A new international independent documentary series from the Independent Television Service (ITVS), GLOBAL VOICES samples the best of international documentary. In its premiere season, the series features five all-new global docs and 21 notable international documentaries that have previously aired on PBS in other forums.
Episode # 319
Hispanic Heritage Month Programming (check local listings) Housekeeper. Nanny. Maid. Surrogate mother. Such are the many roles of las domesticas - undocumented workers who came to America in search of a better life and found themselves scrubbing toilets and setting tables, working long hours for little pay in private homes.
Monday, February 13, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 320
Women workers in Tijuana's assembly factories tell their stories as they work to carve out lives of agency in a new and complicated century, revealing the transformation of a city and its people by globalization.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 322
A bright and happy child, five-year-old Mai is newly arrived from China and placed in a kindergarten classroom in a small, Midwestern town. "Paper Words," an animdated film, follows Mai as she engages her imagination to keep her company in a strange new world. It is paired with the short "Point of Entry."
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 324
Zhora (76 years old) and Knyaz (77 years old) were once the most celebrated masters of tightrope dancing in Armenia. Today, they are the only surviving performers who can keep this ancient art alive against the current of contemporary society. Having been bitter rivals throughout their lives, a common objective has finally brought them together: to train the only student of tightrope dancing left in the country. Hovsep, a 16-year-old orphan boy, has to decide whether or not to accept the role of the last tightrope dancer in Armenia, in a society that has abandoned both him and the art of tightrope dancing.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 325
Historians consider the Karabagh War (1989-1994) one of the first signs of the Soviet Union's collapse. Journalist and former POW, Vardan Hovhannisyan lived alongside the soldiers, doctors and villagers caught in the conflict and captured their immediate thoughts and last words to their families. Twelve years later, Vardan returns to Karabagh to try and find answers to the war and lessons for peace.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 101
The Flying Trapeze Group and Handstand Group are training hard for the national contest but end up differently. Children of the trapeze group win the championship heroically after conquering a number of difficulties. The handstand group gives up the contest because of the training fatigue. This is a story about competition, survival and the hard experiences of a group of children before they become acrobats.
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Length : 55 min
MPT2
Episode # 103
The famous fighting monks of the Shaolin Monastery have seen a resurgence throughout the world, aided in part by the popularity of kung-fu movies among the hip-hop set and films like The Matrix and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This film follows a handful of Shaolin monks who have brought the style to America, chronicling their adventures in New York City, Houston and Las Vegas.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
Episode # 104
Steeped in the sanctity of Japanese tradition stretching back thousands of years, sumo has recently seen an increasing number of foreigners making their mark on the sumo scene. Taking viewers from Hawaii to Japan to Los Angeles, the film profiles some of the most prominent American wrestlers. This fascinating glimpse of the past, present and future of sumo illustrates the intersection of cultures as the hallowed sport grapples with the forces of internationalization.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 105
This program chronicles one man's journey from the food-filled streets of San Francisco to the back streets of Saigon as he searches for the secret ingredient to blend the traditions of his family's culture with his adopted American life.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 106
For the first time in Israel, a group of Arab and Jewish parents decides to establish a bi-national, bilingual grade school in the Wadi Ara village. This program follows the school's first year and shows how fragile the attempt is to create an environment of co-existence against the backdrop of the complicated reality of its subjects.
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
Episode # 107
Filmmaker Lourdes Portillo received a phone call informing her of the mysterious death of her wealthy Mexican uncle Oscar. Though officially ruled a suicide, Portillo's relatives claimed murder, offering several possible suspects, including a business partner, a ranch hand and Oscar's young widow, who stood to inherit everything. Traveling to Mexico, Portillo attempts to learn the truth about her powerful uncle. Using interviews, old snapshots and home movies, she finds a complicated web of family secrets, intrigue, rumor and betrayal that makes her enigmatic uncle's murder seem ever more likely, yet ever more obscure. As the Mexican saying goes, "When evil is lurking, the devil never sleeps."
