Tim and Susan Have Matching Handguns

This year’s winner of the award for Best Documentary at the Tribeca Film Festival, “Point and Shoot” tells the engrossing story of Matthew VanDyke, a timid young American with OCD who traveled across the Middle East for a self-described “crash course in manhood,” filming every step of the way. His journey eventually led him to Libya, where he became perhaps the most unlikely member of the revolution against Gadhafi. Camera in one hand, gun in the other, Matthew captured the fight on the front lines—until being taken prisoner and held in solitary confinement for six months. A remarkably gifted storyteller, director Marshall Curry (“If a Tree Falls,” winner of the Founders Award for Best Documentary at TCFF ‘11) skillfully combines VanDyke’s footage with interviews that offer insight into his personal transformation, and examine ideas of masculinity and what drives people to take part in war.

Featuring the top award-winning documentaries from Sundance and Tribeca, these eight powerful shorts include “One Year Lease,” a cautionary tale about renting an apartment in New York City, told through the voicemail messages of the tenants’ cat-loving landlady; “A Hole in the Sky,” a stirring portrait of life for a young woman in rural Somalia; “The Silly Bastard Next to the Bed,” a stranger-than-fiction account of one of the funniest phone calls ever made from the Oval Office during the Kennedy administration (it would make an excellent script for an episode of “Veep”); and tailor-made for the summer of the World Cup final, “Maradona ’86,” which tells the fascinating story of a controversial soccer icon.

Over the past decade, with conflict escalating throughout the Middle East, enterprising Israeli arms companies have grown exponentially on business generated by their homeland’s ongoing conflict with Palestine; they now rank among the biggest weapons manufacturers in the world, selling tools of destruction indiscriminately to countries and regimes around the globe. Israeli filmmaker Yotam Feldman interviews key players from the past and present of the arms industry, and their testimonies reveal chilling stories of weapons testing on Palestinian communities in the name of advancing military technology and profits. This brave documentary turns a critical lens on the lucrative business of war and occupation, which has become an indispensable part of Israel’s growing economy and political capital.