Film screenings with discussion on the Peninsula — 10 upcoming

DAAAS Movie Night: The Eyes of Ghana

Culture & HumanitiesCivics & Power Film + TalkLecture / ForumUniversity / College

Wed, Nov 4 ·7:00 pm ·Building 80 ·Stanford

A screening of The Eyes of Ghana, a documentary directed by Ben Proudfoot and executive produced by Barack and Michelle Obama, following Chris Hesse, the personal cinematographer to Ghana's first president Kwame Nkrumah. After the film, producer Nana Adwoa Frimpong discusses the archive of over 1,000 rolls of film Hesse preserved and the political power of cinema in Africa's liberation movement, facilitated by Stanford professor Aaron Van Jordan.

via Stanford University ↗ Event link ↗
No Ideas But in Things

Culture & HumanitiesScience & Tech Film + TalkLecture / ForumUniversity / College

Thu, Nov 5 ·4:30 pm ·Clark Center ·Stanford

A screening of No Ideas But in Things, an art film directed by Lan A. Li and produced by Peter N. Miller, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers. The film explores what can be learned through touch, making, and the body, drawing on footage from the Material Intelligence seminar at the American Academy in Rome where scientists, makers, and humanists investigated how to engage with materials in an age of words and algorithms. Using Rome as an object of inquiry and conversation as a research instrument, the film reimagines scholarly output beyond traditional formats.

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The Spies Among Us

Civics & PowerCulture & Humanities Film + TalkLecture / ForumLibrary

Thu, Nov 5 ·6:00 pm ·Palo Alto City Library — Rinconada Library ·Palo Alto

A screening of The Spies Among Us, directed by journalists-turned-filmmakers Jamie Coughlin Silverman and Gabriel Silverman. The documentary documents a rare personal investigation into East Germany's Stasi surveillance state, featuring the first recorded dialogues between Stasi officers and a victim, Peter Keup, a historian and former Stasi target. The film explores the mechanisms of authoritarian control and the human drive for truth and self-determination. Presented by the United Nations Association Film Festival, with discussion facilitated by Jasmina Bojic, Stanford lecturer and UNAFF founder.

via Palo Alto City Library ↗ Event link ↗
Two: The Story of Shostakovich's Wife — Elena Yakovich

Culture & Humanities Film + Talk

Sun, Nov 8 ·6:30 pm ·Oshman Family JCC ·Palo Alto ·$30

A screening of Elena Yakovich's documentary Two: The Story of Shostakovich's Wife, with the filmmaker present for discussion. Yakovich, author of the acclaimed Walks with Brodsky and documentaries on Akhmatova, Dovlatov, and other 20th-century Russian figures, explores Shostakovich's private life through rare photographs, rehearsal footage, amateur clips, and his music. Drawing on interviews with his widow Irina Antonovna, who lived with him during his final thirteen years, the film reveals an intimate portrait beyond the public legacy. Yakovich will introduce the film and participate in a post-screening Q&A. Books available for purchase and signing.

via Oshman Family JCC ↗ Event link ↗
Malês: Film Screening and Conversation

Culture & HumanitiesCivics & Power Film + TalkUniversity / College

Tue, Nov 17 ·4:45 pm ·Bolivar House ·Stanford

A screening of António Pitanga's 2024 historical film *Malês*, depicting the 1835 uprising of enslaved Muslim workers in Salvador, Bahia—the largest Brazilian slave rebellion. The film follows a couple separated by enslavement as they navigate the horrors of bondage and fight for freedom. A conversation with filmmakers and scholars will follow the screening. Co-hosted by the San Francisco Consulate General of Brazil, Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education, Stanford Language Center, Department of Iberian and Latin American Cultures, and the Center for Latin American Studies.

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The Unwritten Play — Irina Litmanovich

Culture & Humanities Film + Talk

Tue, Nov 17 ·7:00 pm ·Oshman Family JCC ·Palo Alto ·$50

A screening of animator Irina Litmanovich's new film *The Unwritten Play: One Day in the Life of a Playwright*, which traces how a poet's own failures and struggles fuel their creative work. Based on the biography and works of Russian playwright Alexander Volodin. The evening includes screenings of Litmanovich's previous films and an exhibition-sale of watercolors and reproductions.

via Oshman Family JCC ↗ Event link ↗
Documentary: UNAFF presents The Panama Deception

Civics & PowerCulture & Humanities Film + TalkLecture / ForumLibrary

Thu, Dec 3 ·6:00 pm ·Palo Alto City Library — Rinconada Library ·Palo Alto

A screening of The Panama Deception, the 1993 Academy Award–winning documentary examining the U.S. invasion of Panama in 1989, its hidden justifications, the disproportionate violence, and the media suppression of evidence. The film presents rare footage and interviews with invasion proponents (General Maxwell Thurman, President Endara) and opponents (Representative Charles Rangel, human rights workers, former diplomats), alongside analysis of how the U.S. government and mainstream media controlled the narrative. Facilitated by Jasmina Bojic, Stanford lecturer and founder of the United Nations Association Film Festival, which presents documentaries on urgent global issues.

via Palo Alto City Library ↗ Event link ↗
Film Screening of the Latvian submission for the Academy Awards – Ulya

Culture & Humanities Film + TalkUniversity / College

Thu, Dec 3 ·6:30 pm ·Bishop Auditorium ·Stanford

A screening of Ulya, Latvia's Academy Award submission, with commentary from Dr. Karla Oeler, Director of the Center for Russian, Eastern European, and Eurasian Studies and Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies at Stanford. The 2026 film tells the true story of Uljana Semjonova, a basketball legend who grew up as an unusually tall girl on a remote Soviet farm in 1964. Oeler is an expert in film history and theory, with particular focus on cinematic aesthetics, violence, and representation; she has published widely on Soviet and Eastern European cinema.

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Cinema Evening with Polina Barskova: Nadezhda Kosheverova's Fairy Tales

Culture & Humanities Film + TalkLecture / Forum

Fri, Dec 11 ·7:00 pm ·Oshman Family JCC ·Palo Alto ·$25

An evening exploring the fairy-tale films of Soviet director Nadezhda Kosheverova—*Cinderella*, *The Shadow*, and *Once Upon a Time*—with film scholar and UC Berkeley professor Polina Barskova. These beloved children's films reveal deeper meanings on adult viewing: why did Kosheverova repeatedly return to fairy tales? What lies beneath her kings, princesses, and sorcerers? Barskova, a poet, writer, and scholar fluent in both literature and cinema, will screen excerpts from Kosheverova's most vivid works and discuss the director's interpretations of Shvartz and Andersen, her beloved actors, and what these timeless films reveal to contemporary viewers.

via Oshman Family JCC ↗ Event link ↗
“Don’t Eat the Mermaid: Exploring the Legend of Yaobikuni”

Culture & Humanities Film + TalkLecture / ForumUniversity / College

Fri, Feb 26 ·2:30 pm ·Humanities Center ·Stanford

A screening of a recent documentary (28 mins) exploring the legend of Yaobikuni—a young woman who ate mermaid flesh and gained immortality, eventually becoming a nun and traveling Japan for eight hundred years before returning to her birthplace in Obama City, Fukui Prefecture. Following the film, Michael Dylan Foster (UC Davis, author of *The Book of Yōkai*) and Hank Glassman (Haverford College, medieval Japanese religious culture specialist) discuss the legend, its Buddhist context, and the documentary's making.

via Stanford University ↗ Event link ↗