Year Round Programming
Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute
Rebel with a Clause
When: Saturday, June 27, 2026, 1:00 PM
Where: Fayetteville Public Library, 401 W. Mountain St., Fayetteville, AR 72701
Cost: FREE
Registration is encouraged but not required.
Registration opens June 6, 2026
Grammar guru Ellen Jovin opened a pop-up grammar table on the streets of Manhattan. So many people stopped to ask questions that she and her filmmaker husband decided to take their show on the road.
Ellen took her table to all 50 states, and people from every imaginable background visited to laugh, argue, and talk about their language insecurities while her husband Brandt Johnson filmed all the grammar action. The public was passionately opinionated, whether they were talking about the proper use of y'all or comma fights. These conversations transcended grammar and brought people a little closer together. In a time of social and political division, the Grammar Table is a place of unity and connection.
Please join Ellen and Brandt in person at this grammar extravaganza. Ellen will be at the Grammar Table in the Event Center lobby starting at 11:30 AM to answer your grammar questions and resolve long-standing family grammar debates. After the screening, Brandt and Ellen will do a Q&A with Kyle Kellams, followed by a signing of Ellen’s national bestseller, also called Rebel with a Clause. Be sure to look for Arkansas in both the movie and the book!
This event is one in a series of documentary screenings put on by the Hot Springs Documentary Film Institute and its partners in celebration of America250. Made possible in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
GIVE ME THE BALL!
An ACS & HSDFF Collab Screening
When: Wednesday, May 27, 2026, 6:30 PM
Where: Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts
Tickets: $15 General | $13 Seniors & Children
World champion tennis trailblazer Billie Jean King has had a game-changing impact on culture and sports. Rare archive and candid interviews with Billie Jean and those closest to her reveal how one woman put changing the world ahead of saving herself.
We're pleased to partner with ACS and The Clinton Foundation for this special screening, a part of our America250 Screening Series.
Cookie Queens
When: May 16, 2026 at 2 PM
Where: Circle Cinema, 10 S. Lewis Ave., Tulsa, OK 74104
A celebration of girlhood and the complexities that come with it, Cookie Queens is a coming-of-age story about the joys, pressures, and pain points woven into one of America’s most cherished rituals: Girl Scout Cookie season. Captivating, candid, and full of heart, the film follows four girls (one being Shannon Elizabeth) ages five to twelve and their families as they navigate the annual whirlwind of selling, striving, and succeeding.
Special Guests:
- Girl Scout Shannon Elizabeth
- Director of Photography Antonio Cisneros
The pre-party kicks off at 1pm in the Circle Gallery, where guests can enjoy Girl Scout cookies baked from the original 1917 recipe created in Muskogee, Oklahoma.
The UAPB Film Festival And The Baddest Speechwriter Of All
When: April 23, 2026 at 6 PM
Where: SJ Parker 1890 Building Auditorium, University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff
On April 23rd, in celebration of America250, UAPB and HSDFF combined forces to co-present two special events in one one unforgettable evening.
Featuring 4 short films directed by UAPB students, followed by a special screening of the brand new documentary short, The Baddest Speechwriter of All. Directed by Oscar-winning director Ben Proudfoot and basketball icon Stephen Curry, the film was recently awarded the Short Film Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.
The Baddest Speechwriter of All, a profile of Dr. Clarence B. Jones, Martin Luther King Jr's lawyer and speechwriter, offers an intimate, insider's view of the Civil Rights Movement.
Special guest: Tim Johnson, Editor, The Baddest Speechwriter of All
Time and Water
ACS & HSDFF Collab Screening
When: Wednesday, April 8, 2026, 6:30 PM
Where: Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts
Tickets: $15 General | $13 Seniors & Children
The Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival and @arkansascinema offer a special co-presentation of TIME AND WATER, the latest documentary from Oscar®-nominated filmmaker Sara Dosa (Fire of Love, The Last Season).
Facing the death of his country’s glaciers and the loss of his beloved grandparents, Icelandic writer Andri Snær Magnason turns his archives into a time capsule to hold what is slipping away — family, memory, time and water.