The 26th annual Woodstock Film Festival (WFF) is currently underway, bringing a diverse selection of new films from emerging and veteran artists alike to venues in Woodstock, Rosendale, Kingston, and Saugerties through October 19. Among the 66 narrative and documentary feature films to screen this year, we have rounded up the eight science and technology-themed films to look out for below, with descriptions excerpted from the festival’s programmers.

WFF also boasts several special events, including an annual awards ceremony where the winners for Best Documentary Feature, Best Ultra Indie, and Best Short Documentary – as selected by a jury – are revealed and celebrated. The event will also honor previously announced award recipients: director Ira Sachs (Fiercely Independent Award), documentarian Laura Poitras (Freedom of Expression Award), and filmmaking duo Tia Lessin and Carl Deal (Art of Activism Award).

Notable artists and film professionals will also lend their expertise to ten panels October 17-19. Covering a range of topics from censorship to the future of film, the panel series kicks off today with Defining Success in Documentary Filmmaking. Participants include Ryan White (GOOD NIGHT OPPY) and Emmy, Independent Spirit, and Peabody Award–winning documentarian Geeta Gandbhir. Already garnering Oscar buzz, Gandbhir’s highly acclaimed new film THE PERFECT NEIGHBOR is available to stream on Netflix as of today, following its limited theatrical release on October 10 and rapturous receptions at Sundance and New York Film Festival earlier this year.

Other highlights at the festival include the Hudson Valley premiere of Sloan grantee Tasha Van Zandt’s documentary A LIFE ILLUMINATED. Van Zandt took the film to new depths – quite literally. Innovating new techniques to film over 3,000 feet below sea level, Van Zandt was able to capture stunning footage of marine biologist Dr. Edie Widder during submersible research dives that would prove critical to advancing our understanding of bioluminescence in the deep sea. Read our recent interview with Van Zandt here.

Van Zandt is not the only Sloan grantee with work at the festival. Urvashi Pathania‘s short film SKIN makes its East Coast premiere at WFF. HOT AIR, a previous short of Pathania’s about Eunice Newton Foote, won a Sloan Production Award at USC in 2019 and can be streamed in its entirety here.

DOCUMENTARY

A LIFE ILLUMINATED. Dir. Tasha Van Zandt. Hudson Valley Premiere. “After a lifetime of unveiling the deep sea’s most elusive secrets, pioneering marine biologist Dr. Edie Widder descends 3,300 feet into the ocean's depths on her most groundbreaking mission yet: to capture a bioluminescent phenomenon that could transform our understanding of life on Earth. “

Still from A LIFE ILLUMINATED. Courtesy of WFF.

FATAL WATCH. Dirs. Mark Benjamin, Katie Carpenter. New York Premiere. “Dead men tell the ocean’s secrets. Four marine observers vanish at sea under suspicious circumstances. This investigation uncovers why. From Fiji to Ghana, Spain to the US, this film reveals the underbelly of the global tuna trade, where profit outweighs human life and environmental destruction is buried beneath the waves.”

RIVER OF GRASS. Dir. Sasha Wortzel. Hudson Valley Premiere. “. . . Through intimate cinematography and interviews with conservationists, biologists, and Indigenous voices, the film captures the slow unraveling of one of America’s most vital wetlands.”

Still from RIVER OF GRASS. Courtesy of WFF.

STARMAN. Dir. Robert Stone. New York Premiere. “You won’t find a more dynamic documentary subject than NASA robotics engineer turned best-selling science fiction author Gentry Lee. STARMAN gives the octogenarian Lee the ideal platform to ponder life’s big questions including the biggest of all: are we alone in the universe?”

THE KEEPER. Dir. Jon Bowermaster. World Premiere “New York’s Hudson River stars in Jon Bowermaster’s environmental documentary THE KEEPER about America’s ‘first river’. The film follows patrol boat captain John Lipscomb who has been the eyes and ears of the environmental watchdog group Riverkeeper and is fast approaching retirement. We learn that while the River might look more beautiful and cleaner than ever, the news isn’t all that great.”

NARRATIVE

NUREMBERG. Dir. James Vanderbilt. “The Allies, led by the unyielding chief prosecutor Robert H. Jackson (Michael Shannon), have the task of ensuring the Nazi regime answers for the unveiled horrors of the Holocaust at the Nuremberg trials, while a US Army psychiatrist (Rami Malek) is locked in a dramatic psychological duel with former Reichsmarschall Herman Goring (Russell Crowe).”

THE SECRET AGENT. Dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho. Hudson Valley Premiere. "Kleber Mendonça Filho’s political thriller is set in 1970s Brazil during the dictatorship. Leading actor Wagner Moura (CIVIL WAR) shines as a disgraced engineer who returns to his hometown, Recife, to see his son and confront a corrupt establishment that ruined his career.”

Still from THE SECRET AGENT. Courtesy of WFF.

• Science Films at True/False 2025
• Sloan Film Collection: Celebrating Women Scientists Born in July
• Sloan-Supported Films on Pioneering Women in Science