In Search of Charlie Chan

Pioneer filmmaker J. Stuart Blackton was intrigued by the idea of a film about the history of the movies as early as 1915. He finally released a 52-minute feature called The Film Parade that was shown in New York and favorably reviewed by "Variety" in 1933. He continued tinkering with the film for the rest of the decade, and later filmmakers and distributors used Blackton's footage for stock or to produce their own variously titled and truncated versions. -UCLA Film & Television Archive

The epic life story of Alice Guy-Blaché (1873–1968), a French screenwriter, director and producer, true pioneer of cinema, the first person who made a narrative fiction film; author of hundreds of movies, but banished from history books. Ignored and forgotten. At last remembered.

The history of Frankenstein's journey from novel to stage to screen to icon.

In 1982, Wim Wenders asked 16 of his fellow directors to speak on the future of cinema, resulting in the film Room 666. Now, 40 years later, in Cannes, director Lubna Playoust asks Wim Wenders himself and a new generation of filmmakers (James Gray, Rebecca Zlotowski, Claire Denis, Olivier Assayas, Nadav Lapid, Asghar Farhadi, Alice Rohrwacher and more) the same question: “is cinema a language about to get lost, an art about to die?”

Díky, pane Kříženecký

Deep Throat, a pornographic film directed by Gerard Damiano, a film-loving hairdresser, and starring Linda Lovelace, a shy girl manipulated by a controlling husband, was released in 1972 and divided audiences, who began to talk openly about sex, desire and female pleasure; but also about violence and abuse; and about pornography, until then an almost clandestine industry, as a revolutionary cultural phenomenon.

An account of the life and work of legendary Japanese actor Toshirō Mifune (1920-97), the most prominent actor of the Golden Age of Japanese cinema.

Documentary film about early years of Russian cinema: its first directors, cameramen, producers and actors. Includes rare fragments of pre-revolutionary feature films, newsreels and Starewicz's animation.

A look at the life and work of Spanish filmmaker and film critic Fernando Méndez-Leite, as he writes his memoirs and a novel with autobiographical resonances.

An inventive remembrance of the impact of the Hollywood blacklist on two American classics, rendered as a visually mesmerizing dialogue between Carl Foreman and Elia Kazan.

The story of the rise to stardom of Joaquin Phoenix, an actor of magnetic physique, tumultuous past, socially committed, who for years has offered outstanding performances.

Ridley Scott's cult film Blade Runner, based on a novel by Philip K. Dick and released in 1982, is one of the most influential science fiction films ever made. Its depiction of Los Angeles in the year 2019 is oppressively prophetic: climate catastrophe, increasing public surveillance, powerful monopolistic corporations, highly evolved artificial intelligence; a fantastic vision of the future world that has become a frightening reality.

A biographical film about cinematic illusionist Georges Méliès featuring Méliès’s widow, Jeanne d’Alcy, as herself, and their son André as his own father.

The history of the comic book superhero, Superman, in his various media incarnations.

A collection of deleted scenes and bloopers from the library of Toho Studios films, including several films from the famous Godzilla franchise.

Fulton and Pepe's 2000 documentary captures Terry Gilliam's attempt to get The Man Who Killed Don Quixote off the ground. Back injuries, freakish storms, and more zoom in to sabotage the project.

A short documentary about the rapidly disappearing era of heritage movie palaces and the film going experience once offered within those hallowed walls.

A deep investigation, in the way of a poetic essay, on one of the main Latin American movements in cinema, analyzed via the thoughts of its main authors, who invented, in the early 1960s, a new way of making movies in Brazil, with a political attitude, always near to people's problems, that combined art and revolution.

France, 1974. The erotic film Emmanuelle, directed by Just Jaeckin, breaks all records for cinema attendance: the story of the creation of a sensual epic that marked a turning point in the struggle for sexual emancipation.

They created and performed the iconic action sequences of 007, Indiana Jones, Superman, Rambo, Star Wars, Conan, the Alien films and pretty much everything since. They crashed cars, jumped from burning buildings, shot, stabbed, kicked and punched their way into cinema history. This is the first feature documentary to unite the legendary community of stuntmen in telling their story and, as you'll see, there's life in the old dogs yet.