Urbanworld takes you on a captivating cinematic voyage through diverse landscapes, where stories of family, fluidity, and progress unfold in short documentary form. This thought-provoking program brings together a collection of compelling narratives, shedding light on the intricacies of modern existence.
Q&A with Filmmakers
WE DANCE
Dirs. Ethan Payne + Brian Foster | 2022 | 12 mins
We Dance is a love story, deconstructed and distilled into its most elemental ingredients. Dreams. Memories. Family. And environments. Tanya Wideman-Davis and Thaddeus Davis take us from Chicago to Montgomery, from New York to the point where their lives meet and become one. Along the way, they honor and signify on Black American art, poetry, and literature. They offer commentary on the importance of movement and migration to Black American identity, lived experience, and consciousness. And they show how all of our stories are kept, in the places we’ve been, and in the food we eat, and in the dreams that we so steadfastly chase.
CHINATOWN: OUR ONLY HOME
Dir. Tony Wang | 2022 | 16 mins
Our Only Home explores the passing down of Chinese traditions across generations in Manhattan Chinatown by examining the evolution of the Chinatown community told through intimate stories of two multiple decades-old family businesses and the new generation of young people working to rebuild the neighborhood during the Covid-19 pandemic.
OUT OF THE SHADOWS
Dir. Rafael Samanez | 2020 | 14 mins
Joselyn, a Mexican transgender immigrant woman, crosses the Mexico/U.S. border to flee increasingly dangerous conditions in her hometown. She attempts to adjust to her new home in Queens, New York, but finds similar oppressive conditions in the U.S. After the murder of her best friend she falls into deep depression. Joselyn finds a community of transgender women and together they fight to lift themselves out of poverty by attempting to open the first trans owned cooperative salon in the United States.
STILL HERE
Dir. Mariah G. Barrera | 2022 | 16 mins
Still Here, a profoundly personal film about a Latino family in the Midwest, tells the story of three brothers whose coming of age was stained by violence, poverty, and prison. Through first person recollections, the Barrera brothers confront childhood trauma and the compounding loss of freedom. But this isn’t a story about hopelessness — it’s an intimate exploration of a love that endures decades of separation. A love that has kept these brothers together now, and indefinitely. Directed, written, filmed and edited by Mariah Barrera, the daughter and niece of the protagonists, Still Here is a revealing, raw, and powerful portrayal of a family whose story is shared through the filmmaker’s lens.
MY FATHER THE MOVER
Dir. Julia Jansch | 2020 | 12 mins
African electronic Gqom beats motivate kids in the township of Khayelitsha, South Africa to jive through their hardship and find their superpowers.