Filmmakers Unite (FU) is a compilation of one-to-nine minute shorts by documentary, narrative and experimental filmmakers cutting across race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, and religion – to present a collective response to the current threats to our democracy.

Peter Bogdanovich's doc delves into the genius of one of Hollywood's timeless comic greats. Anytime is the right time to celebrate Buster Keaton, so hats off and three cheers to Peter Bogdanovich for perceptively bringing the brilliance of one of Hollywood's comic greats to fresh attention in this lovely and sharp-minded new documentary. No matter that Keaton's best work is nearly a century old; it always had and still has a more modern edge to it than that of any of his contemporaries, and this swift and knowledgeable appreciation will well serve its fundamental aim of increasing the size of the Keaton fan club. After debuting at the Venice Film Festival, Bogdanovich's vastly entertaining portrait will presumably serve as an anchor for Keaton seasons on screens large and small in many parts of the world.-Hollywood reporter

Filmmaker in Attendance A Texas voter speaks from the heart.

Using the discarded, deteriorating remnants from seven silent film titles, filmmaker Bill Morrison braids a story of intertwining love triangles that pivots between the accounts of two women.

Artist Fiel dos Santos grew up during the 16-year-long civil war in his home country of Mozambique. The only one of his family to never have shot a gun, today he makes art out of guns to commemorate the lives lost. Little Fiel is a stop motion animation/documentary that is loosely based on the life story of Mozambican artist Fiel dos Santos who grew up during the 16-year civil war - another proxy war equipped and sustained by foreign super powers. Fiel created eight figures representing his father, mother, five brothers and sister from dismantled civil war guns. Three New York artists turned them into puppets and created immersive stop-motion animation, inspired by Fiel's memories. Little Fiel tells a universal story of peaceful people who have been coerced, conscripted and enticed into killing each other. It is a personal act of resistance and hope. Guns are not killers. They are pieces of metal that can be reassembled into anything, including a little boy, a bird or a rose. Just as they make them, we can unmake them, one by one.

Helen Short, puppet maker in attendance With music, magic and a stirring narration by Lotte herself, LOTTE THAT SILHOUETTE GIRL tells the tale of one of animations’ biggest influencers, Lotte Reiniger. Yet despite her monumental innovations of creating the first feature length animation and inventing the multiplane camera, she remains a footnote in the history of film. This short documentary seeks to change that.

Miami Beach Elegy is a visual poem remembering Miami Beach as it was in the early 21st century – a colorful canary in the mine shaft that is climate change. Shot in an observational style and using haunting music by composer Hayden Pedigo, Lord has fashioned a beautiful and dark landscape portrait of place. Like biologists who are studying the Rabbs Fringe limbed tree frog in central Panama as it goes extinct, Lord is “trying to catalog what was out there before it was lost.”

Moments of Truth shows moments from over 100 classic documentaries in nine and a half minutes using brief revealing clips. The documentary clips are accompanied by short interviews with significant filmmakers like Ken Burns, Barbara Kopple, Werner Herzog, John Grierson, Michael Moore and others, edited with music from documentaries and quotations. Many of the films may not be instantly recognized or even well known, but the overall intent is to show the impact of this increasingly significant cinematic genre from decades ago to the present.

Filmmaker in Attendance Before Oprah, before Arsenio, there was Mr. SOUL. On the heels of the Civil Rights Movement, one fearless black pioneer reconceived a Harlem Renaissance for a new era, ushering giants and rising stars of black American culture onto the national television stage. He was hip. He was smart. He was innovative, political, and gay. In his personal fight for social equality, the man ensured the Revolution would be televised. He was Ellis Haizlip. The Revolution was SOUL.

In MR. STANLEY: THE MERCHANT PRINCE, Dallas-based filmmakers Mike Mullins and Miles Hargrove, along with producers Melina McKinnon Cain and Jason Cirone, chronicle the life of the man who not only changed the face of luxury retailing with Neiman Marcus but also transformed Dallas from a rough-and-tumble cotton market town into a mecca of high fashion.

The story of Nellie Bly, a muckracking investigative journalist who changed the game for women in reporting before women even had the right to vote. Drawing from extensive primary sources including Bly’s own writing, and presenting both real-world interviewees and reenactments in several styles of animation and illustration, this short film investigates the porous line between reporting facts and telling stories, while creating a dynamic portrait of a woman who refused to accept the status quo.

The story of Donald Trump's election told entirely through Russian propaganda. By turns horrifying and hilarious, the film is a satirical portrait of Russian meddling in the 2016 election that reveals an empire of fake news and the tactics of modern-day information warfare.