In the future, wars will be fought over water, but in Mexico the war has already begun. This documentary contemplates Mexico’s destiny, telling the story of the struggle of its indigenous people to preserve their natural resources and their cultural identity.

Despite the disturbance from the violinist downstairs, Ernesto attempts to call back his dead wife, Esperanza. The night, however, does not end as Ernesto would have hoped, when what should have been a romantic evening ends in heartbreak.

On the official web site of the Brazilian Environmental Institute, the Brazilian wood pernambuco appears on the list of plant species threatened with extinction. Found only in the remnants of the devastated Atlantic Rainforest in the coast of Brazil, this tree has been vital in the manufacturing of fine violin bows and other instruments ever since Mozart was composing his masterpieces in Vienna. A Arvore da Música explores a path to saving the imperiled trees, along with the music that depends on them.

In 1999, two brothers were deported from the United States to Mexico. Within two weeks, one of them overdosed on heroin in a seedy Tijuana hotel room, his body left unclaimed for two months in a mass grave. These U.S.-raised men, military veterans, were deported from the only country they knew—and had sworn to protect—to forge new lives in Mexico. Against the backdrop of increased attention to the U.S.-Mexico border, filmmaker Monika Navarro draws on her family’s experience to explore national identity and ties, the lives of immigrants, and what happens after deportees are sent to a homeland they don’t consider home.

Básicamente un pozo narrates the story of a primary school language arts teacher trying to solve a physics problem about perpetual motion. In order to solve it, he decides he must dig a hole that reaches to the other side of the world. He suddenly finds his family, friends, students, and the whole community rooting for him to succeed in his quest.

Bracero Stories explores the personal experiences of five former “guest workers” in the controversial US-Mexican government Bracero Program, which granted temporary work contracts to millions of Mexican laborers between 1942 and 1964. Their stories are interwoven and illustrated with archival materials, creating a composite narrative of the “bracero” experience. Interviews with other participants in the program assess its effectiveness—and its justness. These discussions mirror contemporary concerns about illegal immigration and the possible implementation of a new guest worker program. Ultimately, the film seeks to put a human face on the concept of foreign “guest worker.”

Children of the Amazon follows Brazilian filmmaker Denise Zmekhol to the heart of the Amazon rainforest, in search of the indigenous children she photographed 15 years before. The film invites the viewer to see through the eyes of these inspiring, remarkably resilient people, whose lives have been transformed by a road that was carved through their forest home by an outside world. Poetic and visually stunning, this film engages the senses and sympathies as global issues take on a profoundly human perspective.

Using home movies and other media, Diário de Sintra documents director Paula Gaitán’s return to the Portuguese city of Sintra, to search for memories of her late husband, Brazilian cinema novo pioneer Glauber Rocha. Gaitán and Rocha lived exiled in Portugal in 1981 with their two children, Eryk and Ava, before his untimely death. The filmmaker’s layered experimental work creates an impression of the past through its rich accumulation of images, meditations, and reminiscences.

A woman facing a bleak future recounts her life in sketchy, seemingly random, episodes. One by one the scars and despair left by a life ridden with responsibilities and sacrifice, but little joy, inevitably emerge. Diario del fin is a visceral and moving account filled with brutally honest, yet liberating, confessions.

Extranjero is a short film about belonging. The smell of things, the noises and the flavors of the country left behind, haunt you and make you realize that life, maybe, wasn't that terrible back in your country.

A story about an immigrant's beloved, whose sadness and loneliness are not eased by the remittances sent back to them.

The jungle madness known as Grissi Siknis is a contagious, naturally bound syndrome that occurs among the Miskito of Eastern Central America and affects mainly young women. Grissi Siknis is typically characterized by long periods of anxiety, nausea, dizziness, irrational anger and fear interlaced with short periods of rapid frenzy in which the victims lose consciousness, and believe that devils beat them, have sexual relations with them, and run away. Traditional Miskito tradition holds that Grissi Siknis is caused by possession by evil spirits or inflicted by a malevolent evil sorcerer. While Western medicine typically has no effect on those affected with the disease, the remedies of Miskito herbalists or healers are often successful in curing the madness.

The movie documents a cross-cultural conquest dance, La Danza de la Pluma, which evolved from Zapotec dance rituals in Oaxaca under the influence of the Spanish colonizers. It incorporates the struggle between Moctezuma and Cortez, Christianity and paganism, with several variations as to the ultimate victor. It has deep cultural significance and importance, with dancers committing themselves for a three-year period, and involves much ritual preparation and community involvement. The movie focuses on the dancers' motivations, their three-year commitment, the sacrifices involved, and how this ancient tradition has survived.

