While fiscal sponsorship is a component of the program, unlike other sponsoring organizations, we also provide a suite of support services such as tailored consultations, discounts to our workshops and webinars with leading industry professionals, and other essential resources.
In the last 5 years, WMM’s Production Assistance Program has helped 194 films reach completion and assisted filmmakers in raising more than $46,000,000 from government, foundation, corporate or individual, and crowd-funded sources. Since its inception, the program has been a part of raising more than $100,000,000 and helping more than 1,000 films to completion.
Films and filmmakers we have supported have been nominated for or won Academy Awards for the last 22 years, including Oscar-winning documentary CITIZENFOUR by Laura Poitras, STRONG ISLAND by Yance Ford, SUGARCANE by Emily Kassie and Julian Brave NoiseCat, TO KILL A TIGER by Nisha Pahuja, THE ETERNAL MEMORY by Maite Alberdi and THE BARBER OF LITTLE ROCK by John Hoffman and Christine Turner, the last two of which were directed by PA alum. The program has also supported critically acclaimed fiction features like FAMILIAR TOUCH (dir. Sarah Friedland), Dee Rees’ PARIAH, I CARRY YOU WITH ME (dir. Heidi Ewing, prod. Mynette Louie), FAREWELL AMOR (dir. Ekwa Msangi, prod. Huriyyah Muhammad, Sam Bisbee, Josh Penn), and THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL (dir. Marielle Heller). We’re thrilled to continue to have a large presence at the Sundance Film Festival, including GOING TO MARS: THE NIKKI GIOVANNI PROJECT (Dir Michèle Stephenson), LITTLE RICHARD: I AM EVERYTHING (dir. Lisa Cortés), Sandi Tan’s SHIRKERS, which won the World Cinema Documentary Competition Award for Best Directing, and most recently SEEDS (dir. Brittany Shyne, prod. Danielle Varga), which won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize for Documentary. In addition to Sundance, films supported by our program premiere at major festivals like Berlin, Tribeca, CPH:DOX, and SXSW.
FIND PROJECTS AND FILMMAKERS TO SUPPORT
Untitled Kenyan Politics Project
At a moment of historical transformation for Kenya’s ancient Lamu archipelago, the race for Governor has become a battle of extremely high-stakes. Amidst waves of violent terror attacks, billion dollar infrastructure projects, ethnic tensions and an open hostility towards female leadership, the winner will set this sleepy historical fishing village onto a trajectory that could make or break the community forever.
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9-Month Contract
For an orphan Jana, motherhood has always been priceless. When she has to raise a kid single and homeless, Jana becomes a surrogate mother to offer her daughter the life she’s never had. Nine months and 14.000 USD - is it as simple and priceless as it sounds?
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Standing Above the Clouds
When the massive Thirty Meter Telescope is proposed to be built on Mauna Kea, an uprising of kiaʻi (protectors) in Hawaiʻi and around the world dedicate their lives to protecting the sacred mountain from destruction. Through the lens of mothers and daughters in three Native Hawaiian families, Standing Above the Clouds explores intergenerational healing and the impacts of safeguarding cultural traditions.
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ithaka
This film is a project of Documentary Australia and is sponsored by Women Make Movies as part of our ongoing partnership in support of independent filmmakers.
The campaign to free Julian Assange takes on intimate dimensions in this documentary portrait of an father's fight to save his son.
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The In Between
The in Between is a portrait of a unique community that follows the exceptional but very normal lives of the citizens of the sister cities of Eagle Pass, Texas and Piedras Negras, Coahuila along the U.S. / Mexico border, offering an intimate look into the heart of Mexican-American identity.
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Vena Aquatica
In a tender mosaic of El Salvador, women reveal the joys and perils of their lives, deeply bonded with water and land. Vena Acuática is shaped by the relationships among women who defend a landscape haunted by environmental negligence and forced migration.
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Pacific Mother
Having fought hard to get the birth she dreamed of, freediver Sachiko Fukumoto connects with ocean women battling for a world where all people are supported in their birth choices.
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FLANA (formerly WOMEN OF MY LIFE)
Born in the home of a Baghdad midwife, director Zahraa is a witness to violence against women from girlhood. In a cinematic journey she interrogates the past in search of her missing friend and confronts lifelong fears and nightmares as she works with other women to imagine a better future.
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Before The Feast (Nilam Kātha Kālam)
A bittersweet story of love, loss and legacy. In Kochi’s sea-facing salt marshes, aging farmer Vincent is the keeper of a rare seed for the next generation. When a rising sea conspires to damage his crops, causing his family to drift away, an unexpected tragedy causes the tides to turn.
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8x10
8x10: From The Confines of Solitary To The Front Lines of Criminal Justice Reform is the story of one man’s experience with solitary confinement and his journey to change a system bent on destroying his humanity.
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My Color
My Color is an intimate documentary portrait of three artists living entirely in one color — from their clothes to their homes — turning radical visibility into a means of survival.
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Cancer: A Love Story (Working Title)
Cancer: A Love Story is an autobiographical documentary about my battle with cancer, confronting sexual assault, and the crazy things I did to heal myself. It’s a survival story, but also a story of mothers and daughters, and the intimacies of women’s bodies.
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Myself When I Am Real
Set in the year 2000, MYSELF WHEN I AM REAL is an experimental short film about a working mother and her teenage daughter who struggle to make friends and find belonging in a small Wisconsin town. It explores otherness, identity, and assimilation from the contrasting perspectives of childhood and adulthood.
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Game On
GAME ON is a feature-length character-driven documentary about BAFTA-winning game designer Brenda Romero. In the last thirty pioneering years, Brenda has contributed to nearly fifty game titles, developing innovative video and board games in a male-dominated environment. Can she sustain video game gold?
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Hear, Eat, Home
A lyric portrait of how—through art, friendship, music, and food—New York immigrant musicians and artists understand the upheavals they faced in their home countries and answer new challenges that emerge as they make the US their home.
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PERSIS
PERSIS is a documentary film exploring the legacy of the unheralded model-turned-actor Persis Khambatta.
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