Blog

January, 13, 2026

Backside: The Unseen Hands of Horse Racing

aldomorablanco

Immigrant grooms work year-round on the hidden “backside” of Churchill Downs. Rising before dawn, they care for some of the world’s most prized Kentucky Derby racehorses, revealing how race, labor, and class shape an elite American industry. Backside: The Unseen…
80s style illustrated film poster depicting different iterations of Bored Apes in a grid on a retro computer monitor.
September, 10, 2024

Minted

Independent Lens

An insider’s look at the rise and fall of the NFT (non-fungible token) phenomenon and how technology transformed the traditional art world, for better and worse. Featuring verité footage and candid interviews with groundbreaking artists—like Beeple, Latasha Alcindor, and Loish—…
Cartoon parent and child standing in front of large book with various symbols flowing out
September, 10, 2024

Free for All: The Public Library

Independent Lens

Free for All: The Public Library tells the story of the quiet revolutionaries who made a simple idea happen. From the pioneering women behind the “Free Library Movement” to today's librarians who service the public despite working in a contentious…
Photograph of a man and woman looking at a cityscape out of floor-to-ceiling windows covered in graffiti. One of the windows is broken and glass is scattered along the floor.
July, 3, 2024

Skin of Glass

Independent Lens

A journey to reckon with Brazil’s harsh inequality begins when filmmaker Denise Zmekhol discovers her father’s architectural masterpiece in São Paulo—a 24-story tall modernist icon known as “Pele de Vidro” (Skin of Glass)—is inhabited by hundreds of unhoused people. But…
Two female doctors, both with light skin tone, pose outside of their mobile health wagon.
Behind the Films
March, 17, 2024

When the American Dream Becomes Survival: Short Doc Chronicles Rural Healthcare Crisis

Independent Lens in Behind the Films

By Nathan Duke Director Ramin Bahrani’s acclaimed films (like Man Push Cart, Chop Shop, and 99 Homes) focus on people struggling to survive due to economic challenges or failing to achieve the mythologized American Dream. His latest, the short documentary…
A photograph of a woman with medium-dark skin tone and short braids is superimposed over a government building at night.
January, 31, 2024

holding bodies: a justice anthology

Independent Lens

The three-part holding bodies: a justice anthology uses personal experiences of arrest, pretrial detention, and incarceration to reconsider the intention, design, and process of America’s justice system.
A flooded Miami street after a hurricane, a man walks through the waters. Photo Credit (photographer): Hector David Rosales
Beyond the Films
January, 26, 2024

“A Rising Tide Lifts Many Boats”: Climate Gentrification and You

Jennie Z. Rose in Beyond the Films

By Jen Rose For the longest time, wealthy retirees migrated to the beaches—of, say, sunny Florida. Now with the reality of rising sea levels, higher ground is a more desirable destination. But what happens to those who have lived for…
Illustration of a transparent red star laid over a military camp. Three adults and two children are shown fleeing atop the red star.
November, 13, 2023

Beyond Utopia

Independent Lens

They grew up believing their land was paradise. Now, they risk everything in escaping it. In an unforgettable documentary, follow families on a treacherous journey to defect from their homeland of North Korea, as the threat of severe punishment and…
Stylized poster with a bulldozer superimposed over a colorful housing project with palm trees. Above the housing project is an image of the shoreline.
September, 7, 2023

Razing Liberty Square

Independent Lens

Liberty City, Miami, was home to one of the oldest segregated public housing projects in the U.S. Now with rising sea levels, the neighborhood’s higher ground has become something else: real estate gold. Wealthy property owners push inland to higher…
An illustration of a red hand holding a pine sapling. A photo of a family is superimposed on the arm above the hand.
September, 6, 2023

A Thousand Pines

Independent Lens

Over the course of a grueling eight months, a crew of Oaxacan guest workers plant trees throughout the United States. This intimate portrait shows how hard it is to balance the physical demands of reforestation and extreme isolation while staying…
Credit: Diana Mara Henry Photography Caption: Welfare rights leaders (including Johnnie Tillmon and Beaulah Sanders) put their hands together, celebrating passage of their National Plan of Action item at the First National Women's Conference in Houston, Texas.
Beyond the Films
May, 15, 2023

From Mothers’ Pensions to Welfare Queens, Debunking Myths about Welfare

Independent Lens in Beyond the Films

By Lennlee Keep A common mindset through modern American history is that people living in poverty simply don't want to work.¹ For decades, politicians have used programs like food stamps, unemployment, social security, and Section 8 housing not as examples of…
Two women with dark skin tone hold a mirror for a third woman with dark skin tone so she can observe herself. The three women are surrounded by trees.
October, 2, 2022

The Command Center to Bring Women Home

Independent Lens

Through a collaborative writing process with filmmakers, three women bring to life “The Command Center to Bring Women Home,” an imagined space run by formerly incarcerated women for those with nowhere else to turn but to each other, a place…