Muhammad Ali, Mexican Culture and Murder Mysteries Headline Urbanworld's 2015 Film Slate

"Carmín Tropical" is among the movies playing in the Narrative Feature Film competition at Urbanworld 2015.Muhammad Ali: The People’s Champ, a biographical tribute to the former heavyweight boxing champion will serve as the opening night film at the 19th Annual Urbanworld Film Festival, presented by BET Networks (BET) with founding sponsor HBO.

Directed and executive produced by Clarence “Coodie” Simmons and Chike Ozah, this documentary features exclusive interviews with a who’s who of the sports and entertainment world including Muhammad Ali’s daughter Laila Ali, Mike Tyson and Sugar Ray Leonard. “We are excited to launch BET's original news documentary series with the film,” says Constance Orlando, Senior Vice President of Music, Specials and News for BET Networks. Muhammad Ali: The People’s Champ connects the fighter’s boxing prowess as well as his social media activism, to the millennial audience to reveal Ali’s meaning in the world today. It also headlines a fierce program lineup as Urbanworld, the nation’s largest competitive multicultural film festival, announces its 2015 slate.

The festival will screen over 80 films September 23-27, 2015 at Manhattan's AMC Empire 25 on 234 West 42nd Street in New York. An underlying quest for victory is the name of the game, as Urbanworld showcases stories about people fighting for redemption in one way or another. In the psychological drama Carmín Tropical, a transgender woman named Mabel returns to her hometown to investigate the murder of her friend Daniela. Directed by Mexican filmmaker Rigoberto Perezcano, this narrative feature explores gender and culture while taking the main character on a journey of revisiting the life she left behind in a town plagued with senseless violence, homophobia and intolerance.

"In Football We Trust" is among the select documentaries in the 2015 Urbanworld lineup.Urbanworld’s documentary lineup features the New York Premiere of In Football We Trust, about four young Polynesian athletes struggling to overcome gang violence, family pressures and near poverty as they enter the high stakes world of college recruiting and the promise of professional sports. Directed by first-time filmmakers Tony Vainuku and Erika Cohn, the movie explores how professional sports play a role in the “American Dream” phenomenon that fascinates our society.

“I believe In Football We Trust will illuminate how our country’s infatuation with chasing the ‘American Dream’ can often leave people entrenched in the very conditions they are striving to overcome,” says Cohn. Famed wrestler and Hollywood actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson mentioned the film is close to his heart and also helped produce it.

The documentary 3 ½ Minutes, Ten Bullets is among the Spotlight selections at Urbanworld. Directed by Marc Silver, it follows the journey of unraveling the truth behind Michael Dunn’s claim of self-defense in a shooting that led to the death of 17 year-old Jordan Davis. In what IndieWire calls “A harrowing exploration of criminal justice gone awry,” 3 ½ Minutes, Ten Bullets reconstructs the night of the incident and reveals how hidden racial prejudice can result in tragedy. Forgiving Chris Brown joins the narrative short films that are in abundance at this year’s Urbanworld film festival. Directed by Marquette Jones, this dark comedy about a group of heartbroken friends who unite over plans to get revenge on their boyfriends, is set in the hot desert.

Performing arts also takes center stage as A Ballerina’s Tale, a documentary focusing on a crucial period in the career of principal dancer Misty Copeland, is slated to close the festival. Directed by Nelson George, the movie examines issues of race and body image in the elite ballet.

Following Misty’s triumphant lead performance in Igor Stravinsky's Firebird at New York's Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, through her painful injury and recovery that followed, to her return to ABT and subsequent pop star status, A Ballerina's Tale  is the story of how great talent and a powerful will combined can open doors within a very cloistered world.

What are YOU watching this weekend?

Monday Movie Meme: Bar Hopping!

In giving credit to the sponsors who made it possible for this year's qFLIX film festival to bring an excellent program of international stories to Philadelphia's LGBT community, including Tavern on Camac, U bar and The Tavern restaurant, this week's Monday Movie Meme is about leading ladies and leading men congregating at watering holes: Bar Hopping!

