A trance film meditation on childhood and fire that uses 16mm found footage.
In 1967, de Andrade was invited by the Italian company Olivetti to produce a documentary on the new Brazilian capital city of Brasília. Constructed during the latter half of the 1950s and founded in 1960, the city was part of an effort to populate Brazil’s vast interior region and was to be the embodiment of democratic urban planning, free from the class divisions and inequalities that characterize so many metropolises. Unsurprisingly, Brasília, Contradições de uma Cidade Nova (Brasília, Contradictions of a New City, 1968) revealed Brasília to be utopic only for the wealthy, replicating the same social problems present in every Brazilian city. (Senses of Cinema)
Short film about the Austrian diocese of Sankt Florian near Linz.
Erika Blanc self-reflectively narrates her descent into Italian genre cinema while she hyperbolically playacts in the woods.
A 2008 short made in accompaniment with Our Beloved Month of August, documenting Gomes's and his crew's hapless search, during 2007's carnival, for one of Arganil's most storied and elusive characters (who does, in fact, ultimately appear as an interviewee/player in the finished film). Paulo "Miller" is known for taking a dangerous jump into the Alva from a bridge each year during carnival, but what this film is about is, in keeping with the free-roving feature, much less the subject himself than Gomes and co.'s inability to pin him down; not only does he not do his famous jump during this year's carnival, but an ostensible technical/audio failure (as with the feature, it's very difficult to say how much of this film is "fact," how much invented) during Gomes's initial on-camera meeting with Paulo "Miller" leads to five minutes of lip-readers attempting to decipher their conversation.
An incident from the early days of Québec's quiet revolution, tailor-made for the cartoonist. It is the story of a Montréal commuter train, a unilingual ticket collector and a bilingual passenger. The passenger appears on screen himself to describe his bid to have tickets requested in French as well as in English. What ensued, and how even the railway president became involved, is illustrated with wit and humor.
Bringing offerings of rice, flowers, and woven coconut leaves, clients visit Jero in her household shrine to determine the cause of their son's death. Jero lights an incense brazier, sprinkles holy water, and recites mantras as preliminaries to trance. Several ancestors and finally the young son speak through her voice, revealing the nature of his premature death (witchcraft) and his wishes for cremation. In contrast to other films about Balinese trance which focus on spectacular, community performances, this film provides an intimate view of a fascinating process of communication between Jero, the spirits, and her clients who are at one point moved to tears. (der.org)
This documentary about the 70s porn legend attempts to verify his existence as there are practically no Asian male porn stars in the history of American adult cinema. A controversial mystery akin to Bigfoot and alien abduction, Dick Ho was so well endowed that rumors arose of a conspiracy within the porn industry to eliminate any knowledge of his existence. Includes alleged film footage and testimonials from porn veterans.
This film was made by Bass' company as a presentation to AT&T executives. It would have extended to be shown to the public, but a number of his ideas in the film were not ultimately adopted, like his phone booth designs, and men's and women's uniforms. But a great many of the design were adopted—including, most memorably, the telephone vans and hardhat designs of the 1970s. Bass designed down to the details, showcasing in this film a myriad of ideas, like Yellow Pages book designs, cufflinks for executives, and flags. (AT&T Archives)
A documentary about artist Zdenko Buzek.
Justine doesn't speak. She communicates through looking, gesture and the body language of her movement and interactions. Justine observes the rhythms of her day, giving a unique portrait of the experience of a vivacious young woman living with severe neurological disorders. Justine survived a harrowing breakdown as a child but her medical condition is not the subject of this film, which instead gives a sense of her extraordinary life and experience in the rhythms of an ordinary day as she turns 18. Justine's parents tenderly build close family bonds to sustain their youngest daughter. They speak perceptively and movingly about their daughter and sister. Meanwhile, cuts to the UK welfare system endanger the family's hard won achievements, and raise questions and fears for her future.
Although it was actually an impersonal commissioned film, the director's style is clearly recognizable. Once again he manages to make something that is normal very strange: the dancing people in costumes are filmed in such a way that they look bizarre and absurd. Jan de Bont's camerawork shows a series of color images of dancing people, edited to the rhythm of the music. Halfway through the film, a lonely clown can be seen among the dancing crowd, accompanied by sad music. This clown is played by Ditvoorst himself.
73.5% of Punjab's youth is addicted to drugs. A multi-million drug nexus is operating under the noses of the Border Security Force, The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, The Narcotics Control Bureau and the Intelligence Bureau, leaving them as mere bystanders to Punjab's erosion. The yearly consumption of alcohol in Punjab makes the city's population one of the highest per capita consumers of alcohol in the world! The scenario in Punjab is deteriorating at such a rapid rate that experts have already begun to put an expiry date to the state.
This short documentary profiles the uniquely cloistered wildlife of Sable Island, known as the “Atlantic graveyard” due to its inhospitable conditions. Barren sands and endless gales proved too much for human settlement on this island off the coast of Nova Scotia. Only a small group of researchers and maintenance people occupy the island; horses run wild, seals and birds multiply profusely, and the Ipswich sparrow has found a fruitful breeding ground for itself. Sable Island provides a perfect opportunity to observe nature in an untouched, organic laboratory.
A light, humorous look at the motor car and the great North American itch for a place on the road. From the comparative peace of Honest Joe's used-car lot, this film hustles you onto our public speedways, where hot rubber erases any distance between all points. Slow-motion and pop-on-pop-off photography make this a provocative, revealing study of motormania unlimited. A 1960 black and white production. (Also released under the title 1/3 Down and 24 Months to Pay.)
The Salvation Army in action. Band rehearsals, personal reminiscences of an Army officer, and an unrehearsed "coming to Christ" in the Army Citadel make for a revealing film study of men and women dedicated to a life of service to humanity.
First it's paint bombs, followed hard by riots. Tweets proclaim what is to be done. Resistance is everywhere. Something has to give. Two young activists meet amid turbulent events. They dance. The city belongs to them.
The opening of the Kiel Canal in Germany by Kaiser Wilhelm II on 20 June 1895.
The film uses stop-frame animation to create maps on the screen, and showed the then-current military situation in the Dardanelles, using various maps to assist understanding. Small cardboard cut-outs show the deployment of men and ships. Intertitles explain tactics, and shelling explosions are illustrated by clouds of cotton wool.
A BFI-produced documentary about documentary filmmaker John Grierson speaking about documentary.