Friday, February 24, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
Episode # 108
This documentary presents the stories of young girls whose lives have been shattered by the child sex trade. They describe the day they were abducted from their village and sold into sexual servitude as, "The Day My God Died." The film provides footage from the brothels of Bombay, known even to tourists as "The Cages," captured with "spy camera" technology. It weaves the stories of girls, and their stolen hopes and dreams, with an examination of the growing plague of child sex slavery.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Length : 55 min
MPT2
Episode # 110
"T-Shirt Travels" is the story of how secondhand clothing, given away as charity in the western world, ends up in Zambia, Africa. Through this journey and by sharing the lives of those that trade and sell these clothes, this documentary explores the underlying reasons why so many Africans remain in poverty.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
Episode # 111
Mikhail Morozov is a Russian patriot, good Christian and successful businessman. He owns "Durakovo" -- "village of fools" -- 100 km southwest of Moscow. People come here from all over Russia to forget their troubles and become members of a happy village society. When they join the Village of Fools, the new residents abandon all their former rights and agree to obey Mikhail Morozov's strict rules. "What we have here is a democracy, it is a managed democracy, in which everyone has his place and in which everyone lives transparent lives, " says Morozov. The whole spectrum of state power -- political, spiritual and administrative -- gathers in the village for semi-private meetings with Morozov. All of them are Russian patriots. They discuss the future of Russia, their future and their aims.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
Episode # 112
Mike Siv is going to meet his dad and brother for the first time since he escaped Cambodia as a kid. Days before his departure, his mother reveals some shocking news from Cambodia: his father is remarried, has another family and his younger brother Nang was raised by an aunt.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 318
In "Carmen Meets Borat," director Mercedes Stalenhoef follows the life of 17-year-old Carmen. She lives in a gypsy village in Romania, where the men spend their days tying one on and exchanging coarse words in her father's bar. In the evenings, she watches a Spanish soap opera and dreams of a better life in Spain, where the men are romantic and decent. Her plan to emigrate falls to pieces when an American film crew descends on her village to shoot "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan." The village is used in the movie to show where the main character comes from and Borat depicts the villagers as primitive caricatures supposedly from Kazakhstan.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 317
This groundbreaking six-part series captures the rich cultural and artistic expressions of Latinos in the United States. By visiting some of the most influential and dynamic artists working today, VISIONES weaves a tapestry of paintings, songs, dances and spoken-word performances to reflect on how Latinos have impacted arts and culture.
Rebroadcast
Friday, February 10, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 316
This groundbreaking six-part series captures the rich cultural and artistic expressions of Latinos in the United States. By visiting some of the most influential and dynamic artists working today, VISIONES weaves a tapestry of paintings, songs, dances and spoken-word performances to reflect on how Latinos have impacted arts and culture.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, February 09, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 315
This groundbreaking six-part series captures the rich cultural and artistic expressions of Latinos in the United States. By visiting some of the most influential and dynamic artists working today, VISIONES weaves a tapestry of paintings, songs, dances and spoken-word performances to reflect on how Latinos have impacted arts and culture.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 313
This film follows the journey of five Middle Eastern teens from the world's richest country as they are initiated into the cutthroat subculture of competitive high-school debating. Guided by the 22 year-old former president of the Oxford Union, they direct their immense curiosity and ambition towards mastering the arcane strategies of British parliamentary debate. They are determined to show they are not closed-minded extremists -- and even more determined to win. TEAM QATAR offers a window onto the rapidly growing global culture of the Arab world and its relation to the West.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 312
Shadya Zoabi, a charismatic 17-year-old karate world champion, strives to succeed on her own terms within her traditional Muslim village in northern Israel. Despite her father's support, she faces the challenge of balancing her dreams with her religious commitments and other's expectations. SHADYA takes an intimate look at the evolution of a young Israeli Arab woman with feminist ideas in a male-dominated culture.
Rebroadcast
Monday, February 06, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 310
One in seven Afghan women currently dies in childbirth. MOTHERLAND AFGHANISTAN introduces the women behind these devastating statistics. Afghan American filmmaker Sedika Mojadidi examines her father's works as an OB/GYN as he struggles to make a difference, first at Kabul's recently renamed Laura Bush Maternity Ward and then in an isolated provincial hospital, where patients often travel for several days to get treatment.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, February 04, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 309
Director Yishai Orian, the owner of an old Volkswagen Beetle, is about to become a father. His mechanic says that the car will not last long, while his wife complains that the car is unsuitable for a baby. Attempting to keep his beloved car, Yishai goes on a journey that begins with the previous owners of the Beetle, continues to Jordan to renovate the old car and ends with the birth of his first child. The exciting, funny, sad and intimate memories of the Beetle's previous owners blend with the director's personal story.
