Documentary

  • Andrzej Munk – Kolejarskie slowo AKA A Railwayman’s Word (1953)

    1951-1960Andrzej MunkDocumentaryPolandShort Film

    Quote:
    Waiting for coke from the Silesian mines is the “Szczecin” steelworks, and with it the cities and grand constructions of People’s Poland. Steam locomotive drivers undertake not to allow any train delay, and give a letter of guarantee – the railroad’s watchword.Read More »

  • Jean Rouch & Raoul Ruiz & Titte Törnroth – Brise-glace (1988)

    1981-1990DocumentaryExperimentalJean RouchRaoul RuizSwedenTitte Törnroth

    Quote:
    Beyond a film, Icebreaker is in 1987 the first media composition, construction of 3 original works made on the Swedish icebreaker Frej, and involving the main means of expression. “Bateau Givre” by Jean Rouch (35′), carries the principles of direct cinema. Rouch discovers in his camera, without the artifice of a commentary, without the help of a third language, the work and the days of the icebreaker and the men who serve it. “Hans Majestäts Statsisbrytaren Frej” by Titte Törnroth (20′), offers a second approach, where the characters, who have acquired a mysterious presence with Rouch, evoke their work, their emotions, in their activities as well as in their moments of relaxation. This film answers the questions left unanswered in the previous one. Raoul Ruiz’s “Tales of Ice” (34′); when the viewer thinks he has gone around a reality that has become familiar, makes it tip over into a profusion of fictions; three stories weave together in this fantastic film where ice plays the central role, where the icebreaker becomes a strange vessel wandering on the edge of the world.Read More »

  • Mariko Miyagi – Kodomotachi ganbare AKA Hello, Kids! (1986)

    Documentary1981-1990JapanJapanese Female DirectorsMariko Miyagi

    Quote:
    The fourth film in a four-part documentary film depicting children of a nursing home for the physically handicapped, Nemunoki Gakuen, which celebrated its 45th anniversary. Projecting friendship through music and dance between Nemoki children and New York Harlem children.Read More »

  • Mariko Miyagi – Niji o kakeru kodomo-tachi AKA Children Drawing Rainbows (1975)

    1971-1980DocumentaryJapanJapanese Female DirectorsMariko Miyagi

    Quote:
    Mariko Miyagi is back documenting the activities of disabled children from her own school, Nemunoki. This time, the whole documentary focuses itself on the powers of creativity and drawing.Read More »

  • Jonas Mekas – Walden – Diaries Notes and Sketches (1964)

    USA1961-1970DocumentaryExperimentalJonas Mekas

    Quote:
    Jonas Mekas, the godfather of American “underground” cinema, shot literally miles of impromptu film on a tiny, touch-and-go Bolex camera before assembling his first “diary film” and screening it before an audience of friends and fellow indie artists in 1969. At that point the home-movie ethos was somewhat less than groundbreaking, but a glance at what Mekas’s contemporaries were working on or releasing at the time—Kenneth Anger was ensconced in off-and-on production for Lucifer Rising, Stan Brakhage was toiling on the 8mm Songs cycle, and Paul Morrissey had just morphed the Warhol aesthetic into the zeitgeist-preaching Flesh—suggests just how perpendicular his project stood in relation to the remainder of the bicoastal art-house scene. Read More »

  • Barbara Hammer – Nitrate Kisses (1992)

    USA1991-2000Barbara HammerDocumentaryExperimentalQueer Cinema(s)

    Synopsis wrote:
    In her first feature, after decades as a pioneer of lesbian cinema, Barbara Hammer weaves striking images of four contemporary gay and lesbian couples with footage of an unearthed, forbidden, and invisible history, searching eroded emulsions and images for lost vestiges of queer culture. Questions of historic representation are examined through addressing the margins, between-the-line readings, and images outside of prescribed textual boundaries. Archival footage from Lot In Sodom (1933), often regarded as the first queer film made in the United States, as well as footage from German narrative and documentary films of the thirties, are interwoven with contemporary footage in this multi-faceted, haunting documentary.Read More »

  • Wim Wenders – Reverse Angle: Ein Brief aus New York (1982)

    Wim Wenders1981-1990DocumentaryGermanyShort Film

    Quote:
    “REVERSE ANGLE was my first diary film. It is about “new wave music” (among others Jim Jarmusch’s Del Byzanteens), about straying in New York, about the editing process of HAMMETT in the presence of Francis Ford Coppola, about a novel by Emanuel Bove and about Edward Hopper. And somehow, the whole thing was a reflection about filmmaking in Europe and America.” — Wim WendersRead More »

  • Michael Haneke – Nachruf für einen Mörder AKA Obituary for a Murderer (1991)

    1991-2000AustriaDocumentaryMichael HanekeTV

    Synopsis:
    Autumn 1990, a young Austrian goes to a party held by some of his friends and provokes a hideous bloodbath. As a reflection of daily reality and its crass representation of the horror of this extreme crime, Michael Haneke has composed an experimental collage of material gathered from one day of ORF (Austrian TV) broadcasting, using each part in proportion to the time allocated to it in the programme schedule.

    Source: Archival Beta Tape (Austrian Broadcast Corporation)Read More »

  • Hassan Fazili – Midnight Traveler (2019)

    2011-2020AfghanistanDocumentaryHassan Fazili

    In 2015, the Taliban put a price on the head of Hassan, a filmmaker, who was forced to flee Afghanistan with his wife and two young daughters. Using their camera phones, the fugitives show first-hand the many dangers refugees face when seeking asylum in a safe place.Read More »

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