Cherien Dabis's extraordinary first feature, loosely based on her own family's experiences, brings humor to the story of a Palestinian mother and son's bittersweet adjustment to life in Amreeka (America). Just as the U.S. Army is entering Baghdad, Muna and her teenage son, Fadi, travel to Illinois to live with her elegant sister (played by Lemon Tree's Hiam Abbass) and her sister's seemingly successful middle-class family. As Fadi shyly negotiates a treacherous path among high school bullies, stoners, and teachers, his proud, vivacious mother secretly takes a job slinging burgers at White Castle in order to make ends meet. The two find friends and enemies aplenty in their journey to turn a foreign, mythological land into a home. Amreeka premiered to critical acclaim at the Sundance Film Festival, opened the New Directors/New Films series in New York, and had its foreign premiere at the 2009 Cannes Director's Fortnight.

Cherien Dabis, one of Variety's 2009 "Ten Directors to Watch," won the first L'Oréal Paris Women of Worth Vision Award and the Rockefeller Foundation's Renew Media/Tribeca Film Institute's Media Artist Fellowship. A writer and coproducer on Showtime's series The L Word, Dabis was raised in Ohio and Jordan and currently lives in New York City.

Andrew Bujalski made a splash in the underground film world with this beautiful, naturalistic new film about the romantic and business entanglements of Lauren and Jeannie, lively and lovely twin sisters in Austin, Texas. The fact that Jeannie is wheelchair-bound hasn't stopped her from co-owning a vintage-clothing store with Amanda, an old friend slipping away from Jeannie, or from capturing the hearts of men, like Merrill, an old flame returning to Jeannie's life. Meanwhile, Lauren contemplates a major career decision and a move far away from her family. Bujalski's script is so meticulously written that when one is caught up in the spell of Beeswax, it's difficult to remember that his characters are just that: characters. Dialogue is pitch-perfect; costumes fit to a tee; settings have personalities all their own. Jeannie and Lauren are as stubborn and feisty, as wonderful and impossible, as anyone else stumbling toward grace. Beeswax premiered at the Berlin Film Festival and was a favorite at this year's South by Southwest festival.

Andrew Bujalski won critical acclaim with his first two features, Funny Ha Ha and Mutual Appreciation. Among other honors, he received the IFP "Someone to Watch" award, and grants from the LEF Moving Image Fund and the Massachusetts Cultural Council. He was born in Boston and currently lives in Austin, Texas.

Yun Suh has reported extensively on Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip for radio and broadcast television, and she earned the Support, Training, and Access for New Directors (STAND) grant from the Film Arts Foundation. Suh was born in South Korea and currently lives in Berkeley, California.

Preceded by the short film:

MAKING THE CROOKED STRAIGHT
Director/Writer: Susan Cohn Rockefeller
Cast: Rick Hodes
USA, ETHIOPIA/Documentary/2008/Color/Digital projection/30 minutes


Often compared with Albert Schweitzer and Mother Teresa, American doctor Rick Hodes provides Ethiopian patients with hospital care, arranges for overseas surgeries, pays for procedures and medicines, and has adopted 17 African children in need of medical care.

When actor Paul Giamatti (starring as himself) becomes creatively drained and unable to find the right emotional balance to play the role of Uncle Vanya, he rents the soul of a Russian poet from a high-tech company specializing in "soul extraction." With warm, comical turns by David Strathairn as a zany doctor; Lauren Ambrose as his young nurse; Dina Korzun as a Russian "mule" who transports souls on the black market; and Emily Watson as Giamatti's long-suffering wife, Cold Souls was called "flat-out funny" by The New York Times. The film's script won the Nantucket Film Festival's 2006 Screenplay Competition, and writer/director Sophie Barthes worked on the script at the Nantucket Screenwriters Colony. The NFF is also where the close relationship between the film's lead actor and director began, making Cold Souls a film born and bred on the island of Nantucket.

