Participant’s ‘White Coat Rebels’ and ‘My Name is Pauli Murray’ to Screen at AFI Docs 2021

AFI Docs, the non-fiction film festival held each June in the D.C. area, announced a slate that includes four world premieres, including Obama: In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union.

Other feature film and series world premieres include The Slow Hustle, from director Sonja Sohn, focusing on a corruption scandal in the Baltimore police department; Participant’s White Coat Rebels, from Greg Barker, looking at the outsized influence of Big Pharma and the medical professionals pushing back against it; and the previously announced Naomi Osaka, which will open the festival. Directed by Garrett Bradley, the project profiles the tennis star.

The festival runs from June 22-27, with a mixture of virtual and in-person screenings. The latter will be at the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center in Silver Spring, MD.

The festival will close with the previously announced close with Cusp, and the centerpiece screening will be Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain.

The lineup includes 77 films from 23 countries, with 52% of the films directed by women, 40% by Black, indigenous and people of color 18% by LGBTQ directors.

Dawn Porter will take part in this year’s Charles Guggenheim Symposium, with a screening of her film, Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer.