EXCLUSIVE: The Margaret Mead Movie Competition – the longest-running documentary showcase within the U.S. – has introduced its 2025 lineup, a slate that features Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner Seeds.
Director Brittany Shyne is anticipated to be available because the competition kicks off Friday, Could 2 with Seeds, which has earned rave opinions starting in Park Metropolis. “It’s a piece of political activism via sheer lyricism,” Rolling Stone’s David Concern wrote, “and precisely the type of discovery you come to Sundance to see.”
The competition, working Could 2 to Sunday, Could 4 on the American Museum of Pure Historical past in New York Metropolis, will current 17 function documentaries, amongst them one U.S. premiere and 15 New York premieres. This 12 months’s theme, “We Are the Story,” illuminates “the various methods we join with each other, our environments, and shared histories,” based on a launch. Scroll for the total schedule.
Further highlights from this system:
- New York premiere of Our Land, Our Freedom, directed by Zippy Kimundu and Meena Nanji, with government producer Mira Nair in attendance.
- New York premiere of Viktor, directed by Oliver Sarbil and executive-produced by Darren Aronofsky, each of whom shall be current for a post-screening dialogue.
- New York premiere of The Shepherd and the Bear, directed by Max Keegan, a documentary concerning the penalties of an ursine rewilding program within the French Pyrénées. Keegan shall be available for a post-screening Q&A.
- New York premiere of How Deep Is Your Love, directed by Emily Mortimer, with the filmmaker in attendance for a Q&A. The movie goes beneath the waves to doc biologists racing “to gather and identify the undiscovered species of the abyss, the final wilderness on earth.”
“We’re so excited to welcome audiences to the 2025 Margaret Mead Movie Competition, a celebration of storytelling that connects us throughout cultures, borders, and experiences,” commented Jacqueline Helpful, Mead Competition director and director of public packages on the American Museum of Pure Historical past. “A longstanding Museum custom, the Mead is an area for curiosity and dialog, a spot to witness resilience, group, creativity, and the various methods we form—and are formed by—the world round us. We invite you to step past your consolation zone to hear, really feel, and see your self mirrored within the tales introduced on display screen.”
Dr. Margaret Mead, 1901-78
Getty Photos
Two awards shall be introduced on the competition: the 2025 Margaret Mead Filmmaker Award chosen by the competition jury, and the second annual Viewers Award, decided by competition attendees. The competition is called for the famed cultural anthropologist and writer Margaret Mead, a famend curator on the American Museum of Pure Historical past “whose analysis and practices endure within the area right now.”
The American Museum of Pure Historical past, based in 1869 with a twin mission of scientific analysis and science schooling, “is without doubt one of the world’s preeminent scientific, instructional, and cultural establishments.” By way of its Richard Gilder Graduate College, the museum affords two of the one free-standing, degree-granting packages of their type at any museum within the U.S.: the Ph.D. program in Comparative Biology and the Grasp of Arts in Educating (MAT) Earth Science residency program.
The Workplace, an impartial, multidisciplinary curatorial and manufacturing firm based mostly in New York and London, has been working with the American Museum of Pure Historical past on the Margaret Mead Movie Competition since 2012.
The Margaret Mead Movie Competition unfolds within the American Museum of Pure Historical past in New York
American Museum of Pure Historical past
That is the lineup for the 2025 Margaret Mead Movie Competition:
Friday, Could 2
- Seeds – New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Brittany Shyne (in attendance)
2025 | 125 min | USA
Saturday, Could 3
- Remaining Native – New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Paige Bethmann (in attendance)
2025| 87 min | USA
- The Shepherd and the Bear – New York Premiere
Director: Max Keegan (in attendance)
2024 | 100 min | France, Spain
‘Favoriten’
Grandfilm
- Favoriten – New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Ruth Beckermann (in attendance)
2024 | 118 min | Austria
‘Our Land, Our Freedom’
Twende Footage
- Our Land, Our Freedom – New York Premiere
Introduced by Mira Nair, government producer (in attendance)
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Meena Nanji, Zippy Kimundu (in attendance)
2023 | 100 min | Kenya
- Land with No Rider –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Tamar Lando (in attendance)
2024 | 100 min | USA
Kidam
- The Return of the Projectionist – New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Orkhan Agazade (in attendance)
2024 | 77 min | Azerbaijan
- Evening of the Coyotes –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Clara Trischler (in attendance)
2024 | 79 min | Mexico
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Nada Riyadh, Ayman El Amir
2024 | 101 min | Egypt
Sunday, Could 4
- How Deep Is Your Love –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Eleanor Mortimer (in attendance)
2025 | 101 min | United Kingdom
‘Folktales’
Fifth Season/Subject Studios
- Folktales –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Administrators: Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady (in attendance)
2025 | 106 min | Norway
- Partition –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Diana Allan (in attendance)
2025 | 61 min | Palestine
- River of Grass –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Sasha Wortzel (in attendance)
2024 | 83 min | USA
- Make it Look Actual –New York Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Danial Shah (in attendance)
2024 | 67 min | Pakistan
- Vibrant Future –U.S. Premiere
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Andra MacMasters (in attendance)
2024 | 89 min | North Korea
- Viktor – New York Premiere
Introduced by Darren Aronofsky, government producer (in attendance)
Adopted by post-screening dialogue
Director: Olivier Sarbil (in attendance)
2024 | 91 min | Ukraine