The life of actress Camila Quiroga (1891-1948) seems to have been forgotten. In 1943 an autobiography in a magazine detailed her trips around Latin America and Europe, and discussed her pro-proletarian film Juan sin ropa (1919). Juan sin ropa’s scheduled release unfortunately coincided with Argentina’s Semana Trágica (“Tragic Week”), when a series of labor revolts in Buenos Aires were violently suppressed. But 60 years after her death, interviewees throughout this documentary bring to light more intricate details and stories about the acclaimed actress that would have been otherwise left forgotten.

For over 50 years, the Kahnawake Mohawks of Quebec, Canada occupied a 10 square-block hub in the North Gowanus section of Brooklyn, which became known as Little Caughnawaga. The men, skilled ironworkers, came to New York in search of work and brought their wives, children and, often, extended family with them. Little Caughnawaga tells the personal story of Mohawk filmmaker Reaghan Tarbell from Kahnawake, Quebec, as she explores her roots and traces the connections of her family to the once legendary Mohawk community through the stories of the women who lived there.

Kanien’ kehá:ka—Living the Language is a two-part documentary series about what it takes to save a language in the Mohawk community of Akwesasne. The documentary examines various aspects and approaches of the Akwesasne Freedom School and its Mohawk language immersion program, which addresses key concepts of tradition, traditional education and identity preservation. The school has been in existence for 26 years with a philosophy “to create Mohawk speakers and leaders for two worlds.”

In 1930, the American Smelting & Refining Company hired William "Bill" Parker to work at the Angangueo mines in Michoacán. Bill arrived with his girlfriend, Joyce Hartzell, a photographer. Bill and Joyce fell in love with the town and its simple ways and decided to make it their permanent home. Bill was an amateur filmmaker and used his 16mm camera to shoot several documentaries portraying day-to-day life in Angangueo and Joyce’s trips around Spain and South America. But Joyce died in 1975, victim to pulmonary cancer, and 36 days later, Bill shot himself in the head. Bill’s diary describes those last few days: from Joyce’s passing to his own suicide. The movies and photographs made by the Parkers over the years become the material that relives their memories and tells the story of these two lovers that even death couldn’t tear apart.

Los herederos is a portrait of the young children in the Mexican countryside who begin to work at an early age. The film focuses on their daily struggle for survival and their activities in farming, sculpting and painting “alebrijes,” shepherding, making bricks, weaving, looking after their siblings, collecting water, harvesting tomato, chili, maize, and laboring in a myriad of other activities. They have inherited tools and techniques from their ancestors, but they have also inherited their day-to-day hardship because, as generations pass, child workers seem to remain captive in a cycle of inherited poverty.

Nashville, Tennessee, the “buckle of the Bible Belt” and the country music capital of the world, has become one of the most popular destinations for Latino immigrants. Despite the recent growth of this community, until December of 2007 Hispanic Catholics in Nashville did not have a place of worship they could call their own. This film follows the story of Nashville’s first 100% Hispanic Catholic church from the idea of its creation through its inauguration six months later. The film depicts a community that is proud and grateful, having finally found its own place for its members to let go of their minds, let go of their spirits, and truly be free.

Tito Juan Vera used to work as film projectionist, unveiling the magic of the movies to people in the Paraguayan interior. In Profesión cinero, Tito tells of his experiences and commemorates the golden days of cinema, through the thousands of film reels, posters, and equipment conserved from his job.

Shopping to Belong is a documentary about the relationship between consumerism and the sense of belonging and citizenship among Latino immigrants. This documentary aims to explore the hypothesis that immigrants use shopping as a way to feel part of this country, given that it is one of the main cultural activities in the United States. This documentary shows this process through interviews with first generation immigrants who come from various parts of Latin America; they all have different immigration histories and have lived here from only a few months to as long as 25 years.

As part of its new policy to end the “catch and release” of undocumented immigrants, the U.S. government opened the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in May 2006 as a prototype family detention facility. The facility is a former medium-security prison in central Texas operated by the Corrections Corporation of America, the largest private prison operator in the country. The facility houses immigrant children and their parents from all over the world who are awaiting asylum hearings or deportation proceedings. As information about troubling conditions at the facility leaks out, three activist attorneys seek to investigate and address the issues.

The Other Side of Immigration examines the causes and effects of international migration from the perspective of rural Mexican communities where large numbers of people leave to work in the United States. The film explores how NAFTA, Mexican agricultural policies, and Mexican politics have stimulated emigration over the past two decades; the extent to which households in rural Mexico directly and indirectly depend on money that undocumented immigrants send home; and the effects of emigration on families and children left behind in rural Mexico.

Un fragmento de intimidad tells the story of two Mexican immigrant cross dressers in Montreal who are part of a show in which they portray famous Latin American women artists.