Zeitgeist Films

An intensely personal yet epic spiritual journey, THE HORSE BOY follows one Texas couple and their autistic son as they trek on horseback through Outer Mongolia in an attempt to find healing for him. When two-year-old Rowan was diagnosed with autism, Rupert Isaacson, a writer and former horse trainer, and his wife Kristin Neff, a psychology professor, sought the best possible medical care, but traditional therapies had little effect. Then they discovered...

A film portrait of the creative community of women writers, artists, photographers and editors (including Colette, Djuna Barnes, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas) who flocked to the Left Bank of Paris in the early decades of the 20th century. Utilizing groundbreaking research and newly discovered home movies, PARIS WAS A WOMAN re-creates the mood and flavor of this female artistic community in Paris during its most magical era. Winner of the Siegessäule...

In January 2011, millions of Egyptians took to the streets in a spontaneous eruption against thirty years of oppression under the regime of Hosni Mubarak. Communicating via Facebook and Twitter, the largely peaceful protesters braved tear gas, beatings, and live bullets in the hope of facing down security forces and overthrowing the government. Over eight hundred lost their lives, and several thousand were arrested and tortured by security forces....

Yvonne Rainer continued her preoccupation with the contradictions between public and private personas with this story of a female lion tamer from Budapest who comes to New York to become a choreographer.

Eight times a week, from 1960 to 2002, the Sullivan Street Playhouse in New York City’s Greenwich Village played midwife to a musical theater ritual that attracted theater-goers from across the globe. That show was the legendary and beloved Fantasticks, and for 42 years and 17,162 performances, a legion of performers—including future luminaries such as F. Murray Abraham, Ricardo Montalban, Elliott Gould, Liza Minnelli, Glenn Close, Richard Chamberlain...

Margaret Atwood’s visionary work *Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth* is the basis for this riveting and poetic documentary on “debt” in its various forms—societal, personal, environmental, spiritual, criminal, and of course, economic. Filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal (*Manufactured Landscapes*) strikingly interweaves these debtor/creditor relationships: two families in a years-long Albanian blood feud; the BP oil spill vs. the Earth;...

This documentary follows the charismatic Qi Moxiang, a former boxing star and state coach who recruits young fighting talent from the impoverished farms and villages across Sichuan province. A select few boys (and girls) are sent to national training centers, with the hope of discovering China's next Olympic heroes. But will these potential boxing champions leave it all behind to be the next Mike Tyson? Their rigorous training, teenage trials and...

After thirty years of war and five devastating years of Taliban rule, pop culture is beginning to return to Afghanistan. Since 2005, millions have been tuning in to Tolo TV's wildly popular American Idol-style series Afghan Star. Like its Western predecessors, people compete for a cash prize and record deal. More surprisingly, the contest is open to everyone across the country despite gender, ethnicity or age. Two thousand people audition, including...

One of Himalayan Buddhism’s most revered lamas, Khyentse weaves parallel fable-like tales about two men who seek to escape their mundane lives in TRAVELERS & MAGICIANS. Young government official Dondup dreams of escaping to America while stuck in a ravishingly beautiful but isolated village. Along the way, a perceptive yet mischievous monk tells Dondup a story of another young man who sought a land far away: a tale of lust, jealousy and murder that...

Every spring, China’s cities are plunged into chaos as 130 million migrant workers journey to their home villages for the New Year’s holiday. This mass exodus is the world’s largest human migration—an epic spectacle that reveals a country tragically caught between its rural past and industrial future. LAST TRAIN HOME follows one couple who have embarked on this annual trek for almost two decades. Like so many of China’s rural poor, Zhang...