Sophie Barthes was named one of Filmmaker Magazine's "25 New Faces of Independent Film." She received the Annenberg Foundation Film Fellowship and two NYSCA Individual Artists grants. Born in France, Barthes grew up in the Middle East and South America, and currently lives in New York City.

In this riveting documentary, a fearless, ambitious crew of international adventurers, led by National Geographic photographer Louie Psihoyos, employs military spying techniques to record regular and horrific dolphin slaughter in Taiji, Japan. The team is recruited by TV sensation turned activist Richard O'Barry, who in the 1960s was the leading authority on dolphin training, worked on the set of the popular television program Flipper, and helped to create the market for sea life amusement parks, which continue to be a massive tourist industry around the globe. When O'Barry realized the ecological impact his work had had, however, he dedicated the rest of his life to undoing the damage he caused in his youth. The Cove tells the amazing true story of how Psihoyos and O'Barry assemble their elite team of activists, cinematographers, and divers, and embark on a covert mission to penetrate a hidden cove and shine light on a dark and deadly secret.

Louie Psihoyos is a photographer and ardent diver. His photographs have appeared in National Geographic, Smithsonian, Fortune, Time, Newsweek, and The New York Times Magazine, as well as on the Discovery, National Geographic, and History channels. Psihoyos is the cofounder of the Oceanic Preservation Society. He was born in Dubuque, Iowa, and currently lives in Boulder, Colorado.

One love story ends and another begins in this graceful, subtly romantic movie, a gorgeously shot, poetic reverie about the hazy boundary between friendship and love. The Exploding Girl , which was written by filmmaker Bradley Rust Gray in only four days and shot in just 17, tells the story of college student Ivy (Zoe Kazan), who spends a sunny, lazy Brooklyn summer with her mom (Maryann Urbano) and old pal Al (Mark Rendall). Greg, Ivy's boyfriend from school, is only a voice on the telephone—and eventually not even that, after one particularly wrenching phone exchange. Ivy, who suffers from epilepsy, doesn't tell anyone that Greg has dumped her, and even as she grows closer to Al, she keeps her feelings to herself. The Exploding Girl premiered at the Berlin Film Festival, and The New York Times says, "The film is also a lovely mood piece, conjuring effortless moments of beauty and repose from urban bustle."

Bradley Rust Gray's first feature, Salt, won the Berlin Film Festival's Caligari Film Prize for Innovative Filmmaking. Gray, a Fulbright scholar, also produced and cowrote In Between Days and Treeless Mountain with his wife and artistic collaborator, So Yong Kim. He was born in Dayton and currently lives in Brooklyn.

I MISS
Director/Writer: Annie Dorsen
Cast: Miranda Torn, LeeAnn Brown Making its world premiere on a cinematic stage, this mesmerizing short about a girl (Miranda Torn) prompted by her mother (LeeAnn Brown) in the recitation of an intensely romantic poem is a meditation on feminism, love, and the notion of acting. Theater director Annie Dorsen (Passing Strange) and actors Philippa Kaye and Tony Torn created this stunning piece for their Off-Broadway play, Democracy in America.

Three-time world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali defeated almost every top fighter of the golden age of boxing and has symbolized the sport for generations. Now, 10 of his rivals pay him tribute in Facing Ali, Pete McCormack's enthralling new documentary. From the moment he captured the gold at the 1960 Summer Olympics, the fighter who came to prominence with the name Cassius Clay electrified the world. Articulate, handsome, charismatic, and outspoken, he became an icon of the burgeoning civil rights movement and a hero to millions. A master showman and brilliant strategist, Ali won as much by getting inside his opponents' heads as by his physical prowess. Through archival footage and deeply personal conversations with some of the Greatest's most renowned opponents, including Ken Norton, Earnie Shavers, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, and Leon Spinks, Facing Ali recreates his most unforgettable rivalries and explores Ali's triumphs, tragedies, controversies, and unstoppable spirit.

Pete McCormack is a filmmaker, novelist, screenwriter, musician, and producer. His films include Uganda Rising, See Grace Fly, and Hope in the Time of AIDS. McCormack has written two novels, Shelby and Understanding Ken, and released three original CDs. He was born in England and currently lives in Vancouver, Canada.

