While fiscal sponsorship is a component of the program, unlike other sponsoring organizations, we also provide a suite of support services such as tailored consultations, discounts to our workshops and webinars with leading industry professionals, and other essential resources.
In the last 5 years, WMM’s Production Assistance Program has helped 194 films reach completion and assisted filmmakers in raising more than $46,000,000 from government, foundation, corporate or individual, and crowd-funded sources. Since its inception, the program has been a part of raising more than $100,000,000 and helping more than 1,000 films to completion.
Films and filmmakers we have supported have been nominated for or won Academy Awards for the last 22 years, including Oscar-winning documentary CITIZENFOUR by Laura Poitras, STRONG ISLAND by Yance Ford, SUGARCANE by Emily Kassie and Julian Brave NoiseCat, TO KILL A TIGER by Nisha Pahuja, THE ETERNAL MEMORY by Maite Alberdi and THE BARBER OF LITTLE ROCK by John Hoffman and Christine Turner, the last two of which were directed by PA alum. The program has also supported critically acclaimed fiction features like FAMILIAR TOUCH (dir. Sarah Friedland), Dee Rees’ PARIAH, I CARRY YOU WITH ME (dir. Heidi Ewing, prod. Mynette Louie), FAREWELL AMOR (dir. Ekwa Msangi, prod. Huriyyah Muhammad, Sam Bisbee, Josh Penn), and THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL (dir. Marielle Heller). We’re thrilled to continue to have a large presence at the Sundance Film Festival, including GOING TO MARS: THE NIKKI GIOVANNI PROJECT (Dir Michèle Stephenson), LITTLE RICHARD: I AM EVERYTHING (dir. Lisa Cortés), Sandi Tan’s SHIRKERS, which won the World Cinema Documentary Competition Award for Best Directing, and most recently SEEDS (dir. Brittany Shyne, prod. Danielle Varga), which won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize for Documentary. In addition to Sundance, films supported by our program premiere at major festivals like Berlin, Tribeca, CPH:DOX, and SXSW.
FIND PROJECTS AND FILMMAKERS TO SUPPORT
The Day Iceland Stood Still
When 90% of Iceland’s women walked off the job and out of their homes one morning in 1975 the country came to a standstill. Unexpectedly funny and told for the first time, this is the true story of one day that catapulted Iceland to the world’s superpower of gender equality.
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The Coma Club
THE COMA CLUB follows four matriarchs as their loved ones emerge from comas caused by injuries sustained during America's recent wars. Moving between an annual retreat and their lives back home, the film offers a rare, intimate portrait of caregiving and the resilience of families living in combat’s long shadow.
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Rubbish: The Queer Kingdom of Leilah Babirye
The decade-long story of a queer artist-activist from Uganda transforming discarded rubbish into visions of liberation.
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A Mother Apart (formerly MITM)
A Mother Apart (formerly MITM) is part mother-daughter buddy film, part investigative saga that follows Brooklyn's most outspoken poet-activist Staceyann Chin, as she navigates being a mom while discovering the truth about her own mother who abandoned her as an infant.
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Unlocked aka Kings Park: Stories from an American Mental Institution
"Unlocked" is a groundbreaking digital learning site created for people going into healthcare and professionals already working in the field. Building on the success of the "Kings Park" documentary, "Unlocked" features a wealth of personal stories with individuals who have experienced the U.S. mental healthcare system firsthand.
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Listening to Whales
In 1971, Katy Payne and her husband Roger discovered that whales sing and changed how we see life on Earth. Listening to Whales follows Katy and Chris Clark, who Katy trained on the cliffs of Argentina, as breakthrough discoveries collide with a Navy sonar program killing the whales they love.
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KILLFACE
KILLFACE (USA, 16 min) is a sensory, sound-centric meditation on female strength, stamina, and struggle through the visual metaphor of a female fighter.
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It's Not Who I Am
Women are going to jail and prison at rates that have increased by 700% since 1980, a rate 50% higher than men. When they are released, they have expectations of starting life anew, however, in their re-entry journey, they are often confronted with an unforgiving society.
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The Movement of Violence, Northern Ireland
The Movement of Violence, N.I. is an anthemic love letter to Northern Ireland. An experimental dance documentary investigating how violence lingers in the body, how memory shapes gesture, and how dance becomes an act of release, resilience, and restitution.
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Seeing Stars
In this genre bending solo musical film, a legally blind writer waits in her eye Doctor’s office suspecting her low but long stable vision may be changing. Fighting fear, she inhabits her own stories of women with limited sight and limitless vision, turning them into stars to light her way.
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Confessions of a Female Gamer
An actress, reluctantly cast as the voice of the main character (a powerful warrior queen) in a smash-hit video game, becomes an unlikely heroine for female gamers around the world – and uncovers the battles unfolding in their lives.
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DAUGHTERS OF THE FOREST
Lis and Juli are unlikely heroes: instead of weapons or shields, they carry baskets to collect mushrooms. These indigenous foragers and scientists lead this immersive docu-sci fi journey through Mexico’s forests to unveil secrets from the Queendom — the world of fungi and those whose lives intertwine with it.
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The Gender Project
What defines biological sex — science or society? Through immersion in the lives of people who defy simplistic gender labels, The Gender Project uses bold cinematic language to confront the dichotomy of gender, exploding binary myths with scientific, historical, and cultural revelations.
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TO HOLD A MOUNTAIN
In the pristine mountains of Montenegro, a semi-nomadic mother and daughter defend their herding tradition and their land from becoming a NATO military training ground. A gripping family and environmental drama unfolds, as the story of violence against women echoes that of violence against nature.
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No Human Involved
NO HUMAN INVOLVED: a woman is destroyed by a 27-month prison sentence for prostitution in Arizona, the tenacity of those who fight for justice in her name.
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Love, Jamie
The story of Jamie Diaz, a trans artist incarcerated in Texas, and the enduring friendship that brought her art of pride and liberation to the outside world.
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the bomb
the bomb is a critically acclaimed immersive film, music, and art installation that puts viewers in the center of the story of nuclear weapons. It explores their immense power, their perverse allure, and the inherent danger at the very heart of them. An installation version of the bomb is currently touring museums, galleries, film festivals, and academic institutions.
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