Op-Docs

In “Weekend Visits,” an incarcerated woman spends a day with her child at an extended visitation house in Virginia.

By Pete Quandt

After appearing on “Maury” 25 years ago, a singer without legs questions why she’s seen as inspirational in “View From the Floor.”

By Megan Griffiths and Mindie Lind

Two preteen girls promote fashion and beauty products to thousands of online fans from their rural Alabama home in “Christmas, Every Day.”

By Faye Tsakas

Inspired by the movement for women’s rights in Iran, Elahe Esmaili returns to her hometown to start her own resistance in “A Move.”

By Elahe Esmaili

A look into the delicate balance between teamwork, discipline and personal growth in the Oscar-nominated “Instruments of a Beating Heart.”

By Ema Ryan Yamazaki

During the Day of the Dead, the cempasúchil, or marigold, is believed to guide spirits back home. In Mexico City, people who lost a loved one to Covid use the flower to honor their dead.

By César Martínez Barba

How do you cope when an abusive family member becomes terminally ill?

By Frøydis Fossli Moe

There’s a natural world trapped within our cities.

By Karsten Wall

An 86-year-old woman’s decision to end her life raises complex questions about life and death for a filmmaker.

By Guillermo F. Flórez

In this animated short film, women who work in the sex trade in Wales anonymously share their experiences.

By John Robert Lee

Michael February, a boundary-breaking surfer and the first Black South African on the World Surf League Championship Tour, embarks on a transformative journey.

By Sandra Winther and Michael February

In Memphis, a doctor and a volunteer driver contemplate the discontinuation of abortion services at a women’s health clinic two years after the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

By Lynne Sachs

In this short film, the visual artist Nouf Aljowaysir examines a question she’s struggled with since childhood.

By Nouf Aljowaysir

In the early 1970s, two high school filmmakers ventured out in a rowboat to make a 16 mm film about an abandoned space nearby: Ellis Island.

By Phil Buehler and Steve Siegel

A long-due conversation between a man and his mother sends the two of them on a quest for acceptance and love.

By Shuli Huang

In the 1970s, the filmmakers Claudia Weill and Eli Noyes interviewed New Yorkers across the city about their unwanted roommates: roaches.

By Claudia Weill and Eli Noyes

In the midst of a political and environmental dispute between the Czech Republic and Poland over a coal mine, a potato salad contest is held in a small border town.

By Piotr Jasiński

Rob C., a firefighter in Idaho, undergoes psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy in an attempt to address his PTSD.

By Brandon Kapelow

Why would a U.F.O. crash in Roswell, N. M., of all places? In 1994, the filmmaker Bill Brown set out on a road trip to explore the story from 1947.

By Bill Brown

Louis Johnson, the choreographer of “The Wiz,” could “outdance anyone.” Watch two rarely seen performances here.

By Richard Preston and Romaissaa Benzizoune

Both a ceremonial custom and a dynamic sport, lion dancing is a cultural practice that spans generations and continents.

By David Ma

After the 2021 military coup in Myanmar, loved ones of the deceased artist and political prisoner San Zaw Htway wrote him letters as an act of remembrance and hope.

By Petr Lom and Corinne van Egeraat

In this short film, Congolese artworks voice the poet and author Aimé Césaire’s words: “Colonization is thingification.”

By Matthias De Groof

Crafters across Britain speak to how knitting can help us heal, even at our most broken.

By Samantha Moore

Nearly 13 years after his civil service in Senegal, Paul Drey questions his role as a volunteer in the German system of development aid.

By Paul Drey

Mysterious deaths have occurred all over the planet and followed a similar pattern. Why have so many species vanished? And what does it all have to do with us?

By Volker Schlecht, Alexander Lahl and Max Monch

S. Leo Chiang reflects on his relationship with Taiwan, the United States and China from the islands of Kinmen, just a few miles from mainland China.

