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.)
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.
ONLY IN THEATERS, a film by actor/director Raphael Sbarge, is an intimate and moving journey taken with the Laemmle family, spanning nearly three years of challenges, losses, and personal triumphs. Laemmle Theatres, the beloved 84-year-old arthouse cinema chain 3rd generation family business in Los Angeles, is facing seismic change and financial pressure. Yet the family behind this multigenerational business – whose sole mission has been to support the art of film – is determined to survive.
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.
A group of Macedonian women are shown hard at work.
Jorden är platt
Exploring the art of Armenian portraitist Hakob Hovnatanyan, Parajanov revives the culture of Tbilisi of the 19th century.
Actor/cult icon Bruce Campbell examines the world of fan conventions and what makes a fan into a fanatic.
Set to a classic Duke Ellington recording "Daybreak Express", this is a five-minute short of the soon-to-be-demolished Third Avenue elevated subway station in New York City.
What would your family reminiscences about dad sound like if he had been an early supporter of Hitler’s, a leader of the notorious SA and the Third Reich’s minister in charge of Slovakia, including its Final Solution? Executed as a war criminal in 1947, Hanns Ludin left behind a grieving widow and six young children, the youngest of whom became a filmmaker. It's a fascinating, maddening, sometimes even humorous look at what the director calls "a typical German story." (Film Forum)
An Experiment in Leisure explores the link between free time and creativity, between leisure and the kind of imaginative contemplation it facilitates.
There is a distance, emotionally not only physically, between Jimena and her grandmother, Miri. This is a way to try and get closer, to understand, to accept, mixing past and present she tries to find her grandmother, in an attempt to reconnect with something that once existed, but that it no longer does.
When a Mongolian nomadic family's newest camel colt is rejected by its mother, a musician is needed for a ritual to change her mind.
Instructive short on using cylinders to construct all manner of fun objects.
A woman is stuck in a world full of stains, spots, and repetitive thoughts.
Familiar Phantoms is an experimental documentary short film about memory, history and trauma.
Traveling to North Africa, Ripley offers views of The Meeting Place of the Dead in Morocco, a jail for nagging wives, a village with houses made of tin cans, and a sultan with many wives and children.
A moving record of a natural disaster, Volcano documents the effect of a sudden volcanic eruption on the tiny island of Haimaey, off the coast of Iceland. Blasts of flame, clouds of black smoke and showers of rock erupt from the screen in a poignant portrait of a stricken town.
The roads are full of snow and the bus is late. The Principal is mad at the bus driver but he is also sick.
A portrait of 10 senior dogs and their owners who struggle with the thought of letting go.