First Run Features (Firm)

Filmed with five hidden cameras, this documentary totally immerses viewers in the creative process behind legendary British theater director Peter Brook's work, focusing on the "Tightrope," a special exercise he has perfected over decades of experimentation and practice into a process of transformation that revitalizes the theatrical experience for actors and audiences alike.

Why are there so many Jewish comedians? Get the answer to this question with a portrait of the country's greatest generation of comics that includes Jerry Lewis, Sid Caesar, Jackie Mason, Mort Sahl, and Jerry Stiller. It is also found in upstate New York's Catskill Mountains, where Jewish immigrants transformed farmland into the 20th century's largest resort complex. It was the setting for a remarkable group of young Jewish-American comedians to hone...

This video is a double portrait of two contemporary Russian ballerinas, Svetlana Zakharova of the Bolshoi Theater and Ulyana Lopatkina from the Marinsky Theater. Includes interviews and excerpts from such ballet classics as Swan Lake, Scheherazade, and Sleeping Beauty.

Follows animal rights lawyer Steven Wise in his unprecedented challenge to break down the legal wall that separates animals from humans. After thirty years of struggling with ineffective animal welfare laws, Steve and his legal team, the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP), are making history by filing the first lawsuits that seek to transform an animal from a thing with no rights to a person with legal protections. Supported by affidavits from primatologists...

A chilling expose of Cambodia's human trafficking underworld. More than half a million Cambodians work abroad and a staggering third of these have been sold as slaves. Most are young women, held prisoner and forced to work in horrific conditions, sometimes as prostitutes in Malaysia, Thailand and Taiwan. This film weaves the story of Aya, a young girl sold into slavery at age 16, with two powerful traffickers who use deception to funnel a stream of...

The story of the Austrian writer and his life in exile from 1936 to 1942. Zweig was one of the most famous writers of his time, but as a Jewish intellectual he struggled to find the right stance towards the events in Nazi Germany. Driven to emigrate to South America at the peak of his worldwide fame, Zweig fell into despair at the sight of Europe's downfall.

One man's wild, lifelong adventure of testing society's boundaries through his subversive art combines traditional documentary storytelling with original animation culled from seven decades worth of art from the renegade children's book author and illustrator. Using a palette of 20th century events to paint an artist's epic yet controversial life story, the film offers a retrospective of Ungerer's life and art.

A young dreamer whose blind father runs the bathhouse has convinced his father that the bathhouse is filled with customers. His brother is a ruthless industrialist who wants to destroy the building and erect a futuristic city in its place. But that struggle is soon replaced by the movie's dominant storyline, Anton's falling in love with a beautiful 18-year-old girl.

When an Iranian widow takes over her husband's truck stop restaurant after his death, she must hide in the kitchen so she doesn't cause a scandal. Now her brother-in-law wants to be with her for the cafe, while a customer just wants to be with her.

Julien, an ornery butterfly collector, is adopted as a surrogate grandfather by eight-year-old Elsa, who moves into the next-door apartment with her often-absent mother. When Julien hikes into the Alps in search of the exotic and elusive "Isabella" butterfly, he finds that Elsa has come along as an uninvited companion.