Correspondent Nick Schifrin and producer Zach Fannin take us inside Vladimir Putin's Russia, with an in-depth look at the resurgent national identity, the government's propaganda machine, the risk of being a Kremlin critic and much more.
Social & External
Himself
The strange case of Mikhail Khodorkovsky — once believed to be the wealthiest man in Russia — who rocketed to prosperity and prominence in the 1990s, served a decade in prison, and became an unlikely martyr for the anti-Putin movement.
Laika, a stray dog, was the first living being to be sent into space and thus to a certain death. A legend says that she returned to Earth as a ghost and still roams the streets of Moscow alongside her free-drifting descendants. While shooting this film, the directors little by little realised that they knew the street dogs only as part of our human world; they have never looked at humans as a part of the dogs’ world.
The documentary follows the life of Farroukh, a young Tajik immigrant who lives in Moscow outskirts with his family and does odd jobs in dreams of becoming an actor.
In 2012 two members of anarchistic female band Pussy Riot were sentenced to two years in a Mordovian labor camp for "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred". Russian film collective Gogol’s Wives follow each step of the feminist punk band’s battle against Putin including their first disruptive performances on a trolley bus, shooting a video about transparent elections, a controversial performance in a Red Square cathedral, and footage shot in a jail cell. Support comes from many corners including Madonna who painted the words "Pussy Riot" on her back and wore a balaclava during her Moscow show. The documentary portrays the grim state of present-day Russia, a country starkly divided between conservatism and anarchy. Pussy Riot believes that art has to be free and they're willing to take it to extremes. "Pussycat made a mess in the house," they say, and the house is Russia. The filmmakers do not seek to moralize, they simply edit events and leave viewers to draw their own conclusions.
The actor Gøril Mauseth goes on a 11.000 kilometer travel with the Trans-Siberian to play Anna Karenina in a new language in Leo Tolstoj's Russia, discovering the language, and the reasons Tolstoj wrote what he wrote, changing her forever.
The CIA hears of a KGB scheme to assassinate the Soviet General Secretary and enlists Stoner, an agent retired for 10 years, to go to Russia to investigate. He verifies the plot, but then has trouble leaving the country. In the meantime, the U.S. policy makers struggle over whether or not to inform the Soviets of the plot. Stoner's problems are complicated by the renewal of an affair with Anna, a Russian, as he tries to convince her to defect.
Albino bat Bartok – former sidekick to the wicked Grigori Rasputin – ventures to prove his true worth on a new quest to defeat the legendary Russian witch Baba Yaga.
In 1995, former KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin and ex-CIA Director William Colby collaborated in an unexpected way. They made a video game. The Great Game traces how both men rose to the tops of their fields following World War II, before falling out of favor with their respectives agencies — on opposite sides of the Iron Curtain. For Kalugin, a growing discontent with the KGB’s treatment of Russians radicalized him against the institution. Meanwhile William Colby, an OSS operative and the CIA’s man on the ground in Vietnam, was fired by President Ford after testifying before Congress about controversial CIA programs like MKULTRA and CoIntelPro. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, both living on American soil, Colby and Kalugin played themselves in Spycraft, a multi-million dollar game that was among the most advanced of its time — and is now almost entirely forgotten.
Starting in 1881 this film shows the personal battle between Lenin's Ulyanov family and the royal Romanovs that eventually led to the Russian revolution.
For months, the FBI have been investigating Russian interference in the American presidential elections. ZEMBLA is investigating another explosive dossier concerning Trump’s involvement with the Russians: Trump’s business and personal ties to oligarchs from the former Soviet Union. Powerful billionaires suspected of money laundering and fraud, and of having contacts in Moscow and with the mafia. What do these relationships say about Trump and why does he deny them? How compromising are these dubious business relationships for the 45th president of the United States? And are there connections with the Netherlands? ZEMBLA meets with one of Trump’s controversial cronies and speaks with a former CIA agent, fraud investigators, attorneys, and an American senator among others.
A 2017 Russian documentary film about alleged corruption by Prime Minister of Russia Dmitry Medvedev. The film claims that Dmitry Medvedev has embezzled an estimated $1.2 billion.
In 2008, Natasha, a newly rich woman, decides to open an independent TV station in Russia and builds an open-minded team of outcasts. By 2020, Natasha has lost everything to Russia's war between Propaganda and Truth.
Stories from the lives of the tenants of the Moscow's communal apartment: Kostik, who is a college student, lives with his aunt while studying; Arkady Velyurov who is a performing artist; Khobotovs, who are a divorced couple; and Sava, who is Margarita Khobotov's new fiancé. All these people live in one apartment and their lives constantly touch each other's.
As his country is gripped by revolution and war, a Ukrainian victim of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster discovers a dark secret and must decide whether to risk his life and play his part in the revolution by revealing it.
Trapped in a loveless arranged marriage to the immature future Czar, a young German Princess proves a skillful political infighter and rises to become Catherine the Great.
Margarita Mamun, an elite Russian rhythmic gymnast, is struggling to become an Olympic champion. It is the most important year of her career and her last chance to achieve the ultimate goal, the gold Olympic medal. The film creates a captivating portrait of a young woman who is desperately trying to handle her own ambitions and meet the expectations of the official Russian training system.
Into an era seething with war and revolution, a man comes with an incredible power to heal a nation...or destroy it. Based on the true story of one of the most powerful and mysterious figures in Russian history.
