American Documentary

Overview

New York, N.Y. –June 27, 2023 – POV Shorts, the best and boldest independent non-fiction short films from POV (America's longest-running documentary series), announced today the acquisition of seven new short documentary films that will join the season 6 roster: Under G-d, by POV alumni director Paula Eiselt (Aftershock, 93Queen) and producer Darcy McKinnon (Look at Me: XXXTentacion, The Neutral Ground); Freshwater, by 2023 Wyncote Fellow and Peabody Award-winning director, dream hampton (Surviving R. Kelly); By Way of Canarsie directed by Emily Packer and Lesley Steele; The Dream of a Horse directed by Marjan Khosravi; Between Earth & Sky directed and produced by Andrew Nadkarni; Eloise Sherrid & Lauryn Welch's The Body is a House of Familiar Rooms and Still Waters directed by Aurora Brachman. Topical storylines highlighted in the season include: religious rights to advance pro-abortion argument, surviving trauma and abuse, environmental racism, intergenerational relationships and childhood aspirations.

Five films from POV Shorts Season 6 will be available to stream at POV.org and on the PBSApp beginning Tuesday, July 25, 2023, while the remaining titles will premiere Thursday, October 5, 2023. Check local listings for broadcast dates. In addition to standard closed captioning, POV, in partnership with audio description service DiCapta, provides real time audio interpretations for audiences with sensory disabilities.

Opening the season is Paula Eiselt’s Under G-d which made its world premiere at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival pegged to the 50th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. The of-the-moment film weaves together the stories of a Jewish mother and activist in Indiana, a rabbi in Florida and lawyers throughout the country who are seeking to fight abortion bans in part by placing them in the legal and cultural context of religious freedom.

Other films featured in the slate include Freshwater by dream hampton that captures Detroit in crisis as a disappearing Black city filled with flooded basements in this meditation on the fluid nature of memory; in By Way of Canarsie, directors Emily Packer and Lesley Steele, revisit the coastal community of Canarsie, Brooklyn to find the area continues to struggle with their identity after years of neglect by the City of New York and the devastation of Hurricane Sandy; Marjan Khosravi’s poignant film, The Dream of a Horse tells the story of the oldest daughter of a nomad family who wants to pursue bigger dreams as a writer, but is thwarted by her father’s plans to marry her off to better the family's condition; in Andrew Nadkarni’s Between Earth & Sky (premiering October 5th), renowned ecologist Nalini Nadkarni explores "what grows back” after surviving a life-threatening fall from the rainforest canopy, in order to understand the effects of disturbance and recovery throughout her life; Eloise Sherrid & Lauryn Welch's The Body is a House of Familiar Rooms, is a magical-realist exploration of the life of a man with chronic illness through footage and paintings; and in Still Waters (premiering November 20) Aurora Brachman (Joychild, POV Shorts Season 4) shares an unexpected and difficult moment in her childhood during an intimate conversation with her mother.

“With this new season of short-form documentaries, we are continuing to present stories which reflect the varied challenges and triumphs of the human experience,” said Opal H. Bennett, Co-Producer and Shorts Producer, American Documentary I POV. “These films offer unique perspectives and creative approaches to the narratives they convey and we are delighted to present them on public television.”

POV SHORTS LANDMARK SEASON 6 SLATE:

Under G-d

Premieres Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Director: Paula Eiselt

Producers: Darcy McKinnon, Paula Eiselt

24 MIN | USA | 2023

Inspired by the lawsuits filed in Florida challenging the state's abortion ban on the basis of religious freedom, Under G-d is a documentary short film about the national Jewish response to the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization U.S. Supreme Court decision woven through the lived experiences of impacted Jewish women and the various lawsuits currently being launched by rabbis, Jewish organizations and interfaith leaders to challenge the overturning of Roe v. Wade, state by state. Through the lens of maintaining the separation between church and state, these nationwide efforts are predicated on ultimately protecting religious freedom – and democracy – for all.

World Premiere, 2023 Sundance Film Festival

Water Work - A double title presentation featuring Freshwater and By Way of Canarsie

Premieres Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Freshwater

Director/Producer: dream hampton

Producer: ill Weaver

10 MIN | USA | 2022

Detroiters experienced an enhanced form of water destruction from massive flooding that destroyed homes and belongings and lives last summer. The water rose in streets and alleys and yards and, most important, in people’s homes, where it submerged possessions and memories, and surfaced emotions that many were not prepared to confront.

