#HIFF2013: Focus On Documentaries

HIFF2013 is almost upon us! While you’re browsing through our extensive slate, don’t miss these great documentary titles:

Acclaimed documentarian Alex Gibney (ENRON: The Smartest Guys in the Room) masterfully pieces together raw, unseen footage and interviews from the 2009 Tour de France, documenting Armstrong’s post-cancer return to cycling and the deafening controversy surrounding his current cultural status as both a shamed athlete and role model.

Based on a New Yorker article by best-selling writer Jonathan Franzen, Emptying the Skies chronicles the poaching of migratory birds in southern Europe and introduces us to the intrepid volunteer squad of bird-lovers trying to stop it.

A true story of intrigue, Plot for Peace traces the behind-the-scenes diplomatic maneuverings to release Nelson Mandela from jail in South Africa in the 1980s. For the first time, heads of state, generals, diplomats, master spies and anti-apartheid fighters reveal how Africa’s front line states helped end apartheid. One man stood at the center of the whirlwind, a mysterious French businessman dubbed “Monsieur Jacques.”

Debut director Josh Greenbaum turns his lens on eight young golfers, ages seven and eight, who descend on the World Championship of Junior Golf––including Anna Kournikova’s younger brother Allan, and Amari “Tigress” Avery, who shares a birthday, hometown, and ethnic background with one Tiger Woods.

“As long as there’s a camera, the revolution will continue,” says one of the young subjects of the documentary The Square. It does continue, and two years of struggle (right until the summer of 2013) are shown through the eyes of a group of protesters from all walks of society that first came together in Tahrir Square during the Egyptian Revolution of 2011.

When Jimmy Connors arrived at the 1991 U.S. Open, the one-time tennis superstar was eight years removed from his last Grand Slam title, ranked 174th in the world, and approaching his 39th birthday. But on the verge of a first-round exit, Connors unexpectedly re-captured his magic, embarking on an extraordinary run than included an epic contest with Aaron Krickstein.

When renowned photojournalist Elizabeth L. Gilbert returns to the Rift Valley in Africa to visit the tribes she photographed just a decade earlier, she bears witness to the changes wrought on the region. Matt Goldman’s first feature captures the reunions, the dramas, and ultimately the triumph of this remarkable journey.