A documentary about the poisoning of political opponents by Russia. Focuses on specific cases of politically motivated assassinations by poisonings, including the attempted murder of Victor Yuschenko, the candidate and eventual President of Ukraine, using the deadly Dioxin. The film explains that Russia has not stopped this activity and its "Lab X" is still in operation. Originally created for the UK by FremantleMedia's production company talkbackTHAMES, "Poisoned" aired on Sky One in April 2005. (This documentary was made before the well-publicized poisoning by Russia of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006.)
As the Russian invasion begins, a team of Ukrainian journalists trapped in the besieged city of Mariupol struggle to continue their work documenting the war's atrocities.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was one of the first politicians to congratulate Donald Trump on his election as president of the United States in 2016, but over time the relationship between the two heads of state has had its ups and downs. Are they friends or enemies? Has their mutual admiration turned into mutual distrust?
An unhappy divorcée has the bad fortune to move next door to a security systems installer, a voyeur whose hobby is planting hidden video cameras in the bedrooms of all his clients. He then monitors the sex lives of his customers through an elaborate TV monitor system in his garage. Joanna Cole becomes his latest victim, but when she discovers the camera by accident, she reverts back to her exhibitionist ways and begins putting on sex shows for his pleasure. Things gets ugly when Jim professes his love for her but is rebuffed.
A group of friends have created a brand new subculture that is taking over the streets of Glasgow. They've established their very own fight club, but this is no ordinary wrestling event - this is brutal, riotous chaos. Fights don't always stay inside the ring, people are bounced off the side of buses and thrown off balconies in pubs. They now plan the biggest show of their lives. The stakes are high, will it bring them the fame and recognition they need to survive?
Hong Kong movie
Manolo is a famous singer who has a brief affair with Diana, a beautiful hitchhiker. Diana becomes pregnant and gives birth to a child, Lito, the Manolo ignores their existence. Seven years later, Diana wants her son Manolo meet and therefore decided to look for him. However, when he is suffering a great disappointment because Manolo does not remember her. One person who remembers the father Manolo, who follows that Lito is his grandson and both plan unite Manolo and Diana.
A community is under siege as three Belmont Highschool coed students go missing with no trace of their whereabouts. The pressure is on the police to capture the culprits responsible. Scouring the school hallways in search of clues, undercover female detective Maggie Rawdon (Jessica Sonnerborn) enters Belmont High as a transfer student in an attempt to solve the hideous disappearance of the students. Maggie makes a few new friends, and gets invited to a private rave in the country. Just as the group begins to suspect that they've taken a wrong turn, however, the trap is sprung and Maggie finds out firsthand what fate has befallen the missing girls.
Various introductions corners, card games, quizes, 'Making Of', and concert 'Backstage Footage'.
David McDoll is a selfish and wealthy man living an enviable lifestyle in his large villa and collecting fancy cars. However, his life is about to be changed forever when he inherits his six grandchildren. His glamorous lifestyle quickly becomes complete chaos. But he will learn a valuable lesson that teaches him about placing family first and discovering a newfound appreciation for life.
Pilot episode of the cancelled follow-up series to Nickelodeon's "Clarissa Explains it All" in which debutante Clarissa Darling contends to her life in New York City and her internship at a local newspaper.
Manolo Ortega is a tour guide in Granada and, at night, acting in a cave in Sacromonte. It has a small plot totally barren, and yet does not want to sell it to an American company for uranium prospecting. To convince, Spain bequeathed to Margaret, the director of the company. But before his stubborn refusal, decides encandilarlo. So, shake his friendship and he confesses that there is buried treasure that his ancestor discovered by a spell. Last movie starring Manolo Escobar.
Every night before she goes to bed, Evy listens to a self-help tape that aims to tackle her crippling anxiety disorder. But while having a bath, her anxieties take on a horribly physical form…
Sasha, a singer at a musical theatre, persuades his friend Kulik to take him to a remote sacred place for fishing. Soon they find out that wood spirits live here. Kulik warns Sasha to ask them of nothing and not to fool the evil spirit, but he breaks the taboo — and now the spirits demand blood payment. Kulik faces a difficult choice: to leave Sasha in the forest and escape, or pull him out and pay with his life.
A baby woodpecker mistakes Jerry for his mother. The mouse rejects the newly hatched bird but soon finds himself protecting it against his feline nemesis, Tom.
A married "change guru" decides to leave his wife for his younger mistress, but an inconvenient death in the family puts his breakup plans on hold.
Millionaire shipbuilder Freddie Gates decides to publicize his ships by hiring Jack Hylton and his orchestra to broadcast from his yacht.. Brian Gates, Freddie's son, has a low-approval-rating and a high dislike for jazz music and refuses board ship with the band on board. His father enters a conspiracy with singer Dorothy Drew to get him on the yacht, where the broadcasts will be made. Brian falls in love with Dorothy, but calls of the romance when he sees her dancing and singing with Hylton's band in Paris. Dorothy induces three members of the band to shanghai Brian when the yacht sails. A rival shipowner, determined to stop the broadcasts, bribes the crew to desert the ship and all hands are left stranded in mid-ocean on the yacht. The band-members manage to extricate them from their predicament and they get back to London, where Hylton is acclaimed and Brian marries Dorothy.