M2M's first original long-form documentary, Battle at Versailles, follows an event in 1973 at Palace of Versailles where top French designers such as Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Cardin faced of against American newcomers Oscar de la Renta, Bill Blass, Anne Klein and Halston. That pitted France’s best designers against the best America had to offer. It was the first time the fashion world's gaze was fixated on American design.
How can structures, which take up defined, rigid portions of space, make us feel transcendence? How can chapels turn into places of introspection? How can walls grant boundless freedom? Driven by intense childhood impressions, director Christoph Schaub visits extraordinary churches, both ancient and futuristic, and discovers works of art that take him up to the skies and all the way down to the bottom of the ocean. With the help of architects Peter Zumthor, Peter Märkli, and Álvaro Siza Vieira, artists James Turrell and Cristina Iglesias, and drummer Sergé “Jojo” Mayer, he tries to make sense of the world and decipher our spiritual experiences using the seemingly abstract concepts of light, time, rhythm, sound, and shape. The superb cinematography turns this contemplative search into a multi-sensory experience.
Hasse and Tage were best friends for over 30 years. Their films, shows, songs and books influenced an entire nation and were the glue that held people's home together. As a comedic duo, they united right-wing ghosts and anarchists in laughter. When Tage dies prematurely, his children lose a father, Hasse a father figure and all of Sweden a country father. And when Palme dies just months after Tage, the Swedish stable society begins to crumble. For the first time, the Alfredson and Danielsson families open up the archives and give us exclusive access to their stories, photographs and recordings.
In this documentary, Joachim Hellwig uses partly unpublished footage to shed light on a dark chapter of German history and shows the entanglements between the politicians' claims to power and the interests of industry and business in Germany from the beginning of the First World War to the end of the Second World War (1914 to 1945). The Nuremberg War Crimes and Industrial Trials served as the basis for this documentary.
An inspirational story about the power of hope in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds, and an object lesson in what it really means to be a winner in life.
1961 documentary about the history and seedy reality of the sex industry in London's Soho.
In Bettina Büttner’s exquisitely lucid documentary Kinder (Kids), childhood dysfunction, loneliness, and pent-up emotion run wild at an all-boys group home in southern Germany. The children interned here include ten-year-olds Marvin and Tommy. Marvin, fiddling with a mini plastic Lego sword, explains matter-of-factly to the camera, “This is a knife. You use it to cut stomachs open.” Dennis, who is even younger, is seen in a hysteric fit, mimicking some pornographic scene. Boys will be boys, but innocence is disproportionately spare here. Choosing not to dwell on the harsh specifics, Büttner reveals the disconcerting manner in which traumatic episodes can manifest themselves in the mundane — a game of Lego, Hide and Seek, or Truth or Dare. Filmed in lapidary black-and-white, Büttner’s fascinating film sheds light on childhood from the boys’ characteristically disadvantaged perspective — one not yet fully cognizant — leaving much ethically to ponder over.
Appalachian Journey is one of five films made from footage that Alan Lomax shot between 1978 and 1985 for the PBS American Patchwork series (1991). It offers songs, dances, stories, and religious rituals of the Southern Appalachians. Preachers, singers, fiddlers, banjo pickers, moonshiners, cloggers, and square dancers recount the good times and the hard times of rural life there. Performers include Tommy Jarrell, Janette Carter, Ray and Stanley Hicks, Frank Proffitt Jr., Sheila Kay Adams, Nimrod Workman and Phyllis Boyens, Raymond Fairchild, and others, with a bonus of a few African-Americans from the North Carolina Piedmont.
The gorgeous and evocative Otto Schenk/Günther Schneider-Siemssen production continues with this second opera in Wagner’s Ring cycle. Hildegard Behrens brings deep empathy to Brünnhilde, the favorite daughter of the god Wotan (James Morris) who nevertheless defies him. Morris’s portrayal of Wotan is deservedly legendary, as is Christa Ludwig, as Fricka. Jessye Norman and Gary Lakes are Sieglinde and Siegmund, and Kurt Moll is the threatening Hunding. James Levine and the Met orchestra provide astonishing color and drama. (Performed April 8, 1989)
Siegfried is the third of the four operas that constitute Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), by Richard Wagner.
A Place of Our Own
Tennis competitions between Swedish actors at Saltsjöbaden.
A woman's voice says she was wife to Renzo Franchi and Carlos Gardel (1890-1935), Argentina's great tango singer. People say she's crazy. Her story unfolds. Buenos Aires, 1933: Juana Romero, a seamstress who lives for the music of Gardel, dumps her boyfriend Gustavo for Renzo, a singer who looks like Gardel. She insists that his trio performs Gardel's tangos, which leads to Renzo recording a Ford commercial when Gardel himself is overbooked. The trio, with Joanna in tow, goes on an ill-fated tour of points north. The couple breaks up: she goes home and he tries to get to New York. Fate steps in, and once again he's called upon to pose as Gardel. Then, legend and a bracelet take over. Written by
An ageing hard-living 1970s rock star decides to change his life when he discovers a 40-year-old undelivered letter written to him by John Lennon.
After selling herself at fourteen to a brothel inside her home town of Svay Pak, Mien takes an undesired path all over Cambodia for the remainder of her teenage life. At twenty, her path crosses with a group of people fighting to make a difference, bringing her long and onerous journey back to face where it all began. The Pink Room is an intertwined story of the heart-rending, epic battle to end sex slavery, from rescue to prevention, and experiencing first hand, the need to change not just individuals, but the communities they come from. Most documentaries on trafficking only bring awareness to the problem. This film bring awareness to the solutions.
Shots fired inside a club frequented by black Brazilians in the outskirts of Brasilia leave two men wounded. A third man arrives from the future in order to investigate the incident and prove that the fault lies in the repressive society.
Rohit, a Gujarati, studies the life of Anthony Firengee, and in the process meets with a mysterious man Kushawl Hajra.
Jack Parr hosts a variety program of comedic sketches.
Live at Angkor Wat is a semi-acoustic live album from alternative rock band Placebo, released on 12 December 2011. It was recorded at Angkor Wat in Cambodia on 7 December 2008, at the start of the Battle for the Sun tour. Placebo was the first rock band to play at the temple, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
A short film about Pete Seeger and the birth of banjo music throughout the Southern United States.