Independent Lens: Season 19
Season 19 Lore Primer
Key plot threads, lore context, and character stakes you need to remember before diving into this season.
- Directly follows the overarching narrative developments of Independent Lens Season 18.
- Faction dynamics and core character alliances shift under escalating external stakes.
- Crucial mysteries introduced previously reach key turning points and narrative reckonings.
- Sets up serialized story arcs that build directly toward the climactic season finale.
Episode Guide
Season 19 Progress Shield
Chasing Trane
Nov 6, 2017 · 60 min
Set against the social, political and cultural landscape of the times, Chasing Trane brings saxophone great John Coltrane to life, as a man and an artist. The film is the definitiv
Shadow World
Nov 20, 2017 · 60 min
Explore the shocking realities of the billion-dollar global arms trade through those who perpetrate and investigate it.
Supergirl
Dec 18, 2017 · 60 min
A profile of a seemingly ordinary Orthodox Jewish preteen from New Jersey whose extraordinary talent—breaking world powerlifting records—has turned her into an international phenom
The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin
Jan 1, 2018 · 60 min
A profile of "Tales of the City" creator Armistead Maupin, including his evolution from a conservative son of the Old South to a gay rights pioneer.
Unrest
Jan 8, 2018 · 60 min
Director Jennifer Brea, confined to her bed due to chronic fatigue syndrome, documents how people around the world live and function with this disease.
I Am Not Your Negro
Jan 15, 2018 · 60 min
Filmmaker Raoul Peck examines James Baldwin's unfinished book about the lives and assassinations of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.
The Force
Jan 22, 2018 · 60 min
A cinema vérité look at the Oakland Police Department as it struggles to confront federal demands for reform, a popular uprising following events in Ferguson, Mo., and an explosive
I Am Another You
Jan 29, 2018 · 60 min
Chinese filmmaker Nanfu Wang follows a homeless man on a journey across America, exploring the meaning of freedom.
Winnie
Feb 5, 2018 · 60 min
One of the more misunderstood and intriguing contemporary female political figures, Winnie Mandela's rise and seeming fall from grace bear the hallmarks of epic tragedy. Winnie exp
Tell Them We Are Rising
Feb 19, 2018 · 60 min
Historically black colleges and universities play a pivotal role in shaping American history, culture and national identity.
Rat Film
Feb 26, 2018 · 60 min
The history and cultural fabric of Baltimore is explored through the lens of the city's rat infestation.
Dolores
Mar 27, 2018 · 60 min
The story of Dolores Huerta, among the most important, yet least-known, activists in American history. Co-founder of the first farmworkers union with Cesar Chavez, she tirelessly l
When God Sleeps
Apr 2, 2018 · 60 min
The story of Iranian musician Shahin Najafi's stand for freedom of expression, after he was forced into hiding when hardline clerics issue a fatwa for his death, incensed by a rap
The Art of the Shine
Apr 9, 2018 · 60 min
Shining shoes is a calling and a passion, a way to be one’s own boss and connect with other people from all walks of life. From New York to Toronto, from Paris and La Paz, travel t
What Lies Upstream
Apr 16, 2018 · 60 min
Investigative filmmaker Cullen Hoback travels to West Virginia to study the unprecedented loss of clean water for over 300,000 Americans in the 2014 Elk River chemical spill. While
Look & See: Wendell Berry's Kentucky
Apr 23, 2018 · 60 min
A portrait of the changing landscapes and shifting values of rural America through the voice of writer, farmer, and activist Wendell Berry. Centered in his native Henry County, Ken
True Conviction
Apr 30, 2018 · 60 min
After serving a combined 60 years in prison for crimes they did not commit, three recently exonerated Texans join forces to form the unlikeliest of investigative teams, on a missio
No Man's Land
May 7, 2018 · 60 min
A detailed, on-the-ground account of the 2016 standoff between protesters occupying Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and federal authorities.
ACORN and the Firestorm
May 14, 2018 · 60 min
For 40 years, the community-organizing group ACORN sought to empower poor and marginalized communities. Its critics believed ACORN exemplified everything wrong with progressive ide
Served Like a Girl
May 28, 2018 · 60 min
A candid look at a shared sisterhood to help the rising number of homeless women veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and suffer from PTSD, sexual abuse, and other traumas.