Trailer | A Town Called Victoria | Episode 1
After a mosque is burned in an act of arson, the community is left to reflect on its history with racism.
Trailer | Three Chaplains
Muslim chaplains uphold the First Amendment and vow to protect service members' right to practice their faith freely, despite facing long-held prejudice and disapproval from their own communities. The Muslim chaplains work hard to ensure that all service members have access to religious materials, services, and resources regardless of the religious beliefs they hold.
Trailer | El Equipo
Legendary U.S. anthropologist Dr. Clyde Snow sets out to train a new group of Latin American students in the use of forensic anthropology. Their goal: to investigate disappearances in Argentina during the “dirty war.” The group expands its horizons, traveling to El Salvador, Bolivia, and Mexico, doggedly working behind the scenes to establish the facts for the families of the victims.
Trailer | Sansón and Me
Filmmaker Rodrigo Reyes wants to document Sansón's story, an immigrant serving life in prison. Unable to film Sansón, the documentary creatively shares his narrative through reenactments of his letters, featuring his own family as actors.
Fall Season Trailer | Coming to Independent Lens
Independent Lens, America’s home for documentaries, returns Monday, September 19, starting with Sansón and Me, followed by El Equipo, Three Chaplains and the three part series A Town Called Victoria. Watch these powerful, acclaimed new films on the PBS App.
Trailer | Mama Bears
They call one another “mama bears” because of the ferocity with which they fight for their children’s rights. Although they grew up as fundamentalist, evangelical Christians praying for the souls of LGBTQ+ people, these mothers are now willing to risk losing friends, family, and faith communities to champion their kids—even if it challenges their belief systems and rips apart their worlds.
Trailer | Sam Now
In this coming-of-age documentary about generational trauma, follow Sam Harkness from age 11 to 36 as his middle-class Seattle family is heartbroken and unsure of what to do after his mother suddenly leaves them. Woven together with home movies lovingly crafted by Sam’s half brother, director Reed Harkness, witness a boy grow up grappling with the ripple effects of a singular traumatic event.
The Misrepresentation of Chol Soo Lee
Remember 1989’s True Believer, starring James Woods and Robert Downey, Jr.? Was it a prime example of Hollywood’s White Savior Complex? Dolly Li examines how the flick centered a white lawyer in a story based on Chol Soo Lee’s arrest. Stream Free Chol Soo Lee now on YouTube or the PBS App.
Trailer | Matter of Mind: My ALS
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neuromuscular disease with an average survival time of 2-5 years from diagnosis. In this intimate exploration, three people with ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease, bravely face different paths as they live with this progressively debilitating illness.
The Ballad of Chol Soo Lee
Did a song help free an incarcerated man? Dolly Li breaks down how UC Berkeley college students wrote a track about Chol Soo Lee, a wrongfully convicted Korean immigrant sentenced to life in prison. Stream Free Chol Soo Lee now on the PBS App.
Teaser | Free Chol Soo Lee
Through his journey from an inspiring icon to a swing-shift janitor, Chol Soo Lee personifies the ravages of America’s prison industrial complex.
Trailer | Free Chol Soo Lee
Sentenced to life for a 1973 San Francisco murder, Korean immigrant Chol Soo Lee was set free after a pan-Asian solidarity movement, which included Korean, Japanese, and Chinese Americans, helped to overturn his conviction. After 10 years of fighting for his life inside California state prisons, Lee found himself in a new fight to rise to the expectations of the people who believed in him.
Dinner And a Doc | Free Chol Soo Lee
Free Chol Soo Lee co-directors Julie Ha and Eugene Yi share mouthwatering lunch with activists Ranko Yamada and Gail Whang in L.A.'s Koreatown.
Inside Look | Free Chol Soo Lee
Get an inside look at Free Chol Soo Lee from Independent Lens. After 10 years of fighting for his life inside California state prisons, Lee found himself in a new fight to rise to the expectations of the people who believed in him.
Trailer | Silent Beauty
In this autobiographical exploration of survivorship, New Orleans journalist and filmmaker Jasmín Mara López unabashedly shares her process of healing from childhood sexual abuse. After Jasmin discloses to her family she'd been abused by her grandfather, she liberates others to come forward in a story of confronting a culture of silence over generational trauma.
Trailer | This Spring on Independent Lens
This Spring, your go-to destination for documentaries offers a captivating slate of films including Free Chol Soo Lee, Matter of Mind: My ALS, Sam Now, and Mama Bears.
Trailer | Hidden Letters
The bonds of sisterhood, and the parallels of struggles among generations of women in China, are drawn together by the once-secret written language of Nüshu, the only script designed and used exclusively by women.
Trailer | Storming Caesars Palace
After losing her job as a hotel worker in Las Vegas, Ruby Duncan joined a welfare rights group of mothers who defied notions of the “welfare queen.” In a fight for guaranteed income, Ruby and other equality activists took on the Nevada mob in organizing a massive protest that shut down Caesars Palace.
Trailer | Outta the Muck
Wade into the rich soil of Pahokee, Florida, a town on the banks of Lake Okeechobee. Beyond its football legacy, including sending over a dozen players to the NFL (like Anquan Boldin, Fred Taylor, and Rickey Jackson), the fiercely self-determined community tells their stories of Black achievement and resilience in the face of tragic storms and personal trauma.
Trailer | Love in the Time of Fentanyl
As fentanyl overdose deaths in Vancouver, Canada reach an all-time high, the Overdose Prevention Society opens its doors—a renegade safe injection site that employs current or former drug users. Its staff and volunteers save lives and give hope to a marginalized community, doing whatever it takes to remain open in this intimate documentary that looks beyond the stigma of injection drug users.
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