KILLER
Directors: Adam Leon and Jack Pettibone Riccobono
USA/Narrative/2008/Color/Digital projection/10 minutes
Fluid, nimble cinematography depicts a group of inner-city teens emerging from the evening city shadows. They conduct mysterious night business with grace and energy, despite the chill of underlying danger.

Celebrate the 25th anniversary of Slimer and the bumbling, hilarious Ghostbusters squad at this rare showing on the big screen! One of the funniest movies of all time, Ghostbusters set the bar in comedy writing, directing, special effects and performance for years to come. Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis), Ray Stantz (Dan Ackroyd), and Peter Venkman (Bill Murray) are three zany psychology professors who specialize in the paranormal. When they lose their Columbia University research grants after an otherworldly trip to the New York Public Library, however, the gang move into an old firehouse, add a fourth member named Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson), and become ghost hunters for hire. With hauntings in the city at an all-time high, the threat of an apocalyptic Judgment Day on the horizon, and ghosts like the Gatekeeper (Sigourney Weaver), the Keymaster (Rick Moranis), and the gigantic Stay Puft Marshmallow Man on the loose, who ya gonna call? Ghostbusters!

Ivan Reitman directed classic comedy films including Meatballs, Stripes, Kindergarten Cop, and Dave, and produced films including Shivers, Rabid, National Lampoon's Animal House, Private Parts, Road Trip, Old School, Euro Trip, and I Love You, Man. Reitman was born in Komárno, Czechoslovakia, grew up in Toronto, Canada, and currently lives in California.

In Lynn Shelton's riotous third feature, young married couple Ben and Anna (Mark Duplass and Alycia Delmore) find their domestic routine—and their trust in each other—abruptly shaken when wild childhood friend Andrew (Joshua Leonard) dares Ben to join him in entering Seattle's annual pornography contest, Humpfest. It's been a decade since Ben and Andrew were rowdy students together; Andrew has remained a vagabond artist, while Ben has settled down in suburbia with Anna. One evening, when the couple are in bed, Andrew arrives, unannounced, on their doorstep. Though years have passed, the two friends easily fall back into their old dynamic of heterosexual one-upmanship. But after a particularly rambunctious night of carousing, the two men find themselves locked in a mutual dare: to sleep together...on camera. It's not gay; it's beyond gay. It's not porn; it's an art project. But will it work? How will it work? And more importantly, who will tell Anna?

Lynn Shelton won a 2009 Independent Spirit Award as "Someone to Watch." She is an actress, an experimental and documentary filmmaker, and the writer/director of two feature films, We Go Way Back and My Effortless Brilliance. Shelton was born in Seattle, where she currently lives.

JOHN AND KAREN
Director/Writer/Animator: Mathew Walker
Voices: James Bachman, Emma Cunniffe
UK/Animation/Color/35mm/3 minutes
John the polar bear and Karen the penguin struggle to articulate apology, love, and forgiveness.

Army Staff Sergeant Will James (Jeremy Renner) grows increasingly addicted to mortal danger in this action-packed thriller from war correspondent Mark Boal and legendary director Kathryn Bigelow (Strange Days, Point Break). In a story rife with kinetic, nail-biting action sequences that will have audiences on the edge of their seats, the young James, who has disabled 873 Iraqi bombs in his brilliant and audacious career, joins the tight-knit bomb-disposal unit where Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) is the intelligence expert. James approaches the job with uncanny bravery, but as the tension and urgency rise with each new mission, Sanborn and the other soldiers start to rebel against his risky, even reckless methods. They have only 38 days left in their rotation in Iraq, and they're hoping to see day 39.

Kathryn Bigelow's films include Near Dark, Point Break, Strange Days, and K-19: The Widowmaker. The Museum of Modern Art honored her with a retrospective, and The New York Times called her "furiously talented," "one of the most gifted...directors working in movies today." Bigelow grew up in San Carlos, California, and currently lives in Los Angeles.