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Sisters in Resistance
🇫🇷 France 🇩🇪 GermanyFour young women joined the Resistance to fight Nazi oppression and brutality in occupied France. They were arrested and deported to Ravensbruck concentration camp, where they helped each other to survive. SISTERS IN RESISTANCE captures their recollections and the intense friendship that has survived with them.
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White Hotel
🇪🇷 EritreaWhen two women with a video camera follow an HIV research team to Eritrea, Africa, they find a strange and magical country which transforms their documentary into an intimate investigation of their own capacities to love, suffer and forgive.
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Westray
Nova Scotia The 1990sIn this feature documentary, filmmaker Paul Cowan offers an innovative, moving account of the Westray coal mine disaster that killed 26 men in Nova Scotia on May 9, 1992. The film focuses on the lives of three widows and three miners lucky enough not to be underground that day when the methane and coal dust ignited. But their lives were torn apart by the events. Meet some of the working men, who felt they had no option but to stay on at Westray. And wives, who heard the rumours, saw their men sometimes bloodied from accidents and stood by them, hoping it would all turn out all right. This is a film about working people everywhere whose lives are often entrusted to companies that violate the most fundamental rules of safety and decency in the name of profit.
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I Love the Sound of the Kalachnikov It Reminds Me of Tchaikovsky
🇦🇿 Azerbaijan The 20th CenturyAn autobiographical documentary film that goes beyond the barriers of the genre and is something between videoart, experimental film and home video and seeks to throw light on the consequences of the Armenian Genocide of 1915, which forced the director´s family to emigrate to France. In the spirit of Bertolt Brecht´s theory of art and distanciation, Khazarian frees himself from reality, combining in the film amateur films about his own family and contemporary footage from the battlefield in Nagorno-Karabakh. His film is not a recapitulation of historical fact, but rather a visual meditation on the fetishist aesthetics of war, diverse sexual orientations and the consequences of emigration. The film deals with topics such as war, destruction and sexuality, which, in the director´s view are indissolubly linked.
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Dark Days
New York The 1990sA cinematic portrait of the homeless population who live permanently in the underground tunnels of New York City.
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Paradise Lost 2: Revelations
Arkansas The 1990sRevisiting the 1994 Arkansas murder of three 8-year-old boys and the three teenagers convicted of the crime. A follow up to Paradise Lost, Revelations features new interviews with the convicted men, as well as with the original judge and police investigators.
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American Pimp
The 1990sStreet pimps, all of them African-American, discuss their lives and work: getting started, being flamboyant, pimping in various U.S. cities, bringing a woman into their group, taking a woman from another pimp, and the rules and regulations of pimping. The men are clear: it's about money.
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The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition
🇦🇶 Antarctica The 1910sDocumentary on the Shackleton Antartic expedition. A retelling of Sir Ernest Shackleton's ill-fated expedition to Antarctica in and the crew of his vessel 'The Endurance', which was trapped in the ice floes and frigid open ocean of the Antarctic in 1914. Shackleton decided, with many of his crew injured and weak from exposure and starvation, to take a team of his fittest men and attempt to find help. Setting out in appalling conditions with hopelessly inadequate equipment, they endured all weather and terrain and finally reached safety. Persuading a local team of his confidence that the abandoned team would still be alive, he set out again to find them. After almost 2 years trapped on the ice, all members of the crew were finally rescued.
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For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story
🇨🇺 Cuba The 1970sIn the early 1970s, Cuban trumpeter Arturo Sandoval (Andy Garcia) is torn between his own musical dreams and the dreams of his wife, Marianela (Mía Maestro), a fervent supporter of the ideals of the Castro revolution. Also starring Charles S. Dutton as Dizzy Gillespie and José Zúñiga as Paquito D'Rivera, this gripping jazz biopic is at once a detailed portrait of a musician and a stinging critique
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Paragraph 175
🇩🇪 Germany The 1940sDuring the Nazi regime, there was widespread persecution of homosexual men, which started in 1871 with the Paragraph 175 of the German Penal Code. Thousands were murdered in concentration camps. This powerful and disturbing documentary, narrated by Rupert Everett, presents for the first time the largely untold testimonies of some of those who survived.
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Two-part documentary on Japan at war, examining the Japanese treatment of Allied prisoners of war. Turning Against the West Using Japanese archive footage and interviews with both prisoners and their guards, this film investigates why, having treated their POW's comparatively well during World War I, their attitudes had altered so dramatically by World War II Death Before Surrender Conclusion of a two-part documentary on Japan at war, examining why, when the Second World War turned against Japan, so many Japanese soldiers chose death rather than surrender. Archive footage and interviews with veterans form a comprehensive portrait of a nation in crisis, revealing how Japan's inability to surrender would have terrible consequences for all the countries touched by the war in the East
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Scottsboro: An American Tragedy
Alabama The 1930sA look at the infamous "Scottsboro Boys" case that occurred in Alabama in 1931, in which nine young black men were arrested, tried and quickly convicted in the rape of two white women, despite overwhelming evidence that showed their accusers had falsely accused them and the fact that one of the women later admitted that no rape had in fact occurred (although both had had sexual relations with their boyfriends on the day prior to the "rape"). The case was one of the first that shined a spotlight on what many called the "legal lynchings" that occurred in the South whenever blacks were accused of crimes, especially against whites and most especially against white women.
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Marshall University: Ashes to Glory
West Virginia The 1970sIn 1979, a plane carrying the Marshall University football team crashed, leaving no survivors. This film documents how a young coach and the five remaining players achieved one of the most heroic comebacks of all time. Combining archival footage with interviews of individuals close to the tragedy, Ashes to Glory tells a tale of remarkable courage in the face of adversity, in the process honoring the memory of those who perished.
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Up Syndrome
TexasUniversity of Texas student Duane Graves chronicles his charismatic childhood chum Rene Moreno, a San Antonio native with Down Syndrome, in this playful, stirring, remarkably unique portrait documentary.
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Long Night's Journey Into Day
🇿🇦 South AfricaLooking into a dark past for a bright future. — This documentary tells four stories of Apartheid in South Africa, as seen through the eyes of the Truth