With the city awakening from its COVID-19 slumber, a refashioned Tribeca Festival returned this week to celebrate its 20th anniversary. True to Tribeca form, the 2021 edition is as ambitious as ever.

Co-founders Robert De Niro and Jane Rosenthal might not have pulled off their pie-in-the-sky dream of hanging movie screens from bridges, but they are helping usher in a new era of large-scale, in-person festivals in the city. The hybrid virtual/in-person event, which runs through June 20, features free outdoor screenings across the boroughs and culminates in a mask-less, vaccinated-only, full-capacity closing night gala at Radio City Music Hall on June 19. Besides presenting its 2021 programming, the fest is spotlighting films from its 2020 lineup that haven’t yet enjoyed a proper New York City premiere.

Shedding film from its title for 2021, the fest is now freer to branch out into new realms of storytelling. TV, games, podcasts, VR, AR… the sky’s the limit. We aren’t going to go into detail about Tribeca’s expanded 2021 games section or inaugural podcast programming, but you can find out more information here.

The fest, which usually falls in late April/early May, is embracing its new June landing with programming honoring Juneteenth and Pride month. For the former, Tribeca has programmed projects that showcase “the richness of Black stories and storytellers from the African Diaspora.” Among the films to keep an eye out for are documentaries BITCHIN’: The Sound and Fury of Rick James, the Kevin Hart and Lena Waithe-executive produced The One and Only Dick Gregory, and Ailey, which finds the famed choreographer, Alvin Ailey, narrating his own story.

Pride month gets a decent nod at the festival. And, while it might be a downgrade from its day-long Tribeca Celebrates Pride event in 2019, this year’s lineup features over 25 LGBTQIA-themed films. Included are Pray Away, No Straight Lines: The Rise of Queer Comics, and the Martin Scorsese-executive produced Building a Bridge that profiles Father James Martin.

Despite the events of the last year, Tribeca’s slate is pleasantly robust. The fest continues to yield a strong documentary offering, with some delightful surprises in the narrative arena. Below you’ll find 10 of our must-see films.

The Last Film Show

Bhavin Rabari as Samay. Courtesy of Chello Show LLP, Monsoon Films & Jugaad Motion pictures.

Film devotees, if you can only see one film at the festival, we highly recommend it be The Last Film Show. Visually striking and thoroughly charming, it’s the perfect picture for our current moment as we get back up on that horse and return to the cinema. Set in 2010, The Last Film Show captures the wonder of film through the eyes of a nine-year-old boy who lives in a remote village in the Indian countryside. Filmmaker Pan Nalin, clearly a student of cinema, uses the film to pay homage to legendary big-screen directors such as the Lumiere Brothers, Stanley Kubrick, David Lean, and Andrei Tarkovsky.

********************************************

Poser

Sylvie Mix as Lennon. Courtesy of Loose Films.

A Talented Mr. Ripley-esque tale set in Columbus, Ohio’s indie music scene, Poser is an assured feature debut from music video directors Ori Segev and Noah Dixon. The film revolves around Lennon, a doe-eyed, insecure, wanna-be who launches a podcast hoping to ingratiate herself in the local creative community. Motivated by her desire to fit in with the poets and musicians she blindly idolizes, she makes some questionable decisions. Sylvie Mix delivers a mesmerizing performance as Lennon in this haunting thriller. With Poser, Mix, and directors Segev and Dixon have earned spots on our ones-to-watch list.

********************************************

Perfume de Gardenias

Eighty-seven-year-old actress Luz María Rondón shines as the newly widowed Isabel in this character-driven Spanish-language feature from writer/director Macha Colón. After seeing the beautiful wake she prepared her late husband, a coven of ladies from the local church enlists Isabel to design elaborate, custom funerals. But soon her new friends and calling find her re-evaluating her views on life and death. Shot in Puerto Rico, Perfume de Gardenias is an intimate and whimsical film rich with quirky and colorful characters.

********************************************

Souad

Basmala Elghaiesh and Bassant Ahmed in Souad. Courtesy of VIVID REELS.

Originally selected to screen at the 2020 Cannes Film Festival, this Egyptian-set drama from filmmaker Ayten Amin looks at the pressures young Middle Eastern women face in the age of social media. Shot in a naturalistic style, the first chapter of the film focuses on Souad, a conflicted 19-year-old student who projects one image to her conservative family and friends, and another to the various men she chats up online. In the second half, the camera shifts to Souad’s naïve 13-year-old sister, Rabab. Amin’s film is strikingly authentic and remarkably non-judgmental of its flawed characters.

********************************************

Brighton 4th

Levan Tediashvili (Kakhi) and Giorgi Tabidze (Soso) shopping on the boardwalk of Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, in Brighton 4th, directed by Levan Koguashvili. Image courtesy of Kino Iberica.

