Independent Lens

In this excerpt from the Independent Lens documentary, Summer Pasture, Tibetan herder, Locho, describes how he met his wife, Yama. While womanizing and carousing may not be entirely behind him, these two have started a family together and share the hardships and pleasures of nomadic life as two connected by karma.

Tibetan nomad Locho explains that, while summer is welcome as a much-needed reprieve for herders, all seasons -- even the hard ones -- define who he and his fellow nomads are in this excerpt from the Independent Lens documentary, Summer Pasture.

In this video companion to the Independent Lens documentary, Circo, members of the band Calexico, Joey Burns and John Convertino, describe the creative process behind scoring the film, including finding a musical voice for each personality onscreen. Also featured in the video is a performance at the Tucson premiere of the film.

In this video companion to the Independent Lens documentary, Circo, filmmaker Aaron Schock describes how he accidentally stumbled upon the subjects of his film while making a completely different documentary in Mexico. He also realized after commencing the project, that the film would be the story not just of a struggling family business, but of also of a troubled marriage.

During some downtime during the Ponce Family Circus's tour of the Mexican countryside, the children explore a nearby campground and palatial estate in this excerpt from the documentary, Circo.

In this video update to the Independent Lens documentary, Circo, we learn that Ivonne agreed to return to the family circus on one condition: that they break away from her husband Tino's parents and form their own circus. Here, the Ponce family attends the premiere of the film at the Morelia International Film Festival.

In this scene from the Independent Lens documentary, CIrco, Tino and Ivonne Ponce struggle with the challenges of raising a family of their own while running a touring circus in Mexico started by Tino's parents.

For generations the Ponce family has run one of Mexico's traditional family circuses. Ringmaster Tino struggles to keep the family business alive as life on the road and mounting debts threaten to pull his marriage apart.

For the Ponces, circuses literally run in the family from generation to generation. In this scene from the Independent Lens documentary, Circo, we follow Tino and his family to a Day of the Dead reunion at his grandmother's home and pay tribute to the late grandfather, his family's original ringmaster.

In 1933, a white buffalo was born on the National Bison Range in Montana. He was named "Big Medicine" by the Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Valley. White buffalo are sacred to many Native American tribes. In the companion video to the documentary "Facing the Storm," we see a special ceremony held in 2006 commemorating this earlier appearance.

Watch an excerpt from the Independent Lens film, Facing the Storm, in which the American Bison is described as a window looking out onto a vanished world and a living symbol of the American West.

By the early 1880s, buffalo were on the verge of extinction. Ironically, one man, William T. Hornaday, decided that hunting down and stuffing them was the best way to preserve these majestic animals. During one hunting expedition, Native Americans decorated the body of one of fallen buffalo, revealing their reverence for the buffalo.

The bison is an enduring symbol of America, and yet it stands on the brink of collapse. Cattle ranching, urban sprawl, and sport hunting has squeezed the beast from the Great Plains it once dominated. Is there room for the American bison in America anymore?

Former Vice-Chairman of General Motors, Bob Lutz, was blamed for killing off the EV1 electric car. But he came around to champion the Chevy Volt.

Every revolution needs its Napolean. At Nissan World Headquarters the world's most formidible car mogul, Carlos Ghosn, enters the electric vehicle race not with passion or vision, but with sheer capitialist drive.

In 2006, thousands of new electric cars were purposely destroyed by the same auto companies that built them. Today, fewer than six years later, the electric car is back ... with a vengeance.

CEO and founder of Tesla Motors, Entrepreneur Elon Musk, brings movie-star energy and sex appeal to the battle royale over the electic car. He's been compared to comic book hero Tony Stark, the millionaire-turned-superhero of "Iron Man" comic book fame.

Greg "Gadget" Abbott and wife Charlotte Jackson are fighting the good fight in electric car conversion ... one vehicle at a time. They're amping up the jalopies of yesteryear into the dream rides of tomorrow. But can they compete with industry giants and angel investor-backed startups?

Follow the race among major car-makers to make and market electric cars.

In this excerpt from the Independent Lens documentary, When the Drum Is Beating, members of the band Septentrional hold a planning meeting to discuss how they can overcome the obstacles of limited resources and personnel.