To Fly!

In 1886, the United States Department of Agriculture ambitiously commissioned watercolour illustrations of over 3,000 fruit cultivars. In 2019, this collection was digitized. Mesmerizingly detailed, these images now tell an incredible story about the little-known talent of botanical illustrators, and how their work planted the seeds for intellectual ownership over agricultural innovations.

A group of people are standing along the platform of a railway station in La Ciotat, waiting for a train. One is seen coming, at some distance, and eventually stops at the platform. Doors of the railway-cars open and attendants help passengers off and on. Popular legend has it that, when this film was shown, the first-night audience fled the café in terror, fearing being run over by the "approaching" train. This legend has since been identified as promotional embellishment, though there is evidence to suggest that people were astounded at the capabilities of the Lumières' cinématographe.

Ra Paulette digs cathedral-like, 'eighth wonder of the world' art caves into the sandstone cliffs of Northern New Mexico. Each creation takes years to complete, and each is a masterwork. But patrons who have commissioned caves have cut off nearly all of his projects due to artistic differences. Fed up, Ra has chosen to forego all commissions to create his own Magnum Opus, a massive 10-year project.

The story of Alice Herz-Sommer, a German-speaking Jewish pianist from Prague who was, at her death, the world's oldest Holocaust survivor. She discusses the importance of music, laughter, and how to have an optimistic outlook on life.

Director Eric Smith documents the life and wild fashion sense of Miami Beach's Irene Williams.

On December 4, 1872, the unmanned Mary Celeste was found adrift in the Atlantic with its cargo fully intact. The mystery of this "ghost ship" remained unanswered for over 135 years. What happened to the Mary Celeste is widely regarded as the most famous mystery of the sea. Watch it unfold to its stunning conclusion, at last.

An essay film on the editing of erotic movies.

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time. (Silent short, voiced in 1937 and 1996.)

Kieslowski’s later film Dworzec (Station, 1980) portrays the atmosphere at Central Station in Warsaw after the rush hour.

Filmmaker Alain Resnais documents the atrocities behind the walls of Hitler's concentration camps.

A documentary covering the trials of James Hanratty, perceived to be wrongly accused at the time and one of the final eight people in the UK to be executed before capital punishment was effectively abolished.

An identity picture and the memory of Contla village through its Día de Muertos festivity. Celebration where the making of traditional bread, an offering colocation, and the embellishment of their family get mixed with mysticism and the yearning of the people community, preserving a tradition that interweaves for moments as a remembering in the México's heart.

A desktop documentary that focuses on the Golden Record that NASA sent into space in the late 1970s. The piece reflects on issues such as the power of scientific discourse to produce revisions of the world, the evolution of the concept of the archive and the resignification of borders in the rhetoric of space colonialism.

Short doc in which Anthony Slide (Andre De Toth on Andre De Toth) discusses the work of Andre De Toth in general and The Indian Fighter in particular.

The Oil Symphony is a film about the heroic efforts of Azerbaijani labourers drilling for oil.

A short documentary covering the conclave and election of Pope Pius XII.

As part of a geography course, students learn to do topographical surveys. A stroll at the Champlain lookout, in the Outaouais region, will allow them to familiarize themselves with the different methods in use from Samuel de Champlain to the present day. Finally, a visit to the Directorate of Energy, Mines and Resources Canada, in Ottawa, will introduce them to a new device capable of automatically drawing contour lines. This film describes this new technique of digital mapping and gives us an overview of the progress it brings in this field.

As an omnibus of short films, Art Through Our Eyes is inspired by the art collection found at the National Gallery Singapore. Each of the five directors – Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Brillante Mendoza, Eric Khoo, Ho Yuhang and Joko Anwar – handpicked a masterpiece from the 19th and 20th century as inspiration for their short films.

Impressions of a turbulent period in youth.

According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, one veteran dies by suicide in America every 80 minutes. While only 1% of Americans has served in the military, former service members account for 20% of all suicides in the U.S. Based in Canandaigua, NY and open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the Veterans Crisis Line receives more than 22,000 calls each month from veterans of all conflicts who are struggling or contemplating suicide. This timely documentary spotlights the traumas endured by America’s veterans, as seen through the work of the hotline’s trained responders. CRISIS HOTLINE captures extremely private moments, where the professionals, many of whom are themselves veterans or veterans’ spouses, can often interrupt the thoughts and plans of suicidal callers to steer them out of crisis.