James Schamus
Inspired by the explosive investigative article by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ginger Thompson, Somos. imaginatively recreates the stories of the people of the small town of Allende in the days leading up to a shocking massacre. Created by James Schamus, and co-written with Mexico’s Monika Revilla and Fernanda Melchor, Somos. tells the story of the drug wars from the victims’ perspective, giving voice to those whose lives were changed forever when, without forewarning, their town was struck by a tragedy triggered by a DEA operation gone wrong.
A searing look at a day in the life of an assistant to a powerful executive. As Jane follows her daily routine, she grows increasingly aware of the insidious abuse that threatens every aspect of her position.
King Louis XIV's quest for immortality leads him to capture and steal a mermaid's life force, a move that is further complicated by his illegitimate daughter's discovery of the creature.
Over 30 filmmakers and friends of Strand Releasing have come together to honor the company’s indelible contribution to independent cinema over the past thirty years. The participating filmmakers have each created a short film for the project, all shot on iPhones. Produced by Strand Releasing and Connor Jessup.
James’s film provides us with a thoughtful history of photography and the moving image that both pays tribute to the past and celebrates how advancements in technology support the ever-evolving nature of cinema. His film elaborates on a history of storytelling through image and how we can use the iPhone and other new technologies to create, reflect and inspire in our day-to-day lives.
Ed Hemsler spends his life preparing for a disaster that may never come. Ronnie Meisner spends her life shopping for things she may never use. In a small town somewhere in America, these two people will try to find love while trying not to get lost in each other’s stuff.
In between caring for her mother, a young woman works part time at a prison. The rookie guard gets a chance to prove her mettle when she's tasked with accompanying a hell-raising inmate on an emergency furlough to visit her dying mother. But things soon spiral out of control, sending the pair on a hilarious, surprising, and ultimately touching road trip.
Twenty years after the modern world's most notorious child murder, the legacy of the crime and its impact are explored.
A three-part feature in which Cultural Critic/Film Journalist Tasha R. Robinson interviews three key members of the filmmaking team. The first features Director Ang Lee discussing the film in In Conversation with Ang Lee. In Conversation with Tim Squyres looks at how the American-born Editor cut the film, which was shot in Mandarin. Finally, In Conversation with James Schamus features the Screenwriter and Producer discussing the film's worldwide success and his relationship with Ang Lee.
Set against a backdrop of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Palestinian rapper Kareem and his singer girlfriend Manar struggle, love and make music in their crime-ridden ghetto and Tel Aviv's hip-hop club scene.
Berlin in June of 1940. While Nazi propaganda celebrates the regime’s victory over France, a kitchen-cum-living room in Prenzlauer Berg is filled with grief. Anna and Otto Quangel’s son has been killed at the front. This working class couple had long believed in the ‘Führer’ and followed him willingly, but now they realise that his promises are nothing but lies and deceit. They begin writing postcards as a form of resistance and in a bid to raise awareness: Stop the war machine! Kill Hitler! Putting their lives at risk, they distribute these cards in the entrances of tenement buildings and in stairwells. But the SS and the Gestapo are soon onto them, and even their neighbours pose a threat.
In 1951, Marcus Messner, a working-class Jewish student from New Jersey, attends a small Ohio college, where he struggles with anti-Semitism, sexual repression, and the ongoing Korean War.
What is the real value of a dollar? You think that a dollar bill is money and that banks are where your cash is stored and safeguarded. Well, you’re wrong. Like, really wrong.
Tells the history and importance of The National Film Registry, a roll call of American cinema treasures that reflects the diversity of film, and indeed the American experience itself.
The story of Elliot Tiber and his family, who inadvertently played a pivotal role in making the famed Woodstock Music and Arts Festival into the happening that it was. When Elliot hears that a neighboring town has pulled the permit on a hippie music festival, he calls the producers thinking he could drum up some much-needed business for his parents' run-down motel. Three weeks later, half a million people are on their way to his neighbor’s farm in White Lake, New York, and Elliot finds himself swept up in a generation-defining experience that would change his life–and American culture–forever.
During World War II a secret agent must seduce, then assassinate an official who works for the Japanese puppet government in Shanghai. Her mission becomes clouded when she finds herself falling in love with the man she is assigned to kill.
A chronological look at films by, for, or about gays and lesbians in the United States, from 1947 to 2005, Kenneth Anger's "Fireworks" to "Brokeback Mountain". Talking heads, anchored by critic and scholar B. Ruby Rich, are interspersed with an advancing timeline and with clips from two dozen films. The narrative groups the pictures around various firsts, movements, and triumphs: experimental films, indie films, sex on screen, outlaw culture and bad guys, lesbian lovers, films about AIDS and dying, emergence of romantic comedy, transgender films, films about diversity and various cultures, documentaries and then mainstream Hollywood drama. What might come next?
Two modern-day cowboys meet on a shepherding job in the summer of '63, the two share a raw and powerful summer together that turns into a lifelong relationship conflicting with the lives they are supposed to live.
Set just before the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Sgt. Ray Elwood is an American soldier stationed at a German army camp. A soldier because a judge gave him a choice between the army and jail, Ray spends much of his free time cooking cocaine for the MPs. When a soldier dies and a toxicology screen shows an alarming level of illegal narcotics, someone is sent in to investigate.
Two warriors in pursuit of a stolen sword and a notorious fugitive are led to an impetuous, physically-skilled, teenage nobleman's daughter, who is at a crossroads in her life.
