Jazz and decolonization are intertwined in a powerful narrative that recounts one of the tensest episodes of the Cold War.
Social & External
The people behind it
Patrice Lumumba
Self (archive footage)
Louis Armstrong
Nikita Khrushchev
Dizzy Gillespie
Andrée Blouin
Abbey Lincoln
Max Roach
Malcolm X
Nina Simone
John Coltrane
In 1967, in the middle of the Cold War, Joseph Stalin's only daughter goes to the American embassy in New Delhi and asks for asylum. Svetlana leaves behind her country and her two children. Hunted by the press, the KGB, and many admirers, the woman, nicknamed the Kremlin princess, will never cease to flee. From the summit of the Soviet empire to the solitude and poverty of her last years in a Wisconsin home, Gabriel Tejedor traces the destiny of a resolutely free woman, at the very heart of the century and its geopolitical challenges.
The residents of Bucha, Ukraine, are rebuilding their city from the rubble after surviving the horrors of Russian occupation. A newly married couple, a schoolgirl, a city official, and an elderly housewife have all endured the painful experiences of war, yet they manage to hold onto hope and solidarity. But how do you rebuild in the wake of growing trauma, especially with war still raging in your country? As time hopes for a peaceful life fade, they must grapple with mounting tensions within their communities. Shot over a three-year period, the film is a follow-up to When Spring Came To Bucha, as five protagonists navigate the complex terrain of inner conflicts, trauma, and a longing for justice, posing questions about the future of a society at war.
Musician Merrilee Rush reminisces on her life in search of meaning and legacy in Adin Bayer's directorial feature length debut.
How does it feel to be forgotten by the world? A powerful collective cry denouncing the crimes of the military dictatorship installed in Myanmar after the coup perpetrated on February 1, 2021: cinema and imagination against horror and in defense of freedom.
In the Cold War years of the 1970s, an American patrol boat meets a Soviet ship off the east coast of the United States for talks about fishing rights in the Atlantic. In the midst of this, while Russian commanders are aboard the U.S. Coast Guard vessel where the talks are being held, a Lithuanian sailor jumps across the ten feet of icy water separating the boats. Crash-landing on the deck of the American ship, he desperately begs for asylum. Though they try, the Americans ultimately fail to provide protection and the Soviets are allowed to capture him and brutally return him to their vessel. Thus begins a stranger-than-fiction story of imprisonment, discovery, fame, and freedom. Through rare archival footage and a dramatic first-person re-enactment of that fateful day by Simas Kudirka, the would-be defector himself, this tale of one of the biggest Cold War muddles takes us on a journey of uncanny twists of fate, and the emotional sacrifices of becoming a universal symbol of freedom.
THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE presents Nixon’s China Game, the story of an operation so secret that it managed to elude the international press, the members of Nixon’s cabinet, and even the US State Department. The documentary features never-before-seen footage of Kissinger’s secret mission to China, newly released transcripts of the negotiations, private diaries, Nixon’s own handwritten notes, and interviews with American and Chinese officials -- including those who were in on the covert plan, and those who were kept in the dark.
Bangui, Central African Republic. 17 year-old Robert dreams of a career in music, but civil war is tearing the country apart. When both his parents are thrown into prison, he is left to look after his four younger siblings on his own, juggling daily life, odd jobs, school exams and concert stages, determined to follow his dream.
For many years, Buenos Aires, Argentina, was one of the best places in the world for a film buff; but from the mid-sixties onwards, successive authoritarian governments shaped the will of the spectators, dictating what could be seen and what could not, so that the true cinema lovers, in their desire to watch films, had no choice but to embark on the most extraordinary and strange adventures.
A Long Island punk band meets a mysterious director through social media who generously offers to shoot their first music video for free. Desperate for fame, they drive deep into the Pennsylvania woods in hopes of making a killer music video.
In 1938 an airfield was built at the northeastern-most end of America, the descent went slowly but incessantly through the Cold War. This is the story of how its inhabitants gradually moved away from the great world stage and had to reinvent themselves as well as their home town.
Chronicle Caste War in Yucatan held in the nineteenth century, where the land and the people were the property of the landowners, who called themselves " divine caste ". On one hand, General Salvador Alvarado organized the revolution; on the other, the landowners hire Colonel Ortiz Argumedo to organized the defense of their autonomy. Don Wilfrido, one of the masters, do not hesitate to send his son to fight to maintain their wealth and privileges.
Along an overgrown rail track south of the Zairean town Kisangani, a UN expedition together with a handful of journalists discover “lost” refugees. They are eighty thousand Hutus from far away Rwanda, the last survivors of three years of hunger and armed persecution that transpired throughout the vast Congo basin. The Hutu-refugees leave the forest, gathering in two gigantic camps. Hundreds of refugees die every day from diseases and malnutrition The Rwandans are promised repatriation with airplanes out of Kisangani. The film traces those refugees into the heart of the rainforest, and the hopeless attempts to help them.. But only four weeks later, the unprotected UN-camps are again attacked by machine-gun fire, deliberately massacred by factions of the rebel army (AFDL) of today’s Democratic Republic Congo. Eighty thousand men, women and children disappear once again back into the jungle. (jedensvet.cz)
Documentation of the encroachment of European settlers upon Native American lands and the violent reaction of the Indians in their struggle to survive.
