Tian Leng’s short documentary “Dear Friend Chinatown” is an intimate visual essay in the form of a video postcard written to a friend. The film explores the casual encounters between the Chinese filmmaker and everyday life in New York’s Chinatown. Shopkeepers, old neighbors, and monks mingle with worldwide visitors in a vivid microcosm of culture, […]
Vinit Parmar’s short film “Quest for Energy” inspires the viewer to think about energy consumption and live a way of life that decreases environmental impact. While 1.3 Billion people in the world still live without electricity, Indian communities residing in the Sundarbans, the largest mangrove wetland forest in the world, have found sustainable ways […]
“Zikkaron/Kristallnacht: A Family Story” is a short documentary that describes the events of November 9-10, 1938, when Nazis destroyed thousands of Jewish-owned stores, synagogues, and homes all over Germany and parts of Austria under the pretext of the assassination of a German diplomat in Paris. “Kristallnacht” translates as “The Night of Broken Glass,” a […]
https://www.facebook.com/CUNYTVdigitalseries/videos/771367110040574/ Staten Island’s Huddled Masses: An Immigration Storytelling Project” features residents sharing family stories about coming to the United States, and their experiences in Staten Island as immigrants and children of immigrants. The film follows Cesar Vargas, a Staten Island attorney who arrived as an undocumented immigrant from Mexico. He was a recipient of DACA […]
“The Banned” takes a look at the lives of Iranian-Americans affected by the Trump administration ban restricting travel from Muslim-majority countries. The short film, directed by Ali Reza Khoshkjan and produced while he was an undergraduate student in the Brooklyn College Film Department, won the Best Editing Award at the 2019 Brooklyn College Film […]
Zee is an 86-year-old retired teacher, who decides to go back to the happiest time of her life and make peace with the path she has chosen by reconnecting with her students from the early ’90s in East Harlem. Most of her students back then were non-readers, but through non-traditional methods, she helped them produce […]
https://www.facebook.com/CUNYTVdigitalseries/videos/457527114862181/ “The Unstoppable” is a short film inspired by Julianna Greenidge’s real-life battle with anxiety and depression. The film follows Lottie, an eccentric black teenage girl who struggles to communicate her feelings and becomes overwhelmed by things she cannot control. Lottie finds solace in writing, but her fight to work through her emotions is interrupted […]
https://www.facebook.com/CUNYTVdigitalseries/videos/383999312285386/ Through letter writing, six queer and trans Asian Americans grapple with their queerness and consider what family acceptance might look like. CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies LGBTQ Resource Center at Brooklyn College Queens College Asian/American Center Asian American Life Gender Studies at John Jay College CUNY Queer Student Union of Hunter College Patrick G. […]
https://www.facebook.com/CUNYTVdigitalseries/videos/741256809633664 James Verdi’s short film “The Boneyard” takes a look at the remnants of ships hidden along the Arthur Kill, the Staten Island Ship Graveyard. Underneath the hulls of the decaying ships, a museum of stories comes alive. — James Verdi is a native of Staten Island, NY with a passion for filmmaking and history. His […]
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=324280175183914 “Right to College” is a video describing the challenges facing Karoline, Christine, and Enoch. They are seniors at Brooklyn high schools determined to get their classmates to attend college, even as they struggle with the process themselves. They are working as college counselors with the support of CARA -College Access: Research & Action, a […]
Produced by CUNY TV, Short Docs Web Series showcases short documentaries about NYC’s minority communities and examines issues including immigration, human rights, education, diaspora, multiculturalism, environmental issues and criminal justice. Short Docs creates a fresh multi-cultural dialogue and amplifies the film’s issues through social media. The documentaries, produced by Third World Newsreel, stream along with interviews with the filmmakers and subjects related to the pieces.