Rebroadcast
Friday, February 03, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 306
RETURN TO THE BORDER: In the past half-century, millions of people around the globe have sacrificed themselves for communism and socialism. In this program, a Chinese-born filmmaker reflects on the personal ramifications of these political ideals, from his memories of a childhood in the border town of Dandong to his experiences in North Korea. TAKE A LOOK: Blind children invite us for a journey to their world of sensibility and imagination.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, February 02, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:02 AM
Episode # 305
The Rat brothers are on quest to find the big fish--the one that will bring easy money and allow them to leave their small village in Serbia. In this dramatic and often humorous tale, THE CAVIAR CONNECTION follows the brothers as they unsuccessfully gamble with the rules of nature and economics and in the process, become deeper without even noticing it.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 304
Meet eight young Vietnamese, some born in the final days of the Vietnam War, others in its aftermath. They are entrepreneurs and street kids, farmers and students, artists and engineers. Together they embody the hopes, dreams and challenges of a new Vietnam. Through their stories, this film takes an in-depth look at modern-day Vietnam, where a marriage of communism and capitalism is providing opportunity unimagined in their parents' time.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 303
Jasmine left her village in a remote part of China to get a job and help her family. Now she and her teenage friends at the blue jean factory are trying to survive in a brutal work environment.
Rebroadcast
Monday, January 30, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 302
Raised as Americans in inner city projects near Seattle, three young Cambodian refugees each made a rash decision as a teenager that irrevocably shaped their destiny. Years later, facing deportation back to Cambodia, they find themselves caught between a tragic past and an uncertain future by a system that doesn't offer any second chances.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 301
For the past 15 years, Nguyen Van Hung, once a homeless drug addict, has dedicated his life to helping street children survive AIDS in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. TEACHER is the story of one man's fight against an epidemic that claims its victims by the millions and the innocent children and teenagers struck by the reality of a global nightmare.
Rebroadcast
Friday, January 27, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 226
This program tells the story of five Cuban photographers whose lives and work span more than four decades and whose perspectives on photography are as varied as their opinions about the Cuban Revolution. From photographers whose lenses portrayed the heroic masses to more contemporary photographers who seek to portray individual truths, their stories discover the power of art to liberate.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 225
This musical journey follows exiled Chilean musician, Quique Cruz, from the Bay Area to Chile and back, as he creates his masterwork -- a multimedia installation to heal his wounds inflicted by state-sponsored torture of the Pinochet regime.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 224
HELL OF A NATION: In Afghanistan in 2003, the road to becoming a delegate was almost as difficult as the terrain itself; only a fraction of Afghans would be elected to attend the country's constitutional convention, the Loya Jirga. This program offers an intimate look at two candidates struggling to participate in this landmark event. OMELETTE: While a woman in Sofia tries makes an omelette, we learn how difficult it is to make ends meet.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 223
In 1936, General Francisco Franco led a coup d'etat against the Spanish Republic that gave rise to a brutal civil war. During his long dictatorship, hundreds of people were arrested or executed or disappeared. Today, family members of those who vanished have begun to look for their relatives' remains; they reflect on that dark period and its ongoing effect on their lives.
Rebroadcast
Monday, January 23, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 222
In the Israeli Arab village of Tamra, in Galilee, eight widows challenge social conventions and establish the Azka Pickle Cooperative, seeking financial independence for themselves and their children. With little formal education and no work experience outside of the home, the women face endless hurdles in expanding their business start-up -- while their personal lives reflect the joys and sadness of family weddings, bereavement and loneliness.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 221
SEOUL TRAIN: A growing and potentially explosive humanitarian crisis is threatening East Asian peace: the life and death of North Koreans as they try to escape their homeland and China. This program exposes the complex geopolitics and bureaucracy entangling the lives of thousands of North Korean refugees as well as the story of activists who put themselves in harm's way to save them via a clandestine underground railroad. THE CHESTNUT TREE: This short animated film is a tribute to the filmmaker's lost mother.
Rebroadcast
Friday, January 20, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 219
Prior to his death in a Baghdad bombing attack in 2003, former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Sergio Vieira de Mello devoted his life to global humanitarian efforts in countries such as Mozambique, Cambodia and East Timor. "En Route to Baghdad" is a portrait of Vieira de Mello and his extraordinary career and a tragic metaphor for the effort to bring stability to Iraq.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 217
In the final episode, most characters become more settled in the U.S. - buying homes, raising children, pursuing American educations and mates - but the Indian couple goes home with no plans to return. While the Palestinian woman questions her place in the U.S. after 9/11, a daughter in the impoverished Mexican family states that U.S. citizenship is the only dream she feels she might ever attain.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 216
In the sixth episode, one Nigerian family falls behind, while the other finds success. The Mexican family also struggles. The Palestinian and Indian couples are strained by time apart. One of the Dominicans makes his Major League debut.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 215
The fifth episode introduces an Indian computer programmer planning to work in Silicon Valley. Things progress well for the Dominican baseball players, the Palestinian couple becomes more involved in their community and the Mexican family arrives in Kansas.
