Summer has been eventful, to say the least. We’re so proud of our community of filmmakers, and all nonfiction filmmakers, who persist and resist by speaking truth to power through their art.
We’ve been feeling the tremors of Congress’ recent vote to defund public media shaking our doc ecosystem. Filmmakers, peers, and funders are all grappling with cuts, reprioritizations, and hard conversations. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting announced last week it will cease to exist. Our landscape was already challenging, but we know it’s only going to get harder to create and share stories that go against the grain. In an Op-Ed for The Hollywood Reporter, ITVS President & CEO Carrie Lozano said, “in this new reality, the notion of independence itself hangs in the balance.”
We can’t think of anything more worthy of fighting for. We believe independent, public media helps us see ourselves and learn about each other and the world around us. It invites our empathy—and our agency to do something with that empathy as a result.
Well, it’s a good time to do something. We urge our community to support local public media organizations and stations who will be most immediately and severely affected by funding cuts. But we also have a lot of collective imagining to do for the longer term. The solutions for tomorrow might not resemble what we did yesterday. That’s scary, but also an incredible opportunity. We’ve got to be up for it, together.
Thanks for reading.
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Pictured: Tobi connecting with AlumNest filmmaker Emily Ibáñez Cohen
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Chicken & Egg Films made its first-ever visit to the Bogotá Audiovisual Market (BAM)—the most important hub for film, VR, animation, and gaming in Colombia. Industry & Artist Development Manager Tobi Phang-Lyn participated in the Meet the Funds roundtable to connect with filmmakers and share insights on supporting Latin American stories. We’re eager to strengthen ties with creators from Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, and Peru and learn more about how to champion filmmaking from this region.
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2025 (Egg)celerator Lab Summer Retreat |
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Pictured from top left: Program Director Kiyoko McCrae, Siku Allooloo, Patrick G. Lee, Cody Stickels, Hyacinth Parker, Grace Pimentel Simbulan, Aurora Brachman, Fiona Guy Hall, Resita Cox, International Program Consultant Tereza Simikova. Bottom to left: Program Coordinator Will Tamura, Milton Guillén, Natalie Baszile, Cherine Karam, Lou Ray Fayoux Cantillo, Associate Director of Program Sabine Fayoux Cantillo.
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Our (Egg)celerator Lab filmmakers attend a five-day retreat each July, spending time working on their films, creatively recharging, and building relationships together. This year, filmmakers collaborated with amazing editors Fiona Otway, Rabab Haj Yahya, and Maya Daisy Hawke to push forward their stories. Congrats to our Program team and EL filmmakers for a successful retreat!
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Reflecting on our Sheffield Showcase |
"We designed what we hope was an empowering space where our filmmakers got to present their projects on their terms, sharing... how the stories came to be, why they’re important, and what they envision their impact being."
—Tobi Phang-Lyn, Industry & Artist Development Manager
We’re thrilled to share an interview with Tobi on our blog that offers a behind-the-scenes look at our WIP Showcase at this year’s Sheffield DocFest. Click below to hear about how the event took shape, reflections on its impacts, and some of the themes that emerged out of Sheffield 2025.
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August Community Highlights
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Pictured: Farah Kassem's We Are Inside
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✦ We Are Inside won the Black Iris Award at the Amman Film Fest
✦ BlackStar welcomed so many AlumNest filmmakers this year, including Brittany Shyne, Brit Fryer, Geeta Gandbhir, Contessa Gayles, Resita Cox, Latajh Simmons-Weaver, and Jess DeVaney
✦ Brett Story’s filmography will be featured as a program spotlight at DokuFest
For a full rundown of filmmaker awards, premieres, and other achievements this month, click below.
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Film spotlight: Apocalypse in the Tropics |
“Costa clearly has a strong perspective, but she’s also too curious and compassionate to turn her documentary into a simple tale of good versus evil... what she’s witnessing isn’t a nefarious, top-down phenomenon but a reality born of desperation and hopelessness.”
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture
Petra Costa’s Apocalypse in the Tropics digs deep to investigate the Evangelical Christian forces reshaping the Brazilian government away from democratic processes and toward dictatorship. It’s a story about Bolsonaro’s far-right government–but also rings an alarm about where else we might find this pattern in politics and what we can do to disrupt it.
Petra’s narration threads a complex history with elegance, and is matched by beautiful cinematography. Apocalypse in the Tropics also features rare access to one of the most important movement leaders of contemporary Latin America, Lula Da Silva. The film offers him space to share his observations, predictions, and, importantly, his willingness to build relationships with people whose minds might be open to being changed.
The film is now streaming on Netflix.
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Welcome to the team, Nicole! |
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We are thrilled to welcome new Communications intern Nicole Herrera, who brings refreshing enthusiasm and electric energy to each day. Her invaluable support allows us to grow the efforts of our small but mighty communications team. Learn more about Nicole here.
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✦ The UNION film team issued a statement on the Israeli detention and assault of Chris Smalls: "The Amazon Labor Union [is] the subject of our film. This is a movement founded on the central labor axiom an injury to one is an injury to all, and which understands international solidarity to be core to any successful fight for worker rights. We stand with Chris in his morally principled denunciation of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians of Gaza, which has continued now for twenty-two months with the financial, military and political backing of the United States."
✦ AlumNest filmmaker and Kinston, NC, native Resita Cox leads the Defund Kinston Police Department campaign after the violent arrest of an 18 year old. She shares, “The only things that have been proven to decrease and prevent crime and violence are community services, community social services, free housing, universal healthcare, access to free housing, and wellness.”
✦ Carlos A. Gutierrez writes in Distribution Advocates about The Third Cinema, “a politically engaged, collective practice rooted in dialogue with its audience,” as key to democratizing distribution alongside the Hollywood and European art-house models.
✦ The Archival Producer’s Alliance published a set of free Generative AI guidelines and a toolkit in order to “guide the responsible use of this revolutionary technology… and help filmmakers who are considering using GenAI… ground their decisions in the values the documentary community has long held.”
✦ Scott Macauley & Jon Reiss profile four new microdistributors of 2025 via Filmmaker Magazine. Among the emerging leaders are Watermelon Pictures, Willa, Cartuna x Dweck, and Muscle, each offering fresh takes on how a theatrical run can look, feel, and perform.
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Please consider supporting our work to champion the storytellers and stories our world needs, now and forever.
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