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Subject Matter, a recently-launched nonprofit organization that supports social issue documentary films and other nonprofits that work on its featured topics, announced their inaugural grantees, awarding a total of 120,000 to four feature-length documentaries and four of the films’ coinciding nonprofits. Subject Matter launched in July, spearheaded by former Tribeca Film Institute leaders Amy Hobby, David Earls, and Colleen Hammond.

The inaugural grantees were determined by a selection committee that included Subject Matter board members actor Jeffrey Wright, entrepreneur Lily Band, Picture Motion and Kinema founder Christie Marchese, documentary director and producer Ferne Pearlstein and social justice and public health grant maker Julia Greenberg, along with guest jurors filmmaker Shola Lynch and film programmer José Rodriguez.

“All of the films the jury considered were formidable,” Wright said. “But we were especially moved by the handling of the stories in the four selected projects and felt that they are intimate, powerful and...

Exclusive: Shout! Studios has acquired all North American rights to the feature documentary Refuge from levelFILM, Katie Couric Media and Artemis Rising Foundation. The multi-platform entertainment distribution and production arm of Shout! Factory plans to release the film in theaters and across all major digital platforms early next year.

Directed and produced by award winners Erin Bernhardt and Din Blankenship, Refuge is set in the most diverse square mile in America — Clarkston, Georgia — and follows a Syrian Kurd, a former Klansman, and a town of refugees who seek belonging in a country that blames them for its problems. Swimming against the current of an increasingly polarized and isolated America, each must decide whether they will risk knowing and being known by those who oppose them. Ultimately, Refuge uncovers what is possible when we leave the security of our tribes, and what is at stake for our country if we don’t.