Dead, which was on the Academy Award Shortlist for Best Documentary in 2021. She is as of 2021 an adjunct assistant professor at Columbia University.
Joseph Hall Wilson is an American film director and producer, best known for documentaries and impact campaigns that explore oppression and empowerment among gender and sexual minority communities. He has received an Emmy, GLAAD Media and several film festival awards, and his work has been supported by the Sundance Institute, Ford Foundation, ITVS and Pacific Islanders in Communications.
Cooked: Survival by Zipcode is a 2018 American documentary film, directed and produced by Judith Helfand. It follows the 1995 Chicago heat wave which resulted in the deaths of 739 people, primarily affecting poor and disadvantaged communities.