By S. Leo Chiang

On Achill Island in Ireland, Cian hopes to spend the summer playing soccer with his friends. But his grandfather thinks it’s about time to pass down a family tradition.

By Matthias Joulaud and Lucien Roux

Every week Raquel and Madeleine, two friends born 67 years apart, hang out. Madeleine refuses to leave the retirement home, but Raquel finds a way to bring her on a road trip.

By Raquel Sancinetti

Through reconstructions in a special effects studio, “Neighbour Abdi” embarks on a candid journey through Abdiwahab Ali’s personal history scarred by war.

By Douwe Dijkstra

At the dawn of their teenage years, the bond between the twins Raphaël and Rémi begins to weaken. But during the summer, time seems to stand still.

By Justine Martin

Conversations with slaughterhouse workers, by the son of one, explore family and masculinity.

By Martín Benchimol

A filmmaker captures her attempt to come off the synthetic opiates that kept her off heroin for the past six years.

By Miranda Stern

With A.I. and a six-core processor, my avatar learns a backflip.

By Nikita Diakur

A Northern Irish man’s relationship with a peregrine falcon reveals a personal history of torture during the Troubles.

By Tom Besley

Dream Hampton explores water as a force of harmony and devastation as climate change affects her home city of Detroit.

By Dream Hampton

As background extras, some nonplayer characters are programmed to do one thing forever: drudgery.

By Total Refusal

Two actors, partners at the time, discuss their own relationship conflicts between takes of a scripted scene.

By Marie Suul Brobakke

Three women reflect on the complexities of their relationships with their A.I. companions.

By Chouwa Liang

A mother and daughter find a connection in a place they least expected.

By Yana Pan

Two teenage Ukrainian refugees in Budapest express their pain and grief through art.

By Ruslan Fedotow

Akiko Takakura survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. This is her story, in her words.

By André Hörmann and Anna Samo

Nearly 20 years after their deployment to Iraq, veterans grapple with their younger selves and try to make sense of the war.

By Petra Epperlein and Michael Tucker

When a director gets hold of an action movie he and his best friend made two decades ago, he reconsiders the risks they took as young men.

By Christer Wahlberg

It was 1970. Over 50 years later, these words serve as a dire warning.

By Angelo Madsen Minax

A filmmaker revisits his time in Cuba to tell a story he left unfinished.

By Iñaki Dubourg

In Burkina Faso, a diplomatic spouse spends her days within the boundaries of the embassy.

By Theresa Traore Dahlberg

In a traditional Catholic town, Alex develops his identity and defends his dreams.

By Eloisa Diez

Incarcerated men and women watch nature videos on a loop in a mental health program.

By Merete Mueller

A space is filled after an only child leaves the nest.

By Tom Krawczyk

An idealistic journalist and a prosperous real estate guru question each other’s worldviews.

Weixi Chen and Kai Wei

The medium is the message: a poster with your face on it.

By Rishi Chandna

Volunteers at a Montreal call center train to be an ear for a lonely society.

By Sarah Baril Gaudet

In “Long Line of Ladies,” the Karuk people celebrate a girl’s first period in a coming-of-age ceremony.

By Rayka Zehtabchi and Shaandiin Tome

Indigenous Sami tradition versus Swedish bureaucracy — who wins this dogfight?

By Maria Fredriksson

Two brothers from the Boston suburbs set out on an improbable journey to Montreal’s Expo 67 by hoof.

By Eric Strange

Sally Schmitt sold the French Laundry. Then it became “the best restaurant in the world.”

By Ben Proudfoot

For my mother, music unlocks the past, reminding her of both the joy of her life in Sarajevo and the pain of leaving.

By Aleksandra Bilic

After nearly 33 years in prison — and over two decades in solitary confinement — Jack Powers embarks on the first day of his new life.

By Pete Quandt

Throughout her life, Representative Patsy Mink challenged the status quo. As a leading advocate of Title IX, she defended the bill against those who sought to weaken it.

By Ben Proudfoot

In a new short film, Warsaw residents express their deepest worries and anxieties.

By Bartlomiej Zmuda

The path into adulthood is a precarious one for those with a disability. So Samuel Habib, 21, seeks out guidance from America’s most rebellious disability activists.

By Samuel Habib and Dan Habib

What does it mean to live with prosopagnosia? An animator discloses the different ways he lives his life because he can’t recognize faces.

By Steven Fraser

Mourners from across the country gathered on the National Mall to honor loved ones.

By Jamie Meltzer

Yaren, age 10, lost her mother at 6. She felt alone in her grief — until she attended a camp for kids who have lost someone important.

By Renate Raman and Joren Slaets

For a community of Black women in New Orleans, dressing up as baby dolls is a tradition in which they’re encouraged to be free.

By Vashni Korin

A rabbi in a long-term care facility reflects on what it means to be alive in a state of profound isolation.

By Kitra Cahana

A beloved uncle left an inheritance made of love.

By Diego Bragà

From period pains and hip dips to bullying and catcalling, five girls talk about the trials of growing up.

By Bronwen Parker-Rhodes

The director Rona Segal learned filmmaking in the Israeli army. Now she turns the camera on her fellow soldiers.

By Rona Segal

Is work working for us?

By Maximilien Van Aertryck and Axel Danielson

The Young Lords took over Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx on July 14, 1970. Their demand? Accessible, quality health care for all.

By Emma Francis-Snyder

Devon Michael was a rising child actor in the 1990s. Until he auditioned for “Star Wars.”

By Ben Proudfoot

Musician Topaz Jones and directing duo rubberband. reimagine the Black ABCs in this Sundance-winning short film.

By Topaz Jones and Rubberband.

As an investigative reporter, Jason Berry exposed the church’s systematic cover-up of sexual abuse. Somehow, it wasn’t enough.

By Ben Proudfoot

What does love look like? This intimate short film captures the relationship between the artist Wilfrid Wood and his boyfriend-muse, Theo Adamson.

By James Cooper

In 1967, Jocelyn Bell Burnell made an astounding discovery. But as a young woman in science, her role was overlooked.

By Ben Proudfoot

Stable, affordable housing was out of reach for a Bay Area family. In a new short film, see a personal account of building a home without a house.

By Erika Cohn

Moath al-Alwi has never been charged with a crime, but has spent over 19 years at the U.S. military detention camp in Cuba. In a new short film, Mr. al-Alwi talks about the art he makes to survive.

By Dara Kell and Veena Rao

Lusia Harris led her team to three national championships, scored the first basket in women’s Olympic history and was an official draft pick in 1977.

By Ben Proudfoot

“Birding Bob” knows how to find the birds of New York City. But some people aren’t happy about how he does it.

By Jake Sumner

In this short film, the family of one of Spain’s earliest Covid-19 patients chronicles his battle.

By Mario Lumbreras and Laura Brasero

There’s no right way to come of age, especially for a child of immigrants.

By Sean Wang

For a forensic cleaner in Mexico City, helping grieving families heal is at the core of his service.

By Louise Monlaü

In this new short film, an artist finds hope in an unlikely place — the city’s storefront gates, rolling up day after day.

By Neil Goldberg

Two New York Times films, Op-Docs’ “A Concerto Is a Conversation” and the feature documentary “Time,” are among the 2021 Academy Award nominees.

Livestreaming your life to a devoted audience is big business. A new short film explores what happens when the cameras are off.

By David Borenstein

“Why would I want to hear about death and destruction? I’d rather hear somebody made a hole in one yesterday.”

By Lance Oppenheim

A mother told her daughter to keep her father’s absence a secret. Years later, they look back on the prejudices they encountered as a single-parent family in South Korea.

By Seunghee Kim

Had enough of Netflix? Here are three short documentaries you won't find there.