With his third feature, Brighton 4th, filmmaker Levan Koguashvili further secures his title as the Georgian Aki Kaurismäki. The deadpan comedy centers on Kakhi, a stoic former wrestling champion who travels from his Georgian homeland to Brighton Beach, Brooklyn to check on his adult son Soso. To his dismay, his son is living in a shoddy boarding house, has abandoned his medical studies, and owes $14,000 in gambling debts. Interested in helping Soso, Kakhi becomes enmeshed in the local Georgian community and as a result, gets caught up in some absurd situations. An enchanting Georgian gem, you can’t help but fall for Koguashvili’s indelible characters.

********************************************

Ascension

A user livestreaming to sell her product on the Chinese shopping website Taobao.com, as seen in Ascension, directed by Jessica Kingdon. Image courtesy of Mouth Numbing Spicy Crab LLC.

New York-based filmmaker Jessica Kingdon takes viewers on an impressionistic journey through the various layers of China’s industrial supply chain in her towering feature-length documentary debut Ascension. In an observational manner, the film captures the various rungs of China’s capitalist system, from the factory workers to the middle managers and salespeople charged with marketing the Chinese dream, to the elites and leisure class. Kingdon, who also serves as editor, has done a masterful job assembling her footage into a transfixing and thought-provoking work of cinema. Ascension is further boosted by composer Dan Deacon’s energizing electro score.

********************************************

The Scars of Ali Boulala

Photo by Fred Mortagne. Courtesy of Sisyfos Film.

The Scars of Ali Boulala is a curious documentary. Directed by Max Eriksson, the film profiles Ali Boulala, a skateboarding prodigy who went pro in the mid-1990s at the tender age of 16. Known for his outlandish antics both on and off the circuit, Boulala was beloved by fans and fellow boarders. But, in 2007, a tragic accident sidelined Boulala and over a decade later he’s still picking up the pieces. Eriksson’s doc, which is an assembly of archival footage, home movies, and interviews with Boulala and his friends and family, presents a case for the recovering skateboarder. The film rests on Ali’s personal journey and leaves the viewer pondering the notion of forgiveness.

********************************************

All These Sons

Charles Woodhouse (left), a participant in the Inner-City Muslim Action Network program (IMAN), IMAN case manager Billy Moore (middle), and another IMAN program participant (right), as seen in All These Sons, directed by Bing Liu and Joshua Altman. Image courtesy of Concordia Studio.

Forgiveness is also a theme that underlies Bing Liu (Minding the Gap) and Joshua Altman’s affecting documentary All These Sons. World premiering in competition, the film looks inside two community-based programs in Chicago’s South and West sides developed to curtail neighborhood crime and gun violence. The doc, filmed over several years, expertly weaves together a number of storylines. The viewer meets the courageous founders of the programs and also learns what motivates some of the participants.

********************************************

Lady Boss: The Jackie Collins Story

Fame, fortune, big hair, Hollywood glamour, sibling rivalry, intrigue, tragedy, heartbreak, and emotional abuse, the life of British tell-all novelist Jackie Collins makes excellent fodder for a documentary. Jackie, who died of breast cancer in 2015, authored over 30 best-sellers between 1968 and 2014. Her bonkbuster books, such as Hollywood Wives and Chances, were revolutionary and featured strong female characters who weren’t afraid of their sexuality. However, Jackie’s private life was far less romantic.

Propelled by a bangin’ soundtrack, Lady Boss is poignant and entertaining. Filmmaker Laura Fairrie artfully constructs her portrait using Jackie’s journals, home movies, archival footage, and interviews with the novelist’s close friends and family, including her infamous actress sister, Joan.

********************************************

The Neutral Ground

Comedian/filmmaker CJ Hunt uses the Confederate statue debate as an entry into talking about American race relations in his incisive feature-length documentary The Neutral Ground. Fashioned like an extended The Daily Show field segment, Hunt reports on the ground from New Orleans as the city awaits the removal of four confederate monuments. With candor and wit, he exposes the lie of the Lost Cause and constructs an explanation as to why America has difficulty moving forward when comes to issues involving race. Hunt, who is biracial Asian and African-American, further animates the doc with personal anecdotes, participation in Civil War re-enactments, and a show-stealing appearance by his father, “Mr. Hunt.” Executive-produced by Roy Wood Jr. (The Daily Show with Trevor Noah), The Neutral Ground screens as part of Tribeca’s Juneteenth programming and is followed by a discussion with the filmmakers and Nikole Hannah-Jones, founder of the 1619 Project.

Photo credit: From The Neutral Ground. Photo by Paavo Hanninen.