Based on the idea that drugs have influenced some of our greatest minds (Poe, Baudelaire etc.), this film documents just how influential drug experiences have been on the minds of great writers, poets and thinkers.
The brilliant writing and troubled life of Californian Larry Levis came to an abrupt halt when he died at age 49. Is self-destruction required for a serious life of art? Featuring an original score by Iron and Wine and film excerpts by award-winning Spanish filmmaker Lois Patiño, this innovative documentary explores his childhood working alongside Mexican-American field hands, three marriages, friendships with America’s greatest poets, and his own words for answers.
A fragmented biography, inconclusive, partial, of the brilliant Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges, based on different testimonies: his links with Leonor de Acedevo —his mother— and María Kodama —his second wife—; his vast culture and devout dedication to literature, his and that of others; his country: the politicians and the disloyal military. Borges gradually builds his own impersonation of Borges.
Victor Hugo, un siècle en révolutions
Conversations with four people — an artist, a woman struggling with her identity as a high achiever, an actor, and a priest — exploring their inner worlds, their self-image and how they feel they fit into society.
Hold mig fast. Før jeg forsvinder
Erwin Romulo, the late Alexis Tioseco’s best friend, recalls the events after the critic and his girlfriend Nika Bohinc’s untimely death in their home in Quezon City. Diaz makes use of one long take to allow Romulo an uninterrupted narration of the events. The pain of recalling is palpable.
The life and work of Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges, a long interview, fragments of some of his most significant verses and dramatizations of some of his stories. Borges for everyone.
The Patti Smith Group's Rockpalast performance in 1979 was a live concert broadcast as part of the German Rockpalast series. The band at that time included Patti Smith, Lenny Kaye, Ivan Kral, Jay Dee Daugherty, and Richard Sohl. This performance is notable as it captured the band during a period of their career following the release of their album "Easter" in 1978.
Summer 2004. Location: Copenhagen. The city's old legendary jazz house, Montmartre, is reopening for the first time in more than 30 years. But only for a very short note (2 days). To mark today's occasion, some of the oldest veterans of jazz house come together, along with a handful of younger 'descendants', to take stock of their lives and deliver a life-affirming musical testament, in the form of a series of unique concerts in the old jazz house.
James Franco interviews three experts on the poet Hart Crane, whose life was the subject of his feature The Broken Tower (2011).
This short documentary features poet N Rengarajan, a migrant worker from Pudukkottai, India who sustains a practice of poetry as a way of life while working in the construction sector in Singapore. The film, structured around three of his poems, seeks to visually mirror the rhythm and tone of his writing. Together, verse and visuals strive to draw attention to the poet's acute illuminations of the realities of migrant life.
Robert Burns was well aware of the revolution taking place across the Atlantic as he grew up. The poet was inspired. And America was to be inspired by him. From Abraham Lincoln to Frederick Douglass, and Walt Whitman to Bob Dylan, some of the most significant figures in American politics and culture have cited Burns as an influence.
This film is a documentary portrait of the great Bulgarian Writer and poet Valeri Petrov.
"The Lady in the Book" is Sylvia Plath, a major author of 20th-century American poetry and a feminist icon following her sudden death at the age of thirty. This film offers a glimpse into her world and work, through encounters with women who live today in the places where she grew up.
An intimate documentary about the life and times of Swiss poet and folk singer Mani Matter (1936-1972), seen from his friends' perspective.
A celebration of Dr. Maya Angelou by weaving her words with rare and intimate archival photographs and videos, which paint hidden moments of her exuberant life during some of America’s most defining civil rights moments. From her upbringing in the Depression-era South to her swinging soirees with Malcolm X in Ghana to her inaugural speech for President Bill Clinton, we are given special access to interviews with Dr. Angelou whose indelible charm and quick wit make it easy to love her.
A journey into the BBC archives unearthing glorious performances and candid interviews from some of Britain's greatest poets.
Few of us have stopped to consider the lives of the workers who manufacture the objects that make up our daily lives. We use these objects without knowing anything about the Foxconn plants in which they are made, or even where these factories are located, let alone who works in them. One such worker was the young Chinese poet Xu Lizhi, who, at the age of 24, jumped out of a building not far from where he worked at the Foxconn factory in Shenzhen.
This film is dedicated to Mas-Félipe Delavouët, the poet discovered by Lawrence Durrell, who wrote 14,000 verses in Provençal over a period of thirty years, and who died on November 18, 1990. "The sky, history and Mediterranean and Provençal myths are the inexhaustable wellspring of this man rooted down there, near Salon-de-Provence" (J.-D. Pollet). "Mas-Félipe Delavouët wrote five books in Provençal, 14,000 verses. A sort of "Odyssey". Of myths. What is stunning in him is that he always talks of disappearances. Cities, works, men, writings, television, etc., everything has to disappear. In order to be reborn. No pain. A sort of hand-to-hand of man and nature. During the filming, I would simply throw out some words... For example, one time I said "creation" and he said: "creation doesn't exist..., creation is before me..., I can only read creation"; this sentence describes Delavouët perfectly (J.-D. Pollet, 1989 and 1993).