Was the legendary playwright William Shakespeare really the author of his acclaimed plays? Or was he just a straw man working for a secret society? Norwegian organist and researcher Petter Amundsen claims to have a solid theory on the subject. Shakespearean scholar Robert Crumpton decides to travel to Norway to meet him.
A very special encounter between legendary American cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond and young French director Pierre Filmon. A personal journey with the brightest shadowmaker and his friends.
A joyful tale filled with music. The rise of radio. The jazz big bands. The legendary clubs and ballrooms. The soundtracks of the great musical films and TV shows. Sex and romance, gangsters, luxury cars and palm trees. From Barcelona to New York, with a stop in Cuba. The birth of Las Vegas. The sound of the maracas. Chihuahuas everywhere. The incredible life story of Xavier Cugat (1900-90).
Seoane
The story of Austrian, Johann "Jack" Unterweger, who wrote a book about his criminal past while serving a life term in prison for assault. In 1974, Unterweger murdered 18-year-old German citizen Margaret Schäfer by strangling her with her own bra, and in 1976 was arrested and sentenced to life in prison.
For the past 40 years, Bruce Beach has been preparing for a nuclear disaster. A bunker of 42 school buses is buried on his property, designed to save humanity. Curious onlookers and interested preppers regularly visit the site named Ark Two, but it's clear that the creator of this decaying shelter is the only one truly convinced of its practicality in the event of an apocalypse. Now that Bruce is in his 80s, he and his wife Jean need to spend more time taking care of their immediate needs than worrying about the future. What could easily be dismissed as evangelical paranoia becomes a tragic yet uplifting story about a risk-taking inventor who has lived without regrets. Sometimes outside-the-box thinkers become millionaires and are recognized for their genius ability to guide us into the future, while others are pushed to the margins. There’s a lot to be learned from both
Although he'd starred in just three films before his untimely death at age 24, James Dean cast a long shadow that came to define cool. Using excerpts from Dean's personal diaries, found footage from screen and wardrobe tests and interviews with those who knew him best (including Dennis Hopper, Dick Van Patten, Graham Nash and Rod Steiger), this fascinating documentary explores the screen icon's lingering mystique.
Madrid, Spain, March 2020. As the merciless disease that plagues the world spreads through the increasingly deserted streets of the city, people barricades themselves in their homes and move on with their lives…
Walter Bonatti is THE mountaineering legend, capable of meeting the great challenges of mountaineering: K2, Drus, G4, Matterhorn, to name a few. But the summits reached are not points of arrival, they are intermediate stages which then push him on a journey around the world, in search of himself. His exploration, starting from the vertical walls, then moved towards horizontal paths and was always expressed towards the interior space where our fears and our desires reside. Where the man, sitting alone in front of himself, must decide to surpass himself or to adapt. And Walter never complied with them, he wrote his own rules and followed them all his life, allowing himself no loopholes or shortcuts. He built himself as a mountaineer, as an explorer, as a photojournalist and as a writer, but always and only with the intention of being an uncompromising man with his hands, his muscles, his heart and his head.
A portrait of photographer Abisag Tüllmann (1935-1996). Abisag Tüllmann’s photographs have become deeply engraved into our cultural memory. Using more than 500 black-and-white photos, all of which taken by Abisag Tüllmann, this cinematic tribute places her life and work in the context of the 1960s to the 1990s. Claudia von Alemann tries to get close to her friend via pictures and archival documents, excerpts from films by Carola Benninghoven, Helke Sander, Alexander Kluge, Günther Hörmann, and Ulrich Schamoni, via the music of composer José Luis de Delás, and via letters and memories, such as those of photographer Barbara Klemm, who still vividly remembers her former Frankfurt colleague.
Follow the winding career and personal life of professional poker phenom Daniel Negreanu, who rose from humble roots to become the game's top ace.
Invasion 1897 is an epic film based on the invasion of the Benin Kingdom by the British Empire in 1897 and the looting the priceless ancient artifacts of the Benin kingdom.
An in-depth feature length documentary of one of America's greatest and least understood authors, Nelson Algren. This never before told compelling life story reveals a unique literary voice through rare interviews, archival footage and the gritty noirish voice of Algren on Algren. Kurt Vonnegut and Studs Terkel, literary giants in their own right, sing songs of praise along with many of his old friends, which makes this film seem like a hymn from the grave. This stylishly produced film embeds us in the 1950's cold war world when Algren worked. Algren's touching love affair with Simone de Beauvoir weaves it's way through the film along with the damaging impact of FBI and CIA surveillance.
Portrait of an exceptional musical talent and one of opera’s biggest stars, mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli. With interviews from her illustrious friends and colleagues from the world of classical music: Daniel Barenboim, Antonio Pappano, Gustavo Dudamel and more.
Legendary western swing band leader Bob Wills rose up in the Great Depression to fame in Oklahoma and Texas that soon swept the entire nation. The documentary FIDDLIN MAN offers a full biography of Wills, using a vast array of on camera interviews with his friends, family, and fellow musicians. The film also draws on a wealth of rare archival footage.
Sachin Tendulkar plays himself in this sports-docudrama that traces the life and times of one of the world’s biggest cricket phenomenas.
NHK has followed baseball sensation Shohei Ohtani closely since his 2018 Major League debut. We look at Ohtani’s ability to both pitch and bat at the highest level. We hear from those who have supported him on and off the field and examine the importance of his father’s training regime. Join us behind the scenes at such pivotal points as Ohtani’s battle to recover from elbow surgery and reclaim his place as a baseball virtuoso like no other.
Barely 22, Franz Klammer finds himself at the “eye of the storm” when he shows up for the men’s downhill competition at the 1976 Winter Olympic Games. Since the previous season the charismatic newcomer has won virtually every race. The pressure from the media and the public and the hopes of an entire nation are off the scales. His sponsor is pushing him to switch equipment right before the competition, the weather is getting steadily worse, and his toughest rivals know that Franz has to do better than just a flawless run. Franz senses that he has to find his own path and that only the love of his life can give him the strength to do that. This is the most important race of his life in which he skis a line that nobody even thought was possible and which will make him to this day a legend in the sport of downhill skiing.
Leslie Caron, beloved star of Gigi and An American in Paris, is one of the last witnesses to the golden age of American cinema of the mid 20th century. Discovered by Gene Kelly when she was a teenager, she became one of the great talents in the worlds of film, dance, and theatre, still performing to this day! The film reveals a story told through the prism of a living legend who reveals secrets of her work and life- a world of contradictions, ambitions and dreams, lived by one of its most luminous personalities.
Programming prodigy and information activist Aaron Swartz achieved groundbreaking work in social justice and political organizing. His passion for open access ensnared him in a legal nightmare that ended with the taking of his own life at the age of 26.