Loading…
· Public charity
INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FOUNDATION INC
The international documentary association ("ida") supports the vital work of documentary storytellers and champions a thriving and inclusive documentary culture.
$9.7M
Granted FY2023
115
Grants
27
Communities
$494k
Largest
01What you fund
01
What you funded, over time
By grantee IRS cause code (NTEE).
A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 97% of INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FOUNDATION INC’s grantee dollars go to organizations outside the IRS cause taxonomy (common for large international and research funders), so a chart would be mostly “unclassified” and misrepresent the portfolio.
02beneath the categories
Past the labels — and the year it shifted
Beneath the NTEE codes, this is what the grant descriptions actually say.
…and in their own words, year by year
2019
storytellingenterprise production
2020
entertainmentcreatemirabel picturesart mediafiscalcreativefree
2021
fiscalamyenterprise productionjameslucasjohnmedia
2022
fiscalfarlittlepictureschristiansenlucasmedia
2023
sarowitzfiscalloveenterprise productionmichaelcontessa gaylesjames
Words distinctive to each year’s grant purposes (TF-IDF) · event-driven terms in cyan.
03FY2023 · 115 grants
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2023
- Under $10k11 grants · $91k
- $10k–50k57 grants · $1.6M
- $50k–250k39 grants · $3.3M
- $250k+8 grants · $2.8M
$40,400
Median grant
27
States reached
$9.8M
Total assets
Largest grants
- BRAND RENEWABLE LLC$493,962
- LAURA GABBERT$422,420
- NICK MOLLE PRODUCTIONS INC$409,200
- 110TH STREET FILMS LLC$384,585
- KEN ROSENBERG$287,169
- TEN THOUSAND X WISCHES LLC$285,000
- AND SHE COULD BE NEXT LLC$277,500
- MIRA STUDIOS LLC$260,739
- LINDA GOLDSTEIN KNOWLTON$213,900
- SANDRA A CUMMINGS$199,942
- MEDICAL REVOLUTION LLC$154,850
- BEYOND THE PINES LLC$150,148
- REDTAIL PRODUCTION SERVICES LLC$137,175
- FEMINIST FILMS LLC$133,000
- KAREN HAYES$120,000
02The need
04
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
show:
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY18–23) land where the poverty rate runs at 14% — the area typically sits at 10%. 90% of your dollars reach neighborhoods with above-average need. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA, United Way ALICE — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
05
Where the work is directed
The same grants, placed two ways — where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose earmarks the money.
About 10% of INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FOUNDATION INC’s grant dollars are earmarked, by their stated purpose, for a different county than the recipient’s own address — money that lands at a nonprofit in one place but is meant to do its work in another. Read by recipient address, 48% of the giving stays in CA; read by stated purpose it is 46% — less of the work is directed home than the recipients' locations suggest.
INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FOUNDATION INClessmore of its giving
Placed by recipient addressRecipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the foundation’s own 990 grant descriptions.
03Your edge
repeat funding
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
74%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$29M · 134 repeat orgs$10M to everyone else
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +49% since the first grant, against -2% for the ones you funded once.
134 repeat relationships — 65 still active in FY2023, 69 since wound down; 48 grantees were first funded in FY2023 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Re-uppedFunded once
Organizations
134
183
Total granted
$29M
$8.0M
Median revenue growth · since first grant
+49%
-2%
Still filing today
4%
7%
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2023, 74% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $2.1M went to new ones.
RenewedFirst-time
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
Arts & CultureCivil RightsEducationInternationalCommunity ImprovementOther
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as “new.” Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
Backed again, and grew
- UNUnited Nations Association Film Festival5× · 2018–2023 · $546k · revenue +49% · 98% of their budget
- JVJust Vision Inc2× · 2019–2021 · $85k · revenue +10%
- TGTHE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY2× · 2022–2023 · $70k · revenue +11%
Funded once
- TMThe Mosaic Group Incone grant, 2018 · $601k
- TFTeflon Film LLCone grant, 2018 · $559k
- FIFighting in the Dark LLCone grant, 2018 · $290k
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
04Your field
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
1
Film Independent
To support independent filmmakers and to promote independent filmmaking to the public.
Arts & Culture
2
Independent Film Alliance
—
3
International Documentary Foundation Inc
The international documentary association ("ida") supports the vital work of documentary storytellers and champions a thriving and inclusive documentary culture.