Rebroadcast
Monday, January 16, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 214
This miniseries follows new immigrants and refugees - from Nigeria, India, the Dominican Republic, the West Bank and Mexico - as they travel from their homelands to the United States. The Dominicans and one of the Nigerian women return home. A Mexican family attempts to immigrate to the U.S.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, January 14, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 213
This miniseries follows new immigrants and refugees - from Nigeria, India, the Dominican Republic, the West Bank and Mexico - as they travel from their homelands to the United States. In the third episode, everyone faces discrimination and culture clashes.
Rebroadcast
Friday, January 13, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 212
This miniseries follows new immigrants and refugees - from Nigeria, India, the Dominican Republic, the West Bank and Mexico - as they travel from their homelands to the United States. The Palestinian woman is married, the Dominicans face language and cultural differences at spring training and the Nigerian families struggle with low-wage jobs.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 211
This miniseries follows new immigrants and refugees - from Nigeria, India, the Dominican Republic, the West Bank and Mexico - as they travel from their homelands to the United States. Nigerian families, a young Palestinian woman and two Dominican baseball players make plans to travel to the United States.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 207
Papua New Guinea is one of the most remote places on Earth -- fragmented by tribes and clans that collectively speak 800 different languages. This program follows the 2007 elections in which three candidates are vying to be the next governor in a system often plagued with political corruption and violence.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 205
This program tells the stories of three generations of Hmong refugees as they struggle with their personal and political legacies. The Xiong family, who fought on America's side of the "secret" war in Laos, tries to claim their own piece of the American dream while Hmong American Ka Ying Yang tries to understand her own similar family history.
Rebroadcast
Monday, January 09, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 204
This program is the story of Cuban twin sisters, Margarita and Ramona de Saa. Once inseparable, the former ballerinas have been separated for 40 years, one living in Cuba and one living in the United States. The program follows the twins as they grow up in the turbulent 1950's Havana, excel as ballerinas, fall in love and marry men with conflicting political beliefs and painfully separate in 1964. After wrestling for many years with painful memories of her departure, Margarita finally returns to her homeland.
Rebroadcast
Saturday, January 07, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 201
This is a character study of American lawyer Reed Brody, the son of a Holocaust survivor, who fights against all odds to bring an African ex-dictator to justice and his friendship with one of the victims, Souleymane, and the tension between their ideals and the sacrifices they make in their personal lives.
Rebroadcast
Friday, January 06, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 124
The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security and Cooperation (formerly the U.S. Army School of the Americas) in Fort Benning, Georgia, has, according to one U.S. Congressman, "the nefarious distinction of being the place in the United States where the worst human rights abusers in the Western Hemisphere come to learn military tactics and to teach them." "Father Roy" combines explosive and previously unreported information about torture training at Fort Benning with the extraordinary life story and experiences of Father Roy Bourgeois, the daring activist who is leading the campaign to close down the school.
Rebroadcast
Thursday, January 05, 2012
Length : 55 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 122
Sergio, a middle-aged Italian, and Youssef, from Morocco, work in a tiny office in Turin managing the weekly bus to the Magreb. Originally just a smart business idea, the agency is now much more than that. Documenting an odd pair in the middle of a changing world, "Overbooked" takes viewers into the chaotic, funny and sometimes tragic moments of the agency.
Rebroadcast
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
Length : 54 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 121
Arn Chorn-Pond's family was slaughtered by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s, along with 90 percent of Cambodia's musicians and artists. Now living in the U.S., Arn is attempting to transcend the terrors of "Pol Pot time" by rescuing traditional Cambodian music from extinction. "The Flute Player" relates his journey back to a still-uneasy Cambodia to find surviving "master musicians" and to recover his own Cambodian identity. This episode also includes the short film "50/Fifty," a soulful requiem for a family's past. Using old home movies and hand-processed film, Jane Kim pays homage to the memory of her father, who passed away when she was young.
Rebroadcast
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
Length : 56 min
MPT2
01:00 AM
Episode # 120
In the 1920s, Zulu singer Solomon Linda composed "Mbube," a hit melody in his native South Africa. Decades later, it skyrocketed to the top of the international pop charts as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight." This program follows the beloved song's rocky history, from South Africa to Brooklyn and back, asking why Linda died penniless - while American artists made millions from his music.
Rebroadcast
Monday, January 02, 2012
Length : 55 min
MPT2
