Modern Education

In 16th-century Prague, a rabbi creates the Golem - a giant creature made of clay. Using sorcery, he brings the creature to life in order to protect the Jews of Prague from persecution.

A young man travels to Mars in a rocket ship, where he leads a popular uprising against the ruling group with the support of Queen Aelita, who has fallen in love with him after watching him through a telescope.

The story of a poor young woman, separated by prejudice from her husband and baby, is interwoven with tales of intolerance from throughout history.

Frankenstein, a young medical student, trying to create the perfect human being, instead creates a misshapen monster. Made ill by what he has done, Frankenstein is comforted by his fiancée; but on his wedding night he is visited by the monster.

Using every known means of transportation, several savants from the Geographic Society undertake a journey through the Alps to the Sun which finishes under the sea.

The navy captain Avanti Planetaros is inspired by his astronomer-father to travel through outer space to reach other worlds. He becomes an aviator and, along with the young scientist Dr. Krafft, the driving force behind the construction of a space-ship. Despite oppostion from the mocking Professor Dubius, Planetaros gathers a crew of fearless men and takes off. During the long voyage, the crew becomes restless; a mutiny is narrowly avoided. Finally, they reach Mars and discover that the planet is inhabited by people who have reached a higher stage of development, free of diseases, sorrow, violence, sexual urges, and the fear of death. Avanti falls in love with Marya, daughter of the Prince of Wisdom, the head of the Martians. Marya shares his feelings and decides to return with him in order to bring the wisdom of the Martians to the backward Earthlings. (stumfilm.dk)

Hanns Heinz Ewers' grim science-fiction novel Alraune has already been filmed twice when this version was assembled in 1928. In another of his "mad doctor" roles, Paul Wegener plays Professor Brinken, sociopathic scientist who combines the genes of an executed murderer with those of a prostitute. The result is a beautiful young woman named Alraune (Brigitte Helm), who is incapable of feeling any real emotions -- least of all guilt or regret. Upon attaining adulthood, Alraune sets about to seduce and destroy every male who crosses her path. Ultimately, Professor Brinken is hoist on his own petard when he falls hopelessly in love with Alraune himself. Alraune was remade in 1930, with Brigitte Helm repeating her role, and again in 1951, with Hildegarde Knef as the "heroine" and Erich von Stroheim as her misguided mentor.

Carmine Gallone and Amleto Palermi’s The Last Days of Pompeii 1926 stages in sumptuous colour tinting the epic fall of the ancient city buried by Mount Vesuvius’ eruption. Adapted from Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s love story, the film was innovative in its special effects and an early major box-office hit. A beautiful tinted restoration print was prepared using photochemical processes by Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia-Cineteca Nazionale in the mid-1990s and the premiere screening of the restoration print was held in the amphitheatre in Pompeii, followed by a screening at the major restoration festival ‘Il Cinema Ritrovato’ in Bologna in 1998.

The first Chinese film ever made, a sung representation of Battle of Mount Dingjun.

Deep water freediving exposes its practitioners to a form of narcosis, which induces several symptoms, among which a feeling of euphoria and levity that earned this phenomenon its nickname of "raptures of the deep". The short film relates the interior journey of Guillaume Néry, the apnea world champion, during one of his deep water dives. It draws its inspiration from his physical experience and the narrative of his hallucinations.

His mother abandoned him as a child, so he had no choice but to live outside society. Even so, he grows up determined to reunite with her. Worried that she might be living in misery, he saves his money to help, only to find that she has married into wealth and social position and has no intention of seeing her outcast Yakuza son...

Two families, abolitionist Northerners the Stonemans and Southern landowners the Camerons, intertwine. When Confederate colonel Ben Cameron is captured in battle, nurse Elsie Stoneman petitions for his pardon. In Reconstruction-era South Carolina, Cameron founds the Ku Klux Klan, battling Elsie's congressman father and his African-American protégé, Silas Lynch.

A classic of the silent age, this film tells the story of the doomed but ultimately canonized 15th-century teenage warrior. On trial for claiming she'd spoken to God, Jeanne d'Arc is subjected to inhumane treatment and scare tactics at the hands of church court officials. Initially bullied into changing her story, Jeanne eventually opts for what she sees as the truth. Her punishment, a famously brutal execution, earns her perpetual martyrdom.

Professor Barbenfouillis and five of his colleagues from the Academy of Astronomy travel to the Moon aboard a rocket propelled by a giant cannon. Once on the lunar surface, the bold explorers face the many perils hidden in the caves of the mysterious planet.

The mysterious Count Orlok summons a happily married real estate agent to his castle, located up in the Transylvanian mountains, to finalise a terrifying deal.

A dramatized account of a great Russian naval mutiny and a resultant public demonstration, showing support, which brought on a police massacre.

A knight returns home from the Crusades to find his village devastated by disease and his family gone. He roams the forest searching for them, until he finds a mysterious maiden who is being held prisoner by a black knight. In order to free her, he must confront her captor.

God and Satan wager on the soul of a learned and prayerful alchemist as part of their eternal war over Earth.

This mostly lost film is often confused with director Paul Wegener third and readily available interpretation of the legend; Der Golem, wie er in die Welt kam (1920). In this version of the golem legend, the golem, a clay statue brought to life by Rabbi Loew in 16th century Prague to save the Jews from the ongoing brutal persecution by the city's rulers, is found in the rubble of an old synagogue in the 20th century. Brought to life by an antique dealer, the golem is used as a menial servant. Eventually falling in love with the dealer's wife, it goes on a murderous rampage when its love for her goes unanswered.

In northern Finland in the fall of 1916, Saima Niva rescues a man drifting in the river, who turns out to be a German lieutenant Braun. Braun and his six comrades have managed to escape the prisoner of war at the Muurmann railway station, but the lieutenant has had to get rid of the lost group. While Braun is recovering, under the good care of Saima, Niva's neighbor and henchman of the gendarmes, the greedy policeman Simpura, gets a tip about the refugees camped in the desert.