Arts & Culture
4
Filmprojects
We are a non-profit dedicated to promoting the advancement of LGBTQ+ people, other marginalized groups, and the film community as an independent film company. We strive to make films and celebrate cinematic works that are culturally…
Arts & Culture
5
Social Justice Film Institute
The mission of the Social Justice Film Institute is to encourage the appreciation of visual storytelling as a tool to social justice issues. Our primary program is the Social Justice Film Festival, a premier film festival in the U.S.…
Arts & Culture
6
The Filmmaker Fund
Philanthropy
7
Baltimore Filmmakers Collective Inc
Arts & Culture
8
Santa Barbara International Film
Sbiff's mission is to engage, enrich, and inspire people through the power of film. sbiff celebrates the art of cinema and provides impactful educational experiences for their local, national, and global communities.
Arts & Culture
9
Independent Arts & Media
Independent Arts & Media's mission is to steward and empower independent arts and media projects that foster community and civic participation, and facilitate cultural engagement and free expression.
Arts & Culture
10
Mamafilm Inc
—
11
Mountainfilm
To use the power of film, art and ideas to inspire audiences to create a better world.
Arts & Culture
12
Plant Your Dreams Productions
Independent film production
—
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Camera News Inc and the most unlike its peers is The George Washington University. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
06the grantee network
19 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue.
2
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
7
Early backer (in before they grew)
19/19
Grantees still filing
12/19
Grew since you first funded
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Other$37,996,587Arts & Culture$1,011,080Education$95,000International$85,000Civil Rights$58,668Community Improvement$9,356
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Sundance InstituteUT80.1× affinity46 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →
Open a dossier: Sundance Institute · Utah Film Center · The Film Collaborative Inc · Threshold Foundation · Redford Center Inc · Chicken & Egg Films Inc · Perspective Media Initiatives Inc · Video Veracity Inc · The Rogovy Foundation · Catapult Film Fund · The Ford Foundation · Tides Foundation
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organisation INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTARY FOUNDATION INC funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
2025
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
0get no government money at all
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–40%
typical government reliance, FY20–25
Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending — grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check. An association, not a claim that your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12–24 months.
05Through Plinth
Through Plinth
Your grantmaking, live and operational
This dossier was generated cold from public filings. In Plinth it’s a working system — every applicant assessed and every grant monitored. Here’s a taste, run on one of your grantees: United Nations Association Film Festival.
Agentic due diligence · confidence × risk
Financial management
insufficient risk
Limited financial data in public filings.
Track record & reputation
medium risk
4 years of Form 990 filings, still active.
Legal standing
low risk
US 501(c)(3); EIN 820744339 on file with current IRS Form 990 filings.
Governance
Live in Plinth
Board composition & governance documents — verified live in Plinth from the applicant.
Compliance & sanctions
Live in Plinth
OFAC / UN sanctions screening — run live in Plinth at assessment.
Program capacity
Live in Plinth
Staffing, M&E and activity alignment — assessed live in Plinth from submitted proposals.
Live · Plinth’s real DD engine
Run the actual assessment on United Nations Association Film Festival, cold from public data.
Generated live from public IRS filings + open web sources by Plinth’s agentic engine. Shown as an illustration of the product, not a formal assessment.
Post-award monitoring · continuous checks
- Awaiting reportFinancial stability— Runway not derivable from filings.
- On trackSustained operations— Filing through 2024; revenue grew over the period.
- WatchReliance on your funding— Your grants peaked at 98% of their budget — load-bearing; a dependency Plinth would track.
- Awaiting reportEvidence of delivery— Plinth collects the grantee's own monitoring reports post-award.
What you see here is static and public. In Plinth it’s operational — the full six-pillar framework on every applicant (with their own documents + live registry and sanctions checks), monitoring dashboards on every award, custom board reports, and eligibility routing for intake.
Agentic due diligenceMonitoring dashboardsCustom board reportsEligibility routing
Preview generated from this grantee’s public IRS filings and independent reporting. Pillars marked “live in Plinth” require the applicant’s submitted documents. Shown as illustration, not a formal assessment.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPro
How do I get to International Documentary Foundation Inc?
Find your warmest path to International Documentary Foundation Inc through people who sit on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the introduction across shared trustees and officers.
Every link is a documented governance overlap in public IRS 990 filings — not a personal network — and each hop carries its own confidence tier. Low-confidence or distant paths are held back rather than guessed.
More from the funding graph
The regranting layer
51% of grant dollars pass through an intermediary
The DAF merry-go-round
$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
Strange bedfellows
the named clusters of US funding
The camps
funders cluster by geography, not ideology
By state
where grant money is based, and what stays home
State money flows
the interactive map of money crossing state lines