Share on your blog or in the comments section, movies featuring scenes that take place in a bar. Here are my selections for this week's Bar Hopping theme, consisting mostly of bar scenes that come to mind when I think of some of the films that premiered at the festival.

Love Jones

An aspiring photographer named Nina orders a glass of white wine at the bar inside of a Chicago jazz lounge, in this romantic drama starring Nia Long, Larenz Tate and Isaiah Washington.

Those People

A painter encounters his first love while hanging with friends at a New York dive bar in this romantic drama about the ability to connect with people, and its contrasting side of the human condition -- never finding that perfect someone to experience true love.

LUV Don't Live Here No More

Longtime friends discuss a public lover's spat, over drinks at a Philly bar in this dramatic narrative about a man who is reluctant to part with the way his life and relationships were before he became severely ill.

Beautiful Something

A published writer interrupts his casual lover's plans to hook up with someone else at a bar in this romantic drama about eternal questions concerning sex, art, love and identity.

All Yours

Co-workers share drinks at a bar during a night out on the town in this romantic comedy drama about the love triangle between an Argentine hustler, a portly Belgian baker and a single mom.

Fourth Man Out

A drunken woman vomits on a car mechanic who’s celebrating his birthday at a bar, in this dramatic comedy about a fun loving group of blue-collar workers in a small town who try to play matchmaker when their buddy comes out of the closet.

What movies have YOU watched that feature bar scenes?

Where was the last bar YOU visited?

A qFLIX Foreign Film Showdown - Romance vs. Religion

The documentary 'A Sinner in Mecca,' directed by Parvez Sharma is playing Saturday 5pm at the qFLIX Film Festival.Going to film festivals is like speed dating. There usually comes a time when you must choose between at least two equally promising love interests. It's a fun problem to solve and one that I'm not surprised to be facing at the qFLIX film festival taking place this week in Philly, now through Sunday, July 12th.

Ever since Joseph Graham's romantic drama Beautiful Something set this summer attraction in motion, the 2015 qFlix program lineup has remained so strong that I have yet to come across a movie I didn't enjoy watching. For those of you who like foreign films, there are some tough choices to make as the festival schedule gets busier by the hour, complete with parties at nearby taverns and Q&A sessions with filmmakers.

Among the candidates are Parvez Sharma's documentary A Sinner in Mecca playing at The Prince Theater while husband-wife directors Israel Cardenas and Laura Amelia Guman's romantic drama Sand Dollars lights up the screen at The University of the Arts' Caplan Theater. Both East Coast Premieres, these Centerpiece Films are showing at 5pm on Saturday. So, which one gets the dinner date? This is a tough call since each movie looks like it has a lot to offer audiences. Shot in the U.S., India and Saudi Arabia, A Sinner in Mecca follows Sharma as he embarks on his Hajj pilgrimage, the greatest accomplishment and aspiration within Islam.

Israel Cardenas and Laura Amelia Guman's romantic drama 'Sand Dollars' is playing Saturday 5pm at the qFLIX Film Festival. The journey for Sharma, a gay muslim, is risky because filming is forbidden in Saudi Arabia and homosexuality is punishable by death. This documentary is described by Sharma as telling the story of Islam "like it has never been told before, having endured the biggest jihad there is -- the struggle with the self."

Shot in the Dominican Republic, Argentina and Mexico, Sand Dollars is about an older wealthy European woman's enchantment with a young Dominican girl trying to escape poverty. qFlix describes this unconventional story as involving "turmoil and entanglements over issues of class, money, control, power, jealousy, possessiveness, inequality and exploitation."

To me, the appeal of A Sinner in Mecca comes in part from it being a dangerous Middle Eastern documentary that a man risked his life to make. One the flip side, I find Sand Dollars  to also be worth watching, not just because of it being a Latin American narrative about a complex relationship rarely told on the big screen, but also because it is among a very limited selection of lesbian films playing at this year's qFlix festival. Still, much like finding a romantic partner, everyone has their own preferences in movies.

WATCH the movie trailers here and decide: 

Which of these two qFlix selections is the best match for YOU?

Tickets are available online at qflixphilly.com and at the Box Office!