Inspired by a lesson from Erik Satie, a film in the form of a street: Castro Street, running by the Standard Oil Refinery in Richmond, California. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Pacific Film Archive in 2000.
Social & External
Short film about the Manzanar Japanese American internment camp. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2011.
Every school day, African-American teenagers William Gates and Arthur Agee travel 90 minutes each way from inner-city Chicago to St. Joseph High School in Westchester, Illinois, a predominately white suburban school well-known for the excellence of its basketball program. Gates and Agee dream of NBA stardom, and with the support of their close-knit families, they battle the social and physical obstacles that stand in their way. This acclaimed documentary was shot over the course of five years.
A film's art director is in charge of the set, from conception to construction to furnishing. This short film walks the viewer through art directors' responsibilities and the demands on their talents. They read a script carefully and design a set to capture the time and place, the social strata, and the mood. They must be scholars of the history of architecture, furnishings, and fashion. They choose the colors on a set in anticipation of the lighting and the mood. Their work also sets styles, from Art Deco in the 20's to 30s modernism. Then it's on to the next project. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2012.
Primary is a documentary film about the primary elections between John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey in 1960. Primary is the first documentary to use light equipment in order to follow their subjects in a more intimate filmmaking style. This unconventional way of filming created a new look for documentary films where the camera’s lens was right in the middle of what ever drama was occurring. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 1998.
A description and enactment of the discovery of gold by James Marshall, and the role played by John Sutter. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive.
This short focuses on the job of the costume designer in the production of motion pictures. The costume designer must design clothing that is correct for the film historically and geographically, and must be appropriate for the mood of the individual scene. We see famed costume designer Edith Head at work on a production. The Costume Designer was part of The Industry Film Project, a twelve-part series produced by the film studios and the Academy. Each series episode was produced to inform the public on a specific facet of the motion picture industry. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2012.
The documentary traces Eddie Sachs (one of the most popular drivers in the history of the Indianapolis 500) in a behind-the-scenes look at the race from his perspective, starting from a week before the race through the day after the big event. You can feel the fervor and anticipation build (*pay close attention to the scaffolding that collapses with too many people on it during the race) as Eddie prepares to keep his place, "on the pole." Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2010.
Les Blank's poetic documentation of 1967's Los Angeles Easter Sunday Love-In. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2002.
Produced by the Army Pictorial Service, Signal Corps, with the cooperation of the Army Air Forces and the United States Navy, and released by Warner Bros. for the War Activities Committee shortly after the surrender of Japan. Follow General Douglas MacArthur and his men from their exile from the Philippines in early 1942, through the signing of the instrument of surrender on the USS Missouri on September 1, 1945. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2013.
Satyajit Ray's poetic documentary was commissioned by the Chogyal (King) of Sikkim at a time when he felt the sovereignty of Sikkim was under threat from both China and India. Ray's documentary is about the sovereignty of Sikkim. The film was banned by the government of India when Sikkim merged with India in 1975. The ban was finally lifted by the Ministry of External Affairs in September 2010. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2007.
The Town was a short propaganda film produced by the Office of War Information in 1945. It presents an idealized vision of American life, shown in microcosm by Madison, Indiana. It was created primarily for exhibition abroad, to provide international audiences a more well-rounded view of America, and was therefore produced in more than 20 translations. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2012.
A documentary abstraction recorded at night in Los Angeles backed by the music of Stockhausen. It is a preliminary effort to organise camera and audio images through a cybernetic editing model and a digital computer. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2013.
Documentary short explaining proper techniques for handling and disposal of incendiary bombs. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive, from the Academy War Film Collection, in 2009.
A bewitching, mysterious work of enveloping beauty, the film’s ominous title and a dedication to Anne Frank deeply inform our reading of its haunting subtext. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive, in partnership with the National Film Preservation Foundation, in 2009.
This Oscar-winning documentary tells the story behind Japanese daredevil Yuichiro Miura's 1970 effort to ski down the world's tallest mountain. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2010.
The Amazon rain forest, 1979. The crew of Fitzcarraldo (1982), a film directed by German director Werner Herzog, soon finds itself with problems related to casting, tribal struggles and accidents, among many other setbacks; but nothing compared to dragging a huge steamboat up a mountain, while Herzog embraces the path of a certain madness to make his vision come true.
Follows a crusading lawyer as he embarks on a campaign to save an African-American man, Paul Crump, from the electric chair. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 2007.
This film documents the coal miners' strike against the Brookside Mine of the Eastover Mining Company in Harlan County, Kentucky in June, 1973. Eastovers refusal to sign a contract (when the miners joined with the United Mine Workers of America) led to the strike, which lasted more than a year and included violent battles between gun-toting company thugs/scabs and the picketing miners and their supportive women-folk. Director Barbara Kopple puts the strike into perspective by giving us some background on the historical plight of the miners and some history of the UMWA. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with New York Women in Film & Television in 2004.