2022 Blackstar Film Festival; Freep Film Festival; Gary International Film Festival; Chicago International Film Festival; RiverRun International Festival; Mountainfilm Festival; Media City Film Festival

By Way of Canarsie

Directors/Producers: Emily Packer, Lesley Steele

Co-Producer: Shirin Ghaffary

14 MIN |USA | 2020

A wandering portrait of an oft-neglected shoreline community, By Way of Canarsie imagines possible futures at odds with a peaceful present. Using a variety of formats, this experimental series of vignettes explores Canarsie’s unique relationship to the water through recreation and resiliency. Through brief encounters, observational mise-en-scène, and expressive use of analog film, we begin to understand this predominantly Black New York City neighborhood’s shared desires for recognition and respect.

2020 DOCNYC

2020 BlackStar

Third Horizon Film Festival 2022

The Dream of a Horse

Premieres Tuesday, July 25, 2023

Director: Marjan Khosravi

Producers: Milad Khosravi, Sajedeh Saraei

25 MIN |Iran | 2022

In a mountainous but extremely green landscape goats jump over the rocks and laughing children run after them. In this paradise on earth, nomadic families have found their temporary home. From one of these families comes a teenage girl, Shahnaz. The girl should be getting married soon, but her thoughts are focused on the world of literature.

2023 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, Best Short Documentary nominee; 62nd Krakow Film Festival, Golden Dragon nominee for Best Short Documentary; 2022 Crime and Punishment Film Festival, Best Documentary Award nominee; 2022 Tegernsee International Mountain Film Festival, Winner Best Youth Film Award

Between Earth & Sky

Premieres Thursday, October 5, 2023

Director: Andrew Nadkarni

Producers: Swetha Regunathan, Katie Schiller, Andrew Nadkarni

25 MIN | USA, Costa Rica | 2023
Nalini Nadkarni is a world-renowned ecologist who climbs trees in the rainforest canopy to study “what grows back” after an ecological disturbance. In 2015, her rope snapped on a research climb, and she fell fifty feet from a tree and nearly died. After making a miraculous recovery, Nalini begins to explore a new research subject - herself. Between Earth & Sky follows Nalini as she prepares for another research climb in Monteverde, Costa Rica, before considering retirement from the field. In the process, she unearths the roots of other disturbances she faced throughout her life, as the daughter of mixed Indian-Jewish immigrant parents who prized high achievement and contribution above all else.

As a child, trees provided a place of solace and safety to Nalini, so much so that she swore an oath to protect them. Now, Nalini is doing the work of untangling the roots of her past and bringing family secrets to light, in order to understand how each impacted her life's course. In an attempt to heal, she revisits the site of her fall on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, where her past, present, and future converge.

2023 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival - World Premiere, Winner Best Short;
2023 Hot Docs - International Premiere; 2023 Sheffield International Documentary Film Festival - European Premiere; 2023 Environmental Film Festival in the Nation’s Capital, Winner Audience Award; 2023 Mountainfilm Festival

**POV Shorts Accompanying POV Season 36 Features**

The Body is a House of Familiar Rooms

Premieres July 24, 2023 with Eat Your Catfish

Directors/Producers: Eloise Sherrid, Lauryn Welch

10 MIN | USA | 2022

The film is a magical-realist window into Samuel Geiger's experience living with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a painful connective tissue disorder that complicates mobility in both physical and social spheres. It’s also a portrait of his life with his partner, the painter Lauryn Welch. As Sam's physical world becomes more confined, the spaces in which he resides and nurtures compound with imagery and detail, becoming endlessly rich worlds within rooms. In the film, a collaboration between director Eloise Sherrid, Sam and Lauryn, the visual mixing of paintings and live action video footage reveals the emotional dimension of each space. The Body is a House of Familiar Rooms is about disability, love, and the forms both take within the bodies and spaces we are given.

2022 World Premiere ReelAbilities; 2022 Winner of Best Short Award, Indie Memphis

Still Waters

Premieres November 20, 2023 with Wisdom Gone Wild

Director: Aurora Brachman

Producers: Aurora Brachman, Mariales Diaz
12 MIN | USA | 2022

Through a series of extraordinarily honest and intimate conversations, filmmaker Aurora Brachman examines the intergenerational fallout of experiences her mother endured as a child. Together, they forge a path forward that offers them a new beginning.

2023 SFFilm; Seattle FF; HotDocs; 2022 World Premiere BlackStar

Note: As POV Shorts Season 6 progresses, new titles will be added to the roster.

