Sha’Carri Richardson is fast. Really, really, really fast. At the 2021 U.S. Olympic trials, Sha’Carri, only 21 at the time, ran the 100-meter finals in 10.84 seconds, more than a tenth of a second faster than her closest competitor. In “Sub Eleven Seconds”, his artfully crafted documentary portrait of this superstar athlete at a moment of peak performance, the director Bafic captures Sha’Carri’s split-second athletic brilliance, refreshing honesty and totally original style.

As part of our focus on NextGen filmmakers — up-and-coming talents in the documentary world — “Top Docs” is pleased to be partnering with the 28th Palm Springs International ShortFest  (June 21 – 27) to feature several filmmakers with outstanding documentary shorts in this year’s festival. In this episode, Ken and Bafic explore a wide range of filmmaking topics, from the lessons the filmmaker gleaned from Francis Ford Coppola about identifying the core idea of one’s film (in this case, time itself); to Errol Morris’s famous interviewing device, the Interrotron; and the huge influence of the Texas-based music genre “chopped and screwed” on the film’s most critical sequence. “Sub Eleven Seconds” screened as part of the ShortFest documentary shorts block called “Truth Be Told”.

Check out the film at NewYorker.com or YouTube and then take the time to listen to our podcast.

Hidden Gem: Lock Off by Akwasi Poku.

Follow us on Twitter:

@BAFIC

@topdocspod

The Presenting Sponsor of "Top Docs" is Netflix.  Listen to our recent conversations with directors whose documentaries are currently on Netflix:

• Rory Kennedy on "Downfall: The Case Against Boeing"