From dawn till dusk in the bohemian heart of London’s West End. This 1979 portrait of the people and places of Soho catches the neighbourhood towards the end of an era. There's some great footage inside an Italian delicatessen and of assorted street characters. It's a fascinating glimpse into this walled garden of cosmopolitan life on the cusp of the gentrification and commercial interests that have since broken its borders.
This travelogue begins at Bangkok's rail depot, a center of Indo-Chinese commerce. Next the narrator talks about Buddhism as the camera shows us some of Bangkok's many temples. Then, the narrator introduces us to the importance of traditional dance, with emphasis on the way that delicate wrist movements tell stories. It's on to the system of waterways in Bangkok, where more than 1,000,000 people live or conduct commerce. We take a ride down the Menam River, the country's most important commercial and social road. From our boat, we pass Wat Arun and other colorful signs of life typical in serene Siam.
This Traveltalk series short brings us to Lima, Peru where we see a modern city.
This documentary short features Chile's history, culture, and customs.
This Traveltalk short visits Rocky Mountain National Park and a nearby dude ranch in Colorado.
This Traveltalk series short visits Copenhagen.
Dance for All
Blissful scenes of tourists arriving by boat and then sea bathing on a beach in the Venetian lagoon.
CBS TV news special hosted by Harry Reasoner explores the way-out world of the Hippies and the Haight-Ashbury psychedelic 1960s LSD scene. Footage of LSDs users experiencing bummer trips. The Diggers, the Oracle and cool street and Golden Gate Park scenes with hippies tripping out. The Grateful Dead are interviewed and are shown performing "Dancin' in the Streets" on a flatbed truck in Golden Gate Park. The Hippie Temptation!
Originally intended as an advertising short, this film follows The Elizabethan, a non-stop British Railways service from London to Edinburgh along the East Coast Main Line. A nostalgic record of the halcyon years of steam on British Railways and the ex-LNER Class A4.
A short documentary about the transportation of goods and livestock by train around the UK.
Somewhere in the world right now--much closer than you think--people are playing with trains. You might not see them at first, but they're there. In basements. In garages. In converted Army barracks. They're among the world's most compelling underground communities.
Years ago, artists would walk around the muck at the edge of the San Francisco Bay in Emeryville, and build loads of sculptures out there on the flats, created from driftwood and found objects that drivers would enjoy as they motored south on the old Highway 17 (known in numerous radio ads as 'Highway 17, The Nimitz'). Grabbing material off someone else’s work was considered fair game and part of the fun, and contributed a kinetic dynamic to the ongoing display. Now the place is a park, and the sculptures are gone, but you can see what it used to be like in this neat and funny documentary by Ric Reynolds, augmented by Erich Seibert’s wonderful musique-concrète/time-lapse sequences. The flashback circus sequence includes Scott Beach and Bill Irwin. Sculptors interviewed include Walt Zucker, Tony Puccio, Robert Sommer, Ron & Mary Bradden, and Bob Kaminsky.
Druid Heights is a short documentary film by Marcy Mendelson about a wild & wooly place. California’s hidden bohemia. Where sex, drugs and philosophy thrived among the eucalyptus just a few miles north of the Golden Gate.
Shortly after his mother’s passing, playwright and stage director Mohamed El Khatib receives a phone call from his uncle in Bab Berred, the family’s village in the Moroccan Rif, instructing him to come as soon as possible to collect his inheritance – mysteriously insisting that he should make the trip in a Renault 12. Coaxed by his father, El Khatib decides to make the journey from Orléans to Tangier. Structured like a road movie, Renault 12 is also the filmmaker’s quest to discover his own origins, in which he both documents chance encounters and stages situations to bring social, political, and cultural landscapes to light.
Images set to a tape recording that slain San Francisco City Supervisor Harvey Milk made in November 1977 to be played in case he was killed.
A travelogue showing the beauty of the state of West Virginia in 1929.
Mondo Topless is a 1966 pseudo documentary directed by Russ Meyer, featuring Babette Bardot and Lorna Maitland among others.
Travelogue/documentary follows newly married Rita Hayworth and Prince Aly Khan on their honeymoon trip through exotic locales.
Impressionistic picture of the Third Avenue Elevated Railway in Manhattan, New York City, before it was demolished. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2010.