June 21, 2016 | POV’s daily list of essential reading for the documentary and independent filmmaking community.

New Documentary Suited Examines the Importance of Clothing For the Trans and Gender Non-Conforming Community
Three years ago director Jason Benjamin read a story in the New York Times that he couldn’t shake. It was about a fledgling suit-making outfit in Brooklyn called Bindle & Keep that catered to a trans and gender non-conforming clientele who couldn’t find clothes, specifically suits, that made them feel like themselves. To Benjamin, the moment of a client seeing themselves for the first time in a mirror, after years of disillusion and pain around the simple act of putting on clothes, sparked the idea for a documentary.
Read more | Paper Magazine »

Interview: Penny Lane on the Making of Nuts!
One of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film” in 2012, writer-director Penny Lane exudes a winning blend of intellectual curiosity and sheer effervescent humor that shapes her films as well as her personality. In arty DIY shorts and two feature-length documentaries, 2013’s Our Nixon and this year’s Nuts!, Lane often investigates science or history in weird and wonderful ways, imbuing subjects like space travel, Nixon’s presidency, and the use of goat glands to treat impotence with sly humor and unexpected emotion.
Read more | Slate Magazine »

Born to Be Free A Confronting Documentary Goes Inside Australia’s Secretive Offshore Detention Centres
Australia’s offshore detention centres are surrounded with secrecy, and now a documentary is seeking to reveal what is really going on inside. Chasing Asylum takes a look at one of the more distressing results of Australia’s strict immigration policy: the people who are trapped between their homeland and Australia. Journalists have been mostly forbidden by the Australian government from visiting the detention centres since their formation, with notable exceptions, which has hindered any in-depth reporting.
Read more | Mashable »

NASA and Richard Linklater Want You to Make a Short Out of Space Footage
NASA (yes, that NASA) and the Houston Cinema Arts Society have teamed up to organize a contest that is pretty out of this world. The short film competition, CineSpace, offers filmmakers around the world a chance to share their works inspired by—and created with—actual NASA imagery. That gives you quite a bit to work with— 50 years’ worth of universe exploration, to be precise.
Read more | No Film School »

Ron Howard’s Beatles documentary Eight Days a Week gets release date, first trailer
Ron Howard would like you to meet The Beatles in a different way. His documentary The Beatles: Eight Days a Week — The Touring Years will hit theaters on Sept. 16, it was announced on Monday. Hulu will begin streaming the movie the following day, which will be the first time the streaming service has debuted a feature film immediately after its theatrical release.
Read more | Entertainment Weekly »

Upcoming festivals and deadlines
This Week

  • Edinburgh International Film Festival 6/15-6/26
  • BAMcinemaFest 2016 6/15-6/26
  • 18th Docaviv International Film Festival 6/19 – 6/28

Next Week

  • POV’s Call for Entries closes! 6/30
  • Karlovy Vary International Film Festival When 7/1 – 7/9

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POV Staff
POV (a cinema term for "point of view") is television's longest-running showcase for independent non-fiction films. POV premieres 14-16 of the best, boldest and most innovative programs every year on PBS. Since 1988, POV has presented over 400 films to public television audiences across the country. POV films are known for their intimacy, their unforgettable storytelling and their timeliness, putting a human face on contemporary social issues.