Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
Growing up in a poor, violence-stricken section of Baltimore in Maryland, Coffin Nachtmahr was bullied for having a stutter and not fitting into ‘any specific molds’. In high school, he was angry, prone to fights, and struggling with his identity, when he happened upon a video online that introduced him to a form of yo-yo known as ‘throwing’. Drawn in by throwing’s potential for creative self-expression, Nachtmahr found that the practice gave him comfort, confidence and a new sense of self. Before long, he had developed a crew of fellow throwers who also found throwing culture to be a means of transforming their lives amid a vortex of violence and negativity. With transfixing sequences of Nachtmahr’s virtuosic yo-yo chops, Darren Durlach and David Larson’s Throw is a rare story of a subculture whose adherents seem to be healed by their own idiosyncratic, high-flying verve.
Directors: Darren Durlach, David Larson
Website: Early Light Media
video
Sports and games
Young Palestinians find fleeting moments of freedom at a West Bank skate park
13 minutes
video
Food and drink
The passage of time is a peculiar thing in a 24-hour diner
14 minutes
video
Sports and games
Havana’s streets become racetracks in this exhilarating portrait of children at play
5 minutes
video
Art
Radical doodles – how ‘exquisite corpse’ games embodied the Surrealist movement
15 minutes
video
Subcultures
Drop into London’s eclectic skate scene, where newbies and old-timers find community
5 minutes
video
Food and drink
Is a ‘gastronomic society’ dinner the height of decadence, or an act of artistry?
11 minutes
video
Computing and artificial intelligence
Struggling to learn how to do a backflip, Nikita takes on an unusual training regimen
12 minutes
video
Sports and games
A unique project frames college football as an intricately choreographed mass ritual
7 minutes
video
The environment
Tree-sit with activists as they fight industrial logging from 100 feet above the ground
25 minutes