Many times during his presidency, Lyndon B. Johnson said that ultimate victory in the Vietnam War depended upon the U.S. military winning the "hearts and minds" of the Vietnamese people. Filmmaker Peter Davis uses Johnson's phrase in an ironic context in this anti-war documentary, filmed and released while the Vietnam War was still under way, juxtaposing interviews with military figures like U.S. Army Chief of Staff William C. Westmoreland with shocking scenes of violence and brutality.
A sideshow barker uses magic and visual aids to alert the public that proper food management is both a resource and a weapon that could be to America's advantage if conserved properly in winning the then current World War. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive, Academy War Film Collection, in 2008.
Julio, a young fisherman from a provincial village, descends into social alienation as he arrives in Manila to search for his loved one.
One can determine a line in Tscherkassky’s oeuvre which turns around a game with filmic presentation, with degrees of recognisability — with the only-just and the not-any-more. Just to see desire. An example of this is Erotique. One sees swirling pictures, parts of a woman’s face, red lips, eyes in cyclical fragments of movement. Often it is difficult to tell which part of the body one actually sees (whoever wants to can see/imagine/think sexual organs and sexual acts.) The gaze gets hung up on partial objects, no integral, whole body to think about. No body, whose representation was always one of the problems in cinema.
Its slow somnambulic rhythm, its animalistic jungle sounds as well as the eerily mixed images create a dream mood that comes closest to my actual dreaming-feeling. The long black phases between the sequences are as important as the images themselves because they leave empty space where the "echo" of the last image can seep through without interfering with the following image. But our logical mind still somehow feels compelled to construe some kind of sense, parallel, or some erratic story out of it.
An industrialist's affair with a troubled woman entangles him in a dangerous situation with her abusive boyfriend. His glamorous life spirals into unexpected peril.
The arrogant, third most-wanted criminal in Taiwan, decides to get rid of the top two competitors and crowns himself the most-wanted criminal before dying.
While Yeung Kam Wing is trying to remove all connections between the mob and him, his actions are being carefully observed by Lau Kin Ming, who bears a personal grudge against him.
The story of a girl in a small North Indian town who is an obsessive fan of top Hindi movie star Madhuri Dixit, and dreams of moving to Mumbai to become a film heroine herself.
Sounds as witnesses. They blurr into memories, half-dreams, it is undecided if they are real or not. A fluctuation between imagination and reality.
A man takes his wife and their teenage children on a road trip down memory lane while facing divorce.
Statesman and poet Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee's eloquence and vision shaped India's destiny. A look at his remarkable life as he led his country through a challenging period of change and development as the 10th Prime Minister of India.
Max, a ruthless fifty-year-old hitman, discovers he has a problem: he now faints at the drop of blood. With his future in the profession in jeopardy, he's going to have to retrain... But not so simple when his only professional skill is to kill people... They are helped by a couple of young neighbors, Karim and Stéphanie, who do not imagine for a moment who they are dealing with... Max becomes attached, in spite of himself, to the young couple, until his past catches up with him.
Amar is assigned to investigate a case of serial killings. When Amar investigates the case, he realizes it is not what it seems to be and following down this path will lead to nothing but war between everyone involved.
Rachel loves her life, her students, her friends, her ex, her guitar lessons. When she falls in love with Ali, she grows close to his 4-year-old daughter, Leila. She tucks her in, looks after her, and loves her like a mother... which she isn’t. Not yet. Rachel is 40. The desire for a family of her own is growing stronger, and the clock is ticking. Is it too late?
An emotional journey of a prison warden, driven by a personal vendetta while keeping up to a promise made years ago, recruits inmates to commit outrageous crimes that shed light on corruption and injustice, in an attempt to get even with his past, and that leads him to an unexpected reunion.
Once known for his intellectual prowess, a retired professor (Anupam Kher) begins experiencing memory gaps and periods of forgetfulness. But while he tries to laugh it off, it soon becomes clear that the symptoms are a sign of a more serious illness, prompting his grown daughter (Urmila Matondkar) to move in as his caretaker. Meanwhile, as his mind regresses, he recalls a traumatic childhood memory involving the death of Mahatma Gandhi.
The horror film [REC] — directed by Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza, and released in 2007 — was an unprecedented triumph for Spanish fantasy cinema. Fifteen years later, those responsible for the creation and worldwide success of this cinematic milestone decode its keys and resurrect the myth.
A collection of short parodies of the Mobile Suit Gundam saga. Episode 1 pokes fun at key events that occurred during the One Year War. In episode 2, Amuro, Kamille and Judau fight over who runs the better pension when Char comes in to crash their party. Episode 3 is the SD Olympics, an array of athletic events pitting man with mobile suit.
Boy is the unsettling story of a young male prostitute, or Rent Boy, in a small rural town who learns the truth behind a hit and run accident which has killed a local girl. When the news of the girls death spreads through the community, the driver and his family decide that the boy must be silenced. The set out to scare him into silence. The pressure becomes more and more violent, but despite this, the boy battles to expose the truth.
Bill struggles to put together his shattered psyche.