17-year old Murat from Turkey, living in Berlin, Germany, slowly discovers his homosexuality. His older brother Osman, head of the family since the father's death, wants him to finally lose his virginity with a woman and thus causes Murat to run away. In a bar, Murat meets Lola, who has some things to tell about him. He also meets Bilidikid, Lola's man, who thinks that Murat might have thrown an eye on Lola. But the truth about Lola, Murat and his family is far worse that anyone could have expected.
Ride with the Devil follows four people who are fighting for truth and justice amidst the turmoil of the American Civil War. Director Ang Lee takes us to a no man's land on the Missouri/Kansas border where a staunch loyalist, an immigrant's son, a freed slave, and a young widow form an unlikely friendship as they learn how to survive in an uncertain time. In a place without rules and redefine the meaning of bravery and honor.
When Dorine Douglas' job as proofreader for Constant Consumer magazine is turned into an at-home position during a downsizing, she doesn't know how to cope. But after accidentally killing one of her co-workers, she discovers that murder can quench the loneliness of her home life, as a macabre office place forms in her basement, populated by dead co-workers.
In the weekend after thanksgiving 1973 the Hood family is skidding out of control. Then an ice storm hits, the worst in a century.
A directionless teenager (Aesha Waks) becomes involved with a headstrong runaway (Summer Phoenix) and her drug-dealing brother (Sam Rockwell).
Welcome to Levittown, New York - America's first cookie-cutter community. From wife-swapping to bomb shelters, to flag burning, Wonderland takes a hilarious and unforgettable look at life in a town where thousands of identical-looking houses were assigned to their residents in alphabetical order.
Things have been tough lately for Amelia. Her best friend moved out of the apartment, her cat got cancer, and now her best friend, Laura, is getting married. She copes with things, from the help of Andrew, Frank, Laura, and a brief romance with Bill "The Ugly Guy".
Mickey, a free-spirited New York cabbie, and Francis, a materialistic Wall Street stockbroker, are extremely competitive and confused about women as a result of their father's influence. Though they disagree about everything, they have one thing in common: Mickey's ex-fiance Heather is Francis's secret love. Though both brothers have beautiful wives, Heather triggers their longtime sibling rivalry
Carol, a typical upper middle-class housewife, begins to complain of vague symptoms of illness. She "doesn't feel right," has unexplained headaches, congestion, a dry cough, nosebleeds, vomiting, and trouble breathing. Her family doctor treats her concerns dismissively and suggests a psychiatrist. Eventually, an allergist tells her that she has Environmental Illness.
When Jill Godmilow’s documentary Roy Cohn/Jack Smith premiered at the 1994 Toronto International Film Festival, the number of AIDS-related deaths was reaching an all-time high in the United States (over 270,000). In New York City, the epicenter of the AIDS epidemic, many artists and filmmakers were grappling with the disease. While Broadway was hosting the second part of Tony Kushner’s award-winning play Angels in America, downtown New Yorkers were fondly recalling another recent production, Ron Vawter’s one-man show Roy Cohn/Jack Smith, in which the actor, who died of AIDS in April 1994, performed two monologues, first as Cohn, the conservative lawyer, and secondly, as Smith, the flamboyant experimental filmmaker—both of whom died of AIDS-related causes in the late 1980s.
The film tells the story of a retired and widowed Chinese master chef Chu (Si Hung Lung) and his family living in modern day Taipei, Taiwan. At the start of the film, he lives with his three attractive daughters, all of whom are unattached. As the film progresses, each of the daughters encounters new men in their lives. When these new relationships blossom, the stereotypes are broken and the living situation within the family changes.. The film features several scenes displaying the techniques and artistry of gourmet Chinese cooking. Since the family members have difficulty expressing their love for each other, the intricate preparation of banquet quality dishes for their Sunday dinners is the surrogate for their familial feelings.
Jackie and Michael are coworkers at a large law firm, who decide to meet at Jackie's for dinner one night.
A Taiwanese-American man is happily settled in New York with his American boyfriend. He plans a marriage of convenience to a Chinese woman in order to keep his parents off his back and to get the woman a green card. Chaos follows when his parents arrive in New York for the wedding.
A psychic suburban mother--with an affinity for Doris Day films--begins a spiritual journey beyond the confines of her neighborhood and failed nuclear family experience.
Jude, a college professor, is obsessed with Sophie, his student. She, in turn, is intrigued by his scholarly charm. Flirtation turns to lust and the two become lovers.
An aspiring young filmmaker gets involved with an eccentric gangster for the financing of his first film.
Sophie comes to New York from France with the intention of joining a man she met a few months before. She finds herself alone in the apartment of the guy, who left town because he was scared stiff at the idea of seeing her. Originally commissioned as one third of an omnibus feature showcasing the Figaro, a Japan-only retro throwback car.
Three intercut stories about outsiders, sex and violence. In "Hero," Richie, at age 7, kills his father and flies away. After the event, a documentary in cheesy lurid colors asks what Richie was like and what led up to the shooting. In the black and white "Horror," a scientist isolates the elixir of human sexuality, drinks it, and becomes a festering, contagious murderer; a female colleague who loves him tries to help, to her peril. In "Homo," a prisoner in Fontenal prison is drawn to an inmate whom he knew some years before, at Baton juvenile institute, and whose humiliations he witnessed. This story is told in dim light, except for the bright flashbacks.
Mr. Chu is an elderly widower who teaches tai chi chuan in Beijing. He moves to America to live with his son's family, but finds the cultural adjustment difficult. Since his daughter is a white woman who does not speak Chinese, Mr. Chu's son, Alex, must mediate.
A young Karl Rove vies for the position of chief campus conservative under the guidance of Lee Atwater.