Started in the summer of 1961, even before the Wall was built, the film becomes an explanation after this historical event as to why things can no longer go on as they were before. Unmistakably, as in almost all of Karl Gass' films, the passion with which he treats his subject is unmistakable. If you want to get to know the zeitgeist of the historically significant year 1961, which on both sides knew more the Cold War vocabulary than factual arguments, you can see the Eastern variant in this propaganda film.
Short ethnographic documentary showing a leopard dance based upon footage shot by director Luc de Heusch in Congo in 1954 reassembled by Damien Mottier (Université Paris Nanterre) and Grace Winter (CINEMATEK).
Short ethnographic documentary showing some everyday life scenes based upon footage shot by director Luc de Heusch in Congo in 1954 reassembled by Damien Mottier (Université Paris Nanterre) and Grace Winter (CINEMATEK).
An epic exploration of the Czechoslovak New Wave cinema of the 1960s and 70s, structured around a series of conversations with one of its most acclaimed exponents - Closely Observed Trains director Jiří Menzel.
In this debut narrative short film, colonial relationships and land politics are discussed. An investigative piece that peers through ideals of retribution and questions the dynamics of the colonized person and the colonized.
Project MK-Ultra was a CIA program of human experiments, some of which were illegal. What was this project really about? Is it still going on today?
Ndola, Northern Rhodesia (currently Zambia), September 18, 1961. Swedish economist and diplomat Dag Hammarskjöld, Secretary General of the UN, dies mysteriously in a plane crash. Decades later, Danish journalist and filmmaker Mads Brügger and Swedish researcher Göran Björkdahl investigate the case in search of definitive closure.
Meet the real-life airmen who inspired Masters of the Air as they share the harrowing and transformative events of the 100th Bomb Group.
Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories – survivors, bystanders, and perpetrators – Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee, and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.
Experience the events of September 11, 2001 through the eyes of President Bush and his closest advisors as they personally detail the crucial hours and key decisions from that historic day.
An immersive look at the eventful life and brilliant artistic career of visionary American jazz trumpeter Miles Davis (1926-1991).
National Geographic's riveting effort recounts all 12 crewed missions using only archival footage, photos and audio.
An unprecedented and intimate look at the life, work and enduring legacy of British actress Audrey Hepburn (1929-1993).
The history of cinematic sound, told by legendary sound designers and visionary filmmakers.
A documentary examining possible historical and modern conspiracies surrounding Christianity, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the Federal Reserve bank.
Explore how one man's relentless drive and invention of the atomic bomb changed the nature of war forever, led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and unleashed mass hysteria.
An account of the extraordinary life of film pioneer Georges Méliès (1861-1938) and the amazing story of the copy in color of his masterpiece A Trip to the Moon (1902), unexpectedly found in Spain and restored thanks to the heroic efforts of a group of true cinema lovers.
A documentary highlighting the Soviet Union's legendary and enigmatic hockey training culture and world-dominating team through the eyes of the team's Captain Slava Fetisov, following his shift from hockey star and celebrated national hero to political enemy.
Though legendary lyricist Howard Ashman died far too young, his impact on Broadway, movies, and the culture at large were incalculable. Told entirely through rare archival footage and interviews with Ashman’s family, friends, associates, and longtime partner Bill Lauch, Howard is an intimate tribute to a once-in-a-generation talent and a rousing celebration of musical storytelling itself.
The incomparable Bruce Springsteen performs his critically acclaimed latest album and muses on life, rock, and the American dream, in this intimate and personal concert film co-directed by Thom Zimny and Springsteen himself.
In a tiny Alabama town with the curious name of Muscle Shoals, something miraculous sprang from the mud of the Tennessee River. A group of unassuming, yet incredibly talented, locals came together and spawned some of the greatest music of all time: “Mustang Sally,” “I Never Loved a Man,” “Wild Horses,” and many more. During the most incendiary periods of racial hostility, white folks and black folks came together to create music that would last for generations and gave birth to the incomparable “Muscle Shoals sound.”
Atlantis is filmmaker Luc Besson's celebration of the beauty and wonder of the world beneath the sea, expanding upon themes touched on in his film The Big Blue. Combining stunning underwater cinematography and a hypnotic score by Eric Serra, Besson's singular vision defies dialogue or narrative structure to explore ocean life as you've never seen it before. Following the colossal success of The Big Blue, Luc Besson crisscrossed the world's seas and oceans to film the beauty and diversity of marine life: from the giant octopuses of Vancouver to the manta rays of the Pacific (New Caledonia), and the grey sharks of Tahiti. A film with no actors or sets other than the underwater world. A breathtaking view of marine species: sharks, dolphins, manatees, octopuses. An exploration of the seabed in the Bahamas, the Galapagos, Vancouver, and Tahiti.
Long-lost footage from Elvis Presley's legendary Las Vegas residency in the 1970s woven together with rare 16mm footage from Elvis on Tour, and 8mm from the Graceland archive, plus recordings of Elvis telling "his side of the story" rediscovered during Baz Luhrmann's research for his 2022 film, Elvis.
A unique cinematic experience that invites audiences on a vibrant journey through the life of cultural icon Pharrell Williams. Told through the lens of LEGO® animation, turn up the volume on your imagination and witness the evolution of one of music's most innovative minds.
The vivid and inspiring story of British film icon Michael Caine's personal journey through 1960s swinging London.
His unforgettable scores are an essential part of some of the most beloved movies of our time, over a career that spans decades. See and hear maestro John Williams' own story, with insights from filmmakers, musicians, and others he has inspired, complete with rare behind-the-scenes looks at the making of movie history.
