Now in its 24th year, MoMA’s annual Doc Fortnight festival presents adventurous new nonfiction and hybrid fiction cinema from around the world.

Festival Schedule:

4:00 p.m: Šedá zóna and Contractions

Šedá zóna (Grey Zone). 2024. Slovakia. Directed by Daniela Meressa Rusnoková. North American premiere. In Slovak; English subtitles. 75 min.

In Grey Zone, the Slovakian filmmaker and photographer Daniela Meressa Rusnoková transmutes the unspokenly common and often traumatic reality of premature birth into a deeply poetic work of art. Interweaving her own experiences of fear, shame, despair, and hope with those of other mothers in similarly anguished circumstances, Rusnoková offers a complex, even wrenching meditation on a woman’s right to privacy and bodily autonomy, and on the pervasive fear and neglect in society of children born prematurely or with special needs or disabilities.

Contractions. 2024. USA. Directed by Lynne Sachs. 12 min.

Fourteen women and their male allies, their backs to the camera, stand in full force outside a Memphis health clinic that can no longer provide abortion services following the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade. On the soundtrack, an expert obstetrician-gynecologist and an anonymous activist bear witness to the fearsome uncertainties and dangers that lie ahead.

Location: The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2

7:00 p.m: Monólogo colectivo (Collective Monologue)

2024. Argentina/UK. Directed by Jessica Sarah Rinland. With Macarena Santa María Lloydi, María Jose Micale, Alicia Delgado. Courtesy Grasshopper Films. US premiere. In Spanish; English subtitles. 104 min.

Jessica Sarah Rinland’s Collective Monologue is that rarest of breeds, humble yet imaginative, as it depicts the kinship between caregivers and animals in Argentina’s zoos and wildlife sanctuaries. Using a variety of technologies—16mm, surveillance, and infrared cameras; a symphony of animal and industrial sounds; and historical ephemera—Rinland creates a tactile experience of a cloistered world beset by rapid change. Collective Monologue is also a portrait of the workers who toil in anonymity yet allow themselves to feel all the love, anguish, and responsibility that goes into any meaningful relationship. The history of cinema is littered with attempts to anthropomorphize animals, either by rationalizing their behavior as projections of our own or even by putting words in their mouths. Rinland makes no such arrogant claims to dominion or certitude. Small wonder, then, that Collective Monologue has been a standout at recent festivals, including Locarno, the Viennale, London, and TIFF’s Wavelength section.

Followed by a conversation with Jessica Sarah Rinland

Location: The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2