POV Shorts is known for its curation and for broadcasting award-winning titles, including: 2022 News & Documentary Emmy nominated, Oscar® shortlisted, and IDA Documentary Awards winner, A Broken House; A Night at the Garden, which received an Academy Award nomination; Emmy® nominated Earthrise, Water Warriors, The Changing Same; Emmy® winner The Love Bugs and Oscar® shortlisted Àguilas. The series won Best Short Form Series at the IDA Documentary Awards in 2020 and 2022, and was nominated in 2019 and 2021.

POV Shorts launched in 2018 as one of the first PBS series dedicated to bold and timely short-form documentaries. POV Shorts has almost 60 titles in its catalog. In addition, the strand works with major short-form digital distributors such as Field of Vision and has collaborated with The New York Times Op-Docs, Condé Nast and Chicken & Egg Pictures. POV Shorts films were official selections at the Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca, Hot Docs, DOC NYC, Palms Springs International ShortFest and True/False Film Festivals, among others.

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About

About POV Shorts

POV Shorts launched in 2018 as one of the first PBS series dedicated to bold and timely short-form documentaries.The series is known for its curation, and for broadcasting award-winning titles, including: Emmy® nominated Earthrise, Water Warriors, The Changing Same, Emmy® winner The Love Bugs and the Oscar® shortlisted A Broken House and Aguilas. It won Best Short Form Series at the IDA Documentary Awards in 2022 and 2020.

About POV

Produced by American Documentary, POV is the longest-running independent documentary showcase on American television. Since 1988, POV has presented films on PBS that capture the full spectrum of the human experience, with a long commitment to centering women and people of color in front of, and behind, the camera. The series is known for introducing generations of viewers to groundbreaking works like Tongues Untied, American Promise, Minding The Gap and Not Going Quietly, and innovative filmmakers including Jonathan Demme, Laura Poitras and Nanfu Wang. In 2018, POV Shorts launched as one of the first PBS series dedicated to bold and timely short-form documentaries. All POV programs are available for streaming concurrent with broadcast on all station-branded PBS platforms, including PBS.org and the PBS App, available on iOS, Android, Roku streaming devices, Apple TV, Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung Smart TV, Chromecast and VIZIO. For more information about PBS Passport, visit the PBS Passport FAQ website.

POV goes “beyond the broadcast” to bring powerful nonfiction storytelling to viewers wherever they are. Free educational resources accompany every film and a community network of thousands of partners nationwide work with POV to spark dialogue around today’s most pressing issues. POV continues to explore the future of documentary through innovative productions with partners such as The New York Times and The National Film Board of Canada and on platforms including Snapchat and Instagram.

POV films and projects have won 46 Emmy Awards, 27 George Foster Peabody Awards, 15 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards, three Academy Awards® and the first-ever George Polk Documentary Film Award. Learn more at pbs.org/pov and follow @povdocs on social media.

About American Documentary, Inc.

American Documentary, Inc. (AmDoc) is a multimedia company dedicated to creating, identifying and presenting contemporary stories that express opinions and perspectives rarely featured in mainstream media outlets. AmDoc is a catalyst for public culture, developing collaborative strategic engagement activities around socially relevant content on television, online and in community settings. These activities are designed to trigger action, from dialogue and feedback to educational opportunities and community participation.

Major funding for POV is provided by PBS, the Open Society Foundations, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Wyncote Foundation, Reva & David Logan Foundation, Park Foundation, and Perspective Fund. Additional funding comes from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the Chasing the Dream and Peril and Promise public media initiatives of The WNET Group, Chris and Nancy Plaut, Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee and public television viewers. POV is presented by a consortium of public television stations, including KQED San Francisco, WGBH Boston and THIRTEEN in association with WNET.ORG.

About PBS

PBS, with more than 330 member stations, offers all Americans the opportunity to explore new ideas and new worlds through television and digital content. Each month, PBS reaches over 120 million people through television and 26 million people online, inviting them to experience the worlds of science, history, nature and public affairs; to hear diverse viewpoints; and to take front row seats to world-class drama and performances. PBS’s broad array of programs has been consistently honored by the industry’s most coveted award competitions. Teachers of children from pre-K through 12th grade turn to PBS for digital content and services that help bring classroom lessons to life. Decades of research confirm that PBS’s premier children’s media service, PBS KIDS, helps children build critical literacy, math and social-emotional skills, enabling them to find success in school and life. Delivered through member stations, PBS KIDS offers high-quality educational content on TV – including a 24/7 channel, online at pbskids.org, via an array of mobile apps and in communities across America. More information about PBS is available at www.pbs.org, one of the leading dot-org websites on the internet, or by following PBS on Twitter, Facebook or through our apps for mobile and connected devices. Specific program information and updates for press are available at pbs.org/pressroom or by following PBS Communications on Twitter.