Riding Giants

When Pete Carroll took over the football program at USC after the 2000 season, the once-great Trojans were under siege. But thanks to his football knowledge, upbeat personality and recruiting skills, Southern Cal was soon back atop the college football world as home attendance skyrocketed, Carson Palmer, Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush won Heismans and the Trojans put together a 34-game winning streak. As it would be later discovered, though, the program was committing sins that would result in lost scholarships, victories and one of those Heismans. But those revelations didn’t come until after the national championship game in the 2006 Rose Bowl between USC and the University of Texas. Featuring interviews with Carroll, Leinart and others inside the USC program at the time, “Trojan War” looks at Carroll’s nine-year USC reign through the prism of that game, considered one of the greatest in college football history. It was also the beginning of the end.

Back in the 1980s, the road to the Olympics was long and hard for an amateur wrestler. But then along came John du Pont, an eccentric heir to the family fortune with a passion for wrestling. His 800-acre Foxcatcher Farm outside Philadelphia became the hub of the sport, with state-of-the-art training facilities, free accommodations, generous stipends and the support of America’s best freestyle wrestlers, brothers Mark and Dave Schultz. It all seemed too good to be true – and tragically it was, with a savage ending. Featuring fresh testimonials and never-before-seen footage, “The Prince of Pennsylvania” is the story of a paradise lost to the madness of its creator, a man who had the means to buy anything except for the one thing he truly wanted.

Football is a religion to many people. But few know the depths of both faiths as well as Bill McCartney, the former head football coach of the University of Colorado and the founder of Promise Keepers, a Christian men’s ministry. “The Gospel According to Mac” tells the truth-is-stranger-than-fiction story of Coach Mac’s controversial national championship run – two seasons that followed multiple arrests and strife between his mostly African-American players and the Boulder police, continued with McCartney’s own daughter becoming pregnant by the team’s quarterback before seeing that same quarterback struck by cancer, and culminated in consecutive Orange Bowl match-ups against Notre Dame. Bill McCartney’s passionate and often polarizing beliefs have made him many enemies and many admirers, but it’s difficult to deny that he embodies the essential issues facing football in America to this day.

Christmas Island, Australia is home to one of the largest land migrations on earth—that of forty million crabs journeying from jungle to sea. But the jungle holds another secret: a high-security facility that indefinitely detains individuals seeking asylum.

Click for full movie details & trailers.

Click for full movie details & trailers.

A wordless portrait of sculptor Jessica Jackson Hutchins shows us the artist in the process of transforming clay into uncanny forms.

"The King of South Beach" is a documentary evaluating LeBron James' time as a member of the Miami Heat - his controversial announcement, his title wins, and his ultimate departure.

Click for full movie details & trailers.

The Indians and Yankees, both in a tight race with the White Sox, met at the Polo Grounds on August 16th, 1920. In the fifth inning, Carl Mays threw one of his "submarine" pitches that hit Ray Chapman in the head. Chapman collapsed at the plate. He was rushed to the hospital and died the next day, the only Major League Baseball player ever to be killed in a game. Grief tore through Cleveland and the pivotal moment led to an explosion on and off the field. The Indians, sparked by the addition of young shortstop Joe Sewell, recovered in time to win their first World Series Title. What resulted was a rivalry that would last 100 years.

This underwater ballet is an ecological story depicting our paradoxical relationship with plastic. Bakelite launched the #SickOfPlastic campaign from On Est Prêt, along with the Surfrider Foundation, Break Free from Plastic and the Resilient Foundation. Photography was directed by Jacques Ballard, a specialist in underwater cinematography.

I have returned to the island were I grew up. My dad has spent thirty years alone at sea fishing lobster. He was taught the trade by his dad, who learnt from his dad. A heritage pasted down from father to son. My father never got a son, only daughters and since I was a girl no one assumed I was interested. After I turned eighteen I left Sweden and moved to Australia. After a decade abroad I started to long for home. I return to the island to see if I have it in me, can I learn the things I was never taught as a child? Will the legacy fade with me or can I become the family's next lobster fisherman? /Karolin Axelsson

Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer is one of the first and most influential surf movies of all time. The film documents American surfers Mike Hynson and Robert August as they travel the world during California’s winter (which, back in 1965 was off-season for surfing) in search of the perfect wave and ultimately, an endless summer.

Before Lance Armstrong, there was Greg LeMond, who is now the first and only American to win the Tour de France. In this engrossing documentary, LeMond looks back at the pivotal 1986 Tour, and his increasingly vicious rivalry with friend, teammate, and mentor Bernard Hinault. The reigning Tour champion and brutal competitor known as “The Badger,” Hinault ‘promised’ to help LeMond to his first victory, in return for LeMond supporting him in the previous year. But in a sport that purports to reward teamwork, it’s really every man for himself.

This films reveals the extraordinary variety of life found in the vast blue expanses of the
open ocean. Here, all the action takes place in a 10 metre deep band of water, just under the surface. Many species use this section of water to migrate and hunt while others use ingenious ways to stay hidden where there appears to be no shelter.

Real Madrid, the football club with the most Champions League titles, is undertaking a unique renovation of its stadium. The new Santiago Bernabéu will have a metallic facade, retractable roof, 360º video scoreboard, and a logistics ring. It will be the first stadium to store the pitch underground with a revolutionary system, all while continuing to host matches, pushing engineering to the limit.

An adventure of extreme skiing in the Mont Blanc area

After a brush with death, Maya Gabeira makes history in the male-dominated world of big wave surfing.

The story behind the making of the 1985 Chicago Bears' rap anthem and video that became a cultural phenomenon, redefined sports entertainment, and cemented the team's larger-than-life legacy.

Using unprecedented Olympic footage and behind-the-scenes material, The Redeem Team tells the story of the US Olympic Men's Basketball Team’s quest for gold at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing following the previous team’s shocking performance four years earlier in Athens.