Under a Million Stars
Experts and homeless neighbors alike bust myths about Seattle’s homelessness crisis in a deeply reported, humanistic dispatch from the front lines.
Recipient of a 2025 SIFF Grant for Courageous Documentary Filmmaking. The 2026 Grant Cycle opens May 15 on the SIFF website.
Director Chezik Tsunoda scheduled to attend.
Tickets
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Saturday, May 9, 2026
- Limited Availability
- On Standby
- Matinee
Sunday, May 10, 2026
- Limited Availability
- On Standby
- Matinee
Homelessness was declared a civil state of emergency in Seattle in 2015. Since then, the number of people sleeping outside has actually risen by more than 67 percent. Chezik Tsunoda's documentary Under a Million Stars, which received the Satterberg Foundation's Courageous Documentary Filmmaking Grant, is a deeply reported yet humanistic dispatch from the front lines of this crisis. Armed with facts and empathy, the film busts pernicious and all-too-common myths about homelessness.
Tsunoda amplifies the voices of researchers, activists, elected officials, and, most critically, homeless people speaking for themselves. Through this tapestry of perspectives, Under a Million Stars probes the roots of the homelessness crisis and examines promising solutions. The film ultimately exposes how homelessness stems from systemic failures: our systems of care, choked with red tape, have failed the homeless, while a dysfunctional housing market has displaced low-income residents. As Gregg Colburn, author of the influential treatise Homelessness is a Housing Problem, sums it up, "Homelessness thrives in affluence, not poverty." Under a Million Stars is a damning indictment, a call to action, and a course-corrective to our discourse around homelessness.
—Alison Jean Smith
- Director: Chezik Tsunoda
- Principal Cast: Tye Reed, David Delgado, Danny, Star
- Premiere Status: World
- Country: USA
- Year: 2026
- Running Time: 77 min.
- Producer: Gilad Thaler
- Screenplay: Patrick Mannion, Gilad Thaler, Chezik Tsunoda
- Cinematographers: Paul Mailman, John Miller
- Editors: Patrick Mannion
- Music: RZA
- Website: Official Film Website
- Filmography: Drowning in Silence (2022)
- Language: English
Packaged Films
Facing the Sun
USA | 2025 | 12 min. | Mathew CerfAn enigmatic unhoused man spends his days giving free haircuts to the homeless—offering a lesson in love, and a window into the complex human dynamics at the center of America’s housing crisis.