Documentary

IMDB user comment:
Excellent, well-produced documentary

This is one of the better historical documentaries that I have seen in awhile covering any subject. Producing a documentary on Nelson Mandela is a rather formidable undertaking, and I believe that the filmmakers prove to be up to the task. The film portrays Mandela not as a saint, but as a human being — yes sometimes egotistical, but steadfast throughout his struggle. One of the most memorable parts of the film (edited marvelously) for me was the section describing the Sharpeville massacre (including actual footage) and how this event was key in turning Mandela from non-violence to armed struggle. Also powerful is the coverage of Mandela’s first trial on treason. Not only is footage woven in with interviews of key colleagues of Mandela, but one can see from the interview subjects that the fight against apartheid in South Africa was not merely a black versus white struggle. The struggle, in fact, encompassed a number of different ethnicities — even Afrikkaners.
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bbc’s website wrote:
Back in 1960 Ken Russell made a remarkable film about mining in Northumberland called The Bedlington Miners’ Picnic.
Forty five years on, Russell is back in the North East revisiting the people and places featured in the film.
It’s a poignant story of survival, loss and community spirit.
South East Northumberland was once one of Britain’s richest coalfields, producing tons of coal for industry and homes.
Today the coal mining industry is virtually extinct in the North East of England with no deep pits left in production.
Inside Out follows film director Ken Russell as he revisits the area where he shot one of his first documentary films in 1960.
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Tea is an essay film documenting an artistic gesture surrounding Alighiero Boetti’s One Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan. What does it mean to return to a place while visiting it for the first time? How a guest can become a host due to a years-late arrival? How far, really, is Afghanistan from Mexico? These questions, as they pertain to the relationship between Boetti and Mario Garcia Torres, are considered in the film.Read More »

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One of the most important documentary films made in France, Paris 1900 vividly conveys the mood of a world in transition, from the exuberance of the belle époque to the shattering folly of world war. Although much of material in the film is trivial (tastes in fashion, the pastimes of the wealthy elite, and such like), it contains many historically important images. Most memorable is the rare footage of such figures as artist Claude Monet, writer Edmond Rostand (author of Cyrano de Bergerac), filmmaker Ferdinand Zecca, not to mention a sequence where a young Maurice Chevalier gives his impression of cabaret performer Félix Mayol, in the company of Mistinguet.Read More »

Synopsis

Begins a week of LATE SHOW’s looking at the future. This programme argues that the 21st century is going to be just like the 14th. For example Alan Minc has argued that there will be no political order at all and areas of countries will be outside state control, run by crime syndicates the modern equivalents of medieval robber barons.

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Pure dystopic/apocalyptic 90s mentality. Chaos, drugs, AIDS, Ebola, unifying theories in physics, internet, computer graphics, PC games, early GUIs etc etc and parallels drawn between the world to come and middle ages.Read More »

Feature debut of Caouette is an experimental documentary constructed from home movies, photographs, letters, phone messages, and created video footage that Caouette edited on his home computer and layered with appropriate songs. It follows the emotional journey of Caouette and his mentally ill mother from a Texas childhood legacy of abuse, neglect, and an escape into a self-created fantasy world, to their lives 20-odd years later.
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Synopsis: Paul Goodman, whose best-selling ‘Growing Up Absurd’ made him the philosopher of the New Left in the 1960s, was also a brilliant poet, out queer (and family man) in the 1940s, radical pacifist and visionary. His ideas and stubborn integrity helped many find a moral compass in the ’60’s — and can do so again today.Read More »

Synopsis
Explores how Zen Buddhist monks actively got involved in the Second World War and their position now regarding that participation.

“Zen and War” features Shodo Harada Roshi and other contemporary Zen Buddhist teachers speaking of their WWII predecessors’ collaboration in wartime atrocities for the first time on film. The impetus for this film came from Ina Buitendijk, a Dutch woman whose husband suffered severely under Japanese internment in Asia during the war. As a Zen Buddhist practitioner she wrote letters to Zen monastic centers, asking how Buddhist monks could have been involved in warfare.Read More »

Today Iranian cinema is one of the most highly regarded national cinemas in the world, regularly winning festival awards and critical acclaim for films which combine remarkable artistry and social relevance. Iran: A Cinematographic Revolution traces the development of this film industry, which has always been closely intertwined with the country’s tumultuous political history, from the decades-long reign of Reza Shah Pahlevi and his son, the rise of Khomeini and the birth of the Islamic Republic, the seizure by militants of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, and the devastating war with Iraq.Read More »