Prince George's Visit to Scunthorpe

The COVID crisis triggered a real war against the virus. Civilian or military, medical, paramedical or logistical personnel all joined forces to try to deal with it. At the Hôpital d'Instructions des Armées in Percy, in the south of Paris, this real tour de force is both human and technical. On every floor, the staff was confronted with this crisis situation requiring cohesion, adaptation, commitment, immediate decisions, unprecedented actions... with a common objective: to unite to save lives. What has this crisis changed in their profession?

December 1981: Helmut Schmidt, chancellor of the FRG, visits the chairman of the state council of the GDR, Erich Honecker. The experiences with the visit of Willy Brandt in Erfurt in 1970 have warned the state leadership: Euphoria for a federal chancellor is out of the question this time. For December 13th, the protocol plans a visit to Güstrow. The Christmas market, the Barlach memorial, and the cathedral of Güstrow are on the agenda. The enormous machinery of the ministry of state security is set into motion in order to ensure the “safety of the guest”. Erich Mielke: “Never before, such a high effort was necessary as here in Güstrow.” People are temporarily arrested, inhabitants placed under house arrest, Stasi employees dressed up as “visitors of the Christmas market”. And like that, the media was supposed to get presented with a favourable image of the GDR. A reconstruction of three hours of state visit to Güstrow.

Born 3 months premature and weighing only 1 pound 12 ounces, Mollie was given a 1 percent chance of survival. Through months of struggle, which included nearly one year in the neonatal unit of Grand Rapids, Michigan's Helen Devos Children's Hospital, Mollie proves that miracles happen. "Preemie" highlights the struggles, the pain of having a preemie, and the stories of how strong the smallest of babies are.

A documentary about the corrupt health care system in The United States who's main goal is to make profit even if it means losing people’s lives. "The more people you deny health insurance the more money we make" is the business model for health care providers in America.

If We Knew is a documentary about paediatricians in an intensive-care unit for newborns. A film about the compassion needed to heal the sick and occasionally needed to hasten the death of a child.

Four young Americans who've each suffered a Traumatic Brain Injury emerge from their comas at a New Jersey medical facility. Their eyes may be open, but now the real challenge for each of the patients, their families, their doctors and their therapists begins. Brain healing isn't predictable, we're told, and certainly is not guaranteed. So with each 'major' step forward that is observed (opening one's eyes, bending a thumb upon command, vocalizing a word, answering a question correctly) comes a sense of jubilant relief and hope from the families of these patients, but as we soon see, the more a patient progresses, the more difficult things can be for all involved. Moments of faith & hope contrast with disappointments & frustrations, moments of confidence with moments of doubt. It's difficult to watch, and unimaginable to have to ever live through.

Things are busy at the Paris hospital where young psychiatrist Jamal and his colleagues work. The place is run down, the staff are exhausted, budgets are constantly being slashed. You know the story, but you’ve rarely seen it conveyed as engagingly as in ‘On the Edge’, which employs a handheld camera and meaningful, artistic interventions to observe the daily routine at the psychiatric ward. The deeply sympathetic Jamal is an everyday hero with an exemplary, humanistic disposition, for whom the most important prerequisites for mental health – and for a healthy society in general – are good relationships with other people. He puts his philosophy into practice by listening patiently, giving good advice and organising theatre exercises based on Molière. Realism and idealism, however, are in balance for the young doctor, at least as long as the institutional framework holds up.

Kazuo Nishii, renowned editor and photography critic, died in 2001 of stomach cancer. Two months earlier he contacted Naomi Kawase, whose works he admired, to document the remaining weeks of his life. Kawase visits him in the hospital and films the progression of his sickness and the conversations between the two.

The small regional hospitals of Vevey, Montreux, Aigle and Monthey are closing in favor of the new, larger, more adapted and more modern hospital in Rennaz. As the construction of the new hospital progresses, emergency physicians Eric and Frédérique tell us about their daily life in the face of illness and death.

A bright outlook in Birkenhead for a thriving British enterprise.

Harrow’s extraordinary and opulent pageant, and seaside holidays on the south coast.

A small rural hospital in Japan battles an international cybercriminal gang that is holding them ransom with their stolen patient data.

Cut off from his loved ones due to the strict COVID-19 lockdown at the long-term care facility where he lives, a quadriplegic rabbi is filmed by his daughter while reflecting on love, mortality and longing.

Der lange Weg ans Licht

The daily workins of Austria's Danube Hospital.

At the consulting service for immigrants at the Avicenne Hospital in suburban Paris, we observe the sorrow and powerlessness of the immigrants who come here.

“Novanta Giorni” to make a life-changing choice. Two opposing worlds brought into dialogue in this documentary by Women from all walks of life turn to the “Cervello” Hospital in Palermo, Sicily, to terminate their pregnancies while the pro-life center ostracizes this practice and those who instead understand and help in this journey...

A variety of patients are brought in by ambulance 24 hours everyday. In Japan, ambulance as a part of municipal fire departments, do not charge for transportation to hospitals. Under the motto of "emergency care that never refuses," the Ekisaikai Hospital in Nagoya accepts everyone from the elderly with no relatives to those in need. However, the number of ambulances carrying critically ill patients reached a record high due to the pandemic. Patients rejected by other hospitals are pouring into the Ekisaikai Hospital, and the beds are filling up fast... Documentary filmmaker Takuro Adachi observes doctors and patients in various generations and background, and listens to their real voices.

This 1959 documentary short is a frank portrait of the daily operations inside the Montreal General Hospital’s emergency ward.

As debate in Canada and the world rages over health care, Hospital City offers a moving, human portrait of the people whom the issues touch most closely.