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First Aired: August 9th, 1999
Status: Continuing
Network: PBS
Summary: This acclaimed Emmy Award-winning anthology series features documentaries and a limited number of fiction films united by the creative freedom, artistic achievement and unflinching visions of their independent producers and featuring unforgettable stories about a unique individual, community or moment in history.
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Episode Statistics:
# of Episodes: 502
# of Episodes I watched: 0
# of Episodes I haven't watched: 502
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Season 19
Episode 1: Chasing Trane
Air Date: November 6th, 2017
Summary: 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 definitive look at the boundary-shattering musician whose influence continues to this day.
Episode 2: Shadow World
Air Date: November 20th, 2017
Summary: Explore the shocking realities of the billion-dollar global arms trade through those who perpetrate and investigate it.
Episode 3: Supergirl
Air Date: December 18th, 2017
Summary: 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 phenomenon.
Episode 4: The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin
Air Date: January 1st, 2018
Summary: 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.
Episode 5: Unrest
Air Date: January 8th, 2018
Summary: Director Jennifer Brea, confined to her bed due to chronic fatigue syndrome, documents how people around the world live and function with this disease.
Episode 6: I Am Not Your Negro
Air Date: January 15th, 2018
Summary: Filmmaker Raoul Peck examines James Baldwin's unfinished book about the lives and assassinations of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.
Episode 7: The Force
Air Date: January 22nd, 2018
Summary: 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 sex scandal.
Episode 8: I Am Another You
Air Date: January 29th, 2018
Summary: Chinese filmmaker Nanfu Wang follows a homeless man on a journey across America, exploring the meaning of freedom.
Episode 9: Winnie
Air Date: February 5th, 2018
Summary: 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 explores her life and contribution to the struggle to bring down apartheid in South Africa from the inside, with intimate insight from Winnie herself, those closest to her and enemies who sought to extinguish her activism.
Episode 10: Tell Them We Are Rising
Air Date: February 19th, 2018
Summary: Historically black colleges and universities play a pivotal role in shaping American history, culture and national identity.
Episode 11: Rat Film
Air Date: February 26th, 2018
Summary: The history and cultural fabric of Baltimore is explored through the lens of the city's rat infestation.
Episode 12: Dolores
Air Date: March 27th, 2018
Summary: 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 led the fight for racial and labor justice, becoming one of the most defiant feminists of the 20th century.
Episode 13: When God Sleeps
Air Date: April 2nd, 2018
Summary: 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 song focusing on human rights. Despite the risks to his life every time he performs on stage, Shahin refuses to stop, even with a $100,000 bounty on his head.
Episode 14: The Art of the Shine
Air Date: April 9th, 2018
Summary: 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 the world for an inside look at a forgotten profession.
Episode 15: What Lies Upstream
Air Date: April 16th, 2018
Summary: 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 he’s deep into his research in West Virginia, a similar water crisis strikes Flint, Michigan, revealing that the entire system that Americans assume is protecting their drinking water is fundamentally broken.
Episode 16: Look & See: Wendell Berry's Kentucky
Air Date: April 23rd, 2018
Summary: 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, Kentucky, Look & See is an elegy to a lost way of life that was once the bedrock of America--the culture of agriculture.
Episode 17: True Conviction
Air Date: April 30th, 2018
Summary: 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 mission to help wrongfully convicted prisoners obtain freedom like they did.
Episode 18: No Man's Land
Air Date: May 7th, 2018
Summary: A detailed, on-the-ground account of the 2016 standoff between protesters occupying Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and federal authorities.
Episode 19: ACORN and the Firestorm
Air Date: May 14th, 2018
Summary: For 40 years, the community-organizing group ACORN sought to empower poor and marginalized communities. Its critics believed ACORN exemplified everything wrong with progressive ideals. In 2008, these competing perceptions exploded on the national stage as Barack Obama was running for president. Fueled by a YouTube video made by amateur undercover “journalists,” ACORN came under attack.
Episode 20: Served Like a Girl
Air Date: May 28th, 2018
Summary: 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. By entering into the “Ms. Veteran America” competition, these amazing ladies unexpectedly come full circle in a quest for healing and hope.
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