Zeitgeist Films

A brilliant biopic of the influential German-Jewish philosopher and political theorist. Arendt's reporting on the 1961 trial of ex-Nazi Adolf Eichmann in The New Yorker, controversial both for her portrayal of Eichmann and the Jewish councils, introduced her now-famous concept of the 'Banality of Evil.' Using footage from the actual Eichmann trial and weaving a narrative that spans three countries, von Trotta beautifully turns the often invisible...

A month after receiving a fatal diagnosis in January 2015, Oliver Sacks sat down for a series of filmed interviews in his apartment in New York City. For eighty hours, surrounded by family, friends, and notebooks from six decades of thinking and writing about the brain, he talked about his life and work, his abiding sense of wonder at the natural world, and the place of human beings within it. Drawing on these deeply personal reflections, as well...

World-famous Dutch graphic artist M.C Escher (1898-1972) comes to life through history, psychology, and psychedelia, diary musings, excerpts from lectures, and correspondence. Escher's woodcuts, lithographs, and other printing techniques appear in both original and playfully altered form, and two of his sons, George (92) and Jan (80), reminisce about their parents while musician Graham Nash (Crosby, Stills & Nash) talks about Escher's rediscovery...

Lovely, repressed, and quietly intelligent, French chambermaid Hélène comes upon a couple engaged in an intensely sensual chess match, and discovers she has a knack for the game. This obsession, much to the chagrin of her husband and teenage daughter, leads her to seek the clandestine tutelage of a reclusive American doctor, a liaison that radically transforms both of their lackluster lives.

Richard Alpert, after being expelled from Harvard in 1963 for experimenting with LSD, morphed into Ram Dass, a serious and much loved spiritual leader, author and lecturer. This film visits Ram Dass in 2001 as he remakes his life since suffering a stroke five years ago. Balances fascinating, often hilarious footage from the hippie era with contemporary material and interviews with Ram Dass and his associates.

Opens with an ambitious politician fleeing a hit-and-run accident in the dead of night. Afraid of hurting his election chances, he pays off his chauffeur Eyüp to take the rap. While Eyüp stews in jail, this devil's bargain takes its toll on his brooding son Ismail and restless wife Hacer, who falls into an illicit affair with the politician. Ismail's discovery of his mother's infidelity and Eyüp's suspicions after he gets out of jail crank up the...

Critically acclaimed, this is the award winning true tale of a Jewish family who flee the Nazi regime in 1938 and learns to cope with their new life, and each other, on a remote farm in Kenya.

Director Astra Taylor's idiosyncratic, philosophical journey spans millennia and continents, from ancient Athens's groundbreaking experiment in self-government to capitalism's roots in medieval Italy, from modern-day Greece grappling with financial collapse and a mounting refugee crisis to the United States reckoning with its racist past and the growing gap between rich and poor

Working alone in Iraq over eight months, director/cinematographer Laura Poitras creates an extraordinarily intimate portrait of Iraqis living under U.S. occupation. "Keenly observed...Better than any Iraq doc thus far...Desperately hopeful and unrepentantly cynical."--Time Out New York. "The definitive non-fiction film about the occupation of Iraq! Indispensable, heartbreaking, and ferociously wise."--Village Voice. "Illuminating...fascinating"--Hollywood...