From Manila with Love

Expedition China invites you on location in some of the world's most intense, hard-to-reach environments with the filmmakers of Disneynature's big-screen adventure Born in China.

Initially, Ambivalent Future was intended as a film about the production of Kiyoshi Kurosawa's "Bright Future". But director Fujii has taken the "behind the scenes"-concept to unprecedented heights with this unique documentary offering a close look into the world of Kiyoshi Kurosawa, the auteur. Scenes from the surprisingly low key and relaxed production of "Bright Future" are of course sprinkled liberally throughout the documentary, but between these we are treated to interesting and revealing interviews with actors, producers and Kurosawa's many other collaborators. And perhaps the most surprising thing of all is how much of Kurosawa there is, talking candidly about his working methods and the philosophy behind it all.

Four Belgian-Moroccan filmmakers in their thirties produce their latest film. Since adolescence they have managed to produce over thirty low-budget movies in which they often have played the main characters. Their movies are not only the sum of their fears and desires, but also a way of projecting an image of themselves towards their own community and the outside world. When one of them decides to radically change his life, their friendship and the future of their common cinema goals are threatened.

It’s a story that made headlines: “Festival Film Banned!” In the late 1960s, the majority of films screened in Australia were censored in some way or another. DELETE the lovemaking. CUT the ‘Open Mouth Kissing’. REMOVE the fondling of the breast sequence. Deemed too ‘inappropriate’ and ‘morally corrupting’ for Australian eyes, these scenes were hacked from feature films and locked away in government archives. When young Sydney Film Festival director David Stratton attempted to program a Swedish film that the censors believed contained ACTUAL sex, a scandal erupted. In a mash-up of never-before-seen banned clippings, SMUT HOUNDS tells the story of how seventy-seven seconds of celluloid scandalised a government and transformed Australian cinema.

Short film by Sandi Mitchell showing footage of the ruins of the NFB's Halifax office after it was destroyed in a fire in 1991.

A look at the legendary Czech sound designer and his profession. Editor and documentary filmmaker Adéla Špaljová has her father Ivo Špalj talk about his life, career, and working methods. Over the course of his long life, sound designer Ivo Špalj (*1940) has collaborated on hundreds of films and become a mentor for at least one generation of men and women behind the mixing board. This gentle documentary also shows “Engi” (as he is known to his colleagues) again working with Jan Švankmajer, whose films he has lent their typical, dense, and sophisticated sound mix.

Lars von Trier challenges his mentor, filmmaker Jørgen Leth, to remake Leth’s 1967 short film The Perfect Human five times, each with a different set of bizarre and challenging rules.

Film 33 is the most advanced film class in a community college where the entire class teams up to make a short film. In 2023 Spring, the 23rd short film is being made. This epic documentary details the highs and lows of the production of this short film, and all the dramatic events that occurred.

Lloyd Kaufman and the Troma Team struggle against incompetence, conflict and "the man" in order to complete their latest piece of art, Terror Firmer. The documentarians hold nothing back in the fight for truly independent cinema.

This is not a documentary about the making of Midnight Cowboy. It is about a humane and groundbreaking masterpiece and the flawed but gifted people who made it. It is about a troubled era of cultural ferment, social and political change, about broken dreams and strivers, then and now. It is about an era that made a movie and a movie that made an era.

During the production of my Jabba documentary short, Slimy Piece of Worm Ridden Filth, I was put in contact with Toby Philpott’s colleague and Jabba’s right hand man. Literally, his right hand man, puppeteer Dave Barclay. Dave helped us, along with Toby (Jabba’s left arm), Mike Edmonds (tail) and John Coppinger (animatronic engineer) to reconstruct just how it was inside that filthy Hutt. And of course it couldn’t have been done without the amazing work of Eletrographica aka Pete Starling, who rendered all that information into a multilayered illustration. Dave was so impressed with the Jabba documentary that he asked if I would consider doing one on Yoda. Dave aged just 19 in 1979 was involved in building and puppeteering Yoda for The Empire Strikes Back. After a few email exchanges, Dave kindly found time between his work on The Muppet Show for an interview.

Ostensibly a portrait of a place where the artist had resided until recently, the new film by Robert Beavers conjures not only the memory but also the physical presence of those who have previously stayed there. Adhering to a solitary intimacy while simultaneously acting as an ode to human endeavour and shared impulses toward fulfillment through art, Listening to the Space in my Room is a moving testament to existence (whose traces are found in literature, music, filmmaking, gardening) and our endless search for meaning and authenticity. The film's precise yet enigmatic sound-image construction carries a rare emotional weight.

On-set documentary on the making of Ingmar Bergman's The Touch.

An intimate look at cinematographic creation, this visual essay shares with us secrets of the legendary Canadian animator Norman Mclaren and his personal view of filmmaking.

A documentary exploring the birth, death and resurrection of illustrated movie poster art. Through interviews with a number of key art personalities from the 70s and 80s, as well as many modern, alternative poster artists, “Twenty-Four by Thirty-Six” aims to answer the question: What happened to the illustrated movie poster? Where did it disappear to, and why? In the mid 2000s, filling the void left behind by Hollywood’s abandonment of illustrated movie posters, independent artists and galleries began selling limited edition, screenprinted posters — a movement that has quickly exploded into a booming industry with prints selling out online in seconds, inspiring Hollywood studios to take notice of illustration in movie posters once more.

A short documentary about the making of D. W. Griffith's controversial 'The Birth of a Nation'.

A fascinating glimpse into Truffaut’s creative process and how his life informed his art, told from the perspectives of those who knew him best.

A fascinating glimpse into Truffaut’s creative process and how his life informed his art, told from the perspectives of those who knew him best.

Behind the chaos and creativity of the making of 2003's THE MANSON FAMILY directed by Jim Van Bebber. This feature-length documentary was included on the film's unrated DVD and Blu-ray releases from Severin Films.

In this documentary about low-budget filmmaking in upstate New York, you'll learn how affordable digital-video technology has changed the lives of the artists behind action flicks, monster movies, nonfiction stories, and comedies. "Every Pixel Tells a Story" introduces viewers to a wide range of independent filmmakers, all of whom prove that with a little ingenuity, access to the right technology, and plenty of tenacity, filmmakers can still practice their craft 3,000 miles from Hollywood. In fact, "Every Pixel Tells a Story" is an example of what can be accomplished on digital video. Producer-director Peter Hanson shot and edited the movie in a matter of weeks using a camcorder, a computer editing system, and a $30 microphone from Radio Shack, all while spending a fraction of what the documentary would have cost had it been shot on film.