Oil City Confidential
A stylish and stylized portrait of English punk-rock band Dr. Feelgood, set against the backdrop of their dreary hometown, Canvey Island.
More info
Muziekdocs
Items in this selection
Imagine Waking Up Tomorrow and All Music Has Disappeared
Former KLF member Bill Drummond shows with his ad hoc 17-person choir that everything is music, and everybody is musical.
More info
Lyari Notes
Four girls from the violent Karachi neighborhood of Lyari get free weekly music lessons, offering them a ray of hope in their dire circumstances.
More info
This Lovely Shitty Life
Female musicians talk about their lives performing mariachi, traditional Mexican music that warms hearts in spite of the harshness of life in Mexico.
More info
Too White for Me
Colourful portrait of the successful black South African pop musician Chicco Twala.
More info
Muscle Shoals
Mick Jagger, Aretha Franklin, Percy Sledge and many others talk about the magnetic attraction of the remote city of Muscle Shoals, birthplace of the FAME Studios.
More info
RiP - A Remix Manifesto
A cinematic argument against penalizing anyone who takes existing music and makes it into something new.
More info
Keep on Keepin' on
A moving, feelgood documentary about jazz legend Clark Terry (b. 1920) and his young protégé Justin Kauflin, a blind jazz pianist.
More info
The Case of the Three Sided Dream
A portrait of blind jazz virtuoso Rahsaan Roland Kirk, who could play three wind instruments simultaneously and championed civil rights for African Americans.
More info
The Resistance of Honey
Bioni Samp’s bees don’t just make honey – they also make music. A fascinating, mind-expanding glimpse into the exceptional world inside the beehive. On-site reservation required.
More info
Big Star: Nothing Can Hurt Me
This exhaustive, amusing and moving music documentary attempts to find out why 1970s rock band Big Star wasn't successful, despite ecstatic reviews.
More info
Iomax the Songhunter
Roadmovie looking for the roots of Alan Lomax, collector of folk music, incorporating accounts by relatives, friends, colleagues and folk singers.
More info
As Time Goes By in Shanghai
A passion for music has protected the oldest jazz band in the world from the ravages of time, but it has also left its mark on them.
More info
Born to Be Blind
Strikingly visualised portrait of three blind sisters from Campina Grande in Brazil, who survive by singing in the street.
More info
Marta y Luis
‘God, give me a little more time’, sighs Marta Valdez-Rodriguez. Marta is sixty, is a little overweight, but still clearly shows the features of a woman who was once beautiful. In the 1960s she was a diva, as the singer of the immensely popular band Luis Valdez y su Conjunto. Along with her lifetime companion and bandleader Luis, she scored triumphs in the nightclubs of Cuba and - before the revolution - abroad. Today, they live in a modest house in Havana. The devoted couple (‘Marta is my queen, my everything, my music’) brings back memories of the golden era. To the subtle accompaniment of Luis Valdez’ music, we see how these stars, who have lapsed into oblivion, survive. Luis - who gives free music lessons to local children - with melancholy, Marta with pragmatism, and both with the love for each other and the music.
More info
Diário de Naná
Brazilian singer and percussionist Naná Vasconcelos goes to Bahía to search for the spiritual and ethnic soul of his music.
More info
Basically, Johnny Moped
A nostalgic portrait of the peculiar London-based punk band Johnny Moped, consigned to oblivion following initial success in the 1970s.
More info
The Song of Life
Composer Bernhard König works with the elderly to set their life stories to music, achieving some truly touching results.
More info
Glimpse
A spectacular stream of images of nature, people and cities in modern-day South Africa, edited to the music of Cape Town-based musician Campbell Burns.
More info
Thru You Princess
A virtual musical encounter between a cappella singer Princess Shaw from New Orleans and Israeli composer-producer Kutiman leads to an Internet hit.
More info
Karsu
Coming-of-age film about Karsu Dönmez, a young singer from Amsterdam who started playing piano in her parents' Turkish restaurant.
More info
Twenty Feet from Stardom
The background singers for superstars talk about life in the shadow of fame, and their true love of music.
More info
Alive Inside
A compelling film that shows how music can revive the emotions and memories of elderly people suffering from dementia, transforming their lives.
More info
All Together Now
All Together Now is a year in the life of the stressful preparations for a Cirque du Soleil show based on Beatles music, under the watchful eye of none other than Paul McCartney.
More info
Charles Bradley: Soul of America
Sixty-two year old former James Brown impersonator is filmed preparing his own immensely successful debut soul album.
More info
Beats of the Antonov
Traditional music gains new meaning in the Sudanese war: it keeps the people alive, literally and figuratively.
More info
An Affair of the Heart
For fans of Rick Springfield, who was a big star in the 1980s, love for their idol is an all-embracing experience.
More info
Raving Iran
“Underground” isn’t a hip term in Iran but a bitter reality, as we learn in this raw, poetic reportage on a crucial phase in the lives of two techno deejays from Tehran.
More info
We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!
This infectious film immerses the viewer in the surreal world of Grand Funk of Glam band Twisted Sister, still excelling in extravagance after 40 years.
More info
Cure for Pain: The Mark Sandman Story
A portrait of one of the most original rock musicians of the 1990s: singer, bassist, writer, composer and founder of Morphine, Mark Sandman.
More info
Free Improvisation
An intimate portrait of Jerusalem-based musician Jean Claude Jones (60), who suffers from multiple sclerosis and vacillates between creativity and letting go.
More info
A Band Called Death
In this unparalleled family saga, the Hackney brothers were already playing down-and-dirty punk rock in the early 1970s, long before the genre was invented.
More info
Utopia Ltd.
Young Hamburg-based band 1000 Robota is a massive hype and has to negotiate the gray areas between art and commerce.
More info
Big Easy Express
A dreamy recording of a train trip across the United States by three folk bands, as they chug along through the landscape by day and perform in railroad yards by night.
More info
Joe's Violin
A Holocaust survivor donates his violin to a girl from a destitute neighborhood in New York, and the instrument offers her a new opportunity in life.
More info
Anna's Story
Anna is a teenager who copes with the loss of her mother by emulating pop idol Britney Spears, who does everything Anna wouldn't do herself.
More info
Los Wild Ones
The ups and downs of the lively musical "family" of mainly Mexican rockabillies around the Los Angeles-based Wild Record Label.
More info
Pianomania
Concert technician and piano tuner Stefan Knüpfer assists an assortment of famous concert pianists in the quest for the perfect sound.
More info
As the Palaces Burn
This portrait of heavy metal band Lamb of God takes a bizarre turn when singer Randy Blythe gets indicted on manslaughter charges.
More info
Viva Cuba Libre: Rap Is War
A gripping undercover film about the militant Cuban underground rap duo Los Aldeanos, who tackle the injustices in their country in no uncertain terms.
More info
The Lie
This musical documentary exposes the machinations behind the political drama surrounding Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who was deprived of her Dutch citizenship in 2006. With singing politicians.
More info
Hidden Wounds
Subdued video clip for a song by the Belgian band band dEUS, showing sober portraits of war veterans suffering post-traumatic stress disorder.
More info
Hidden Wounds Interactive
An interactive version of a subdued video about the lives of war veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder.
More info
Heaven on Earth
Branson is a rewarding refuge for filmmakers. This town of four thousand souls in Missouri in the United States has one theatre for every hundred inhabitants, is a paradise for entertainers past their prime, patriots and God-fearing Americans looking for a shielded life – in short, almost the perfect America director Rick Minnich is looking for. Minnich follows a few of the quaint characters that Branson boasts, such as the former war pin-up Jennifer Wilson, country star Barbara Fairchild, the singing and dancing prodigy Matthew Matney, and the actor who plays Christ in a pretentious musical. This produces hilarious scenes, but also shocking testimonies of short-sightedness. Like that of Paul Tibbets, pilot of the bomber Enola Gay, during the celebration of Veteran’s Day in Branson. Looking back on his mission over Hiroshima, he maintains: ‘We made no mistake, we did the right thing.’
More info
Sonita
Illegally living in Tehran, an 18-year old Afghani refugee named Sonita dreams of being a rapper in this exciting document of her search for her own path in life.
More info
9 Muses of Star Empire
A year in the life of a Korean girl band on an exhausting journey to stardom.
More info
André Hazes - She Believes in Me
A portrait of the Dutch singer André Hazes (1951-2004) at the height of his fame.
More info
What Happened, Miss Simone?
The turbulent life story of Nina Simone, the spokeswoman for black America in the 1960s.
More info
Shakespeare and Victor Hugo´s Intimacies
This ingeniously constructed narrative gradually unravels the short life of the talented but disturbed musician, painter and writer Jorge Riosse.
More info
Nömadak Tx
Wonderful visuals, great music and experiences in intriguing places around the globe all contribute to an exciting journey.
More info
Austin to Boston
In this high-spirited musical road movie, four well-known bands - including The Staves and Ben Howard - tour the United States in vintage VW campers.
More info
The Rolling Stones Olé Olé Olé! : A Trip Across Latin America
A sparkling recording of the recent Rolling Stones tour of Latin America and Cuba – one of the few places the rockers hadn’t yet played.
More info
Tehran Has No More Pomegranates!
Intelligently edited, hilarious, hurtling, musical compilation of archive footage and newly-shot images offers critical and unadorned portrait of Iranian capital Tehran.
More info
OK Good
In this week's set on talent: This portrait of life somewhere in the Russian hinterland takes the form of a documentary musical.
More info
That's Wicked!
Passionate young Singaporeans introduce us to the world of beatbox: the techniques, their motivations and their competition.
More info
This Band Is So Gorgeous! Sham 69 in China
A gritty and intimate film about a concert tour through China undertaken by four middle-aged punk rockers.
More info
RiseUp
This infectious, self-conscious documentary is about three young Jamaicans who try to exchange the marginality of the dancehall for a real career in reggae music.
More info
Raised by Krump
A fascinating and gorgeous journey into krumping, the street dance with which dancers channel their anger and frustration.
More info
Keith Richards: Under the Influence
Keith Richards is filmed while recording his latest solo album Crosseyed Heart and speaking enthusiastically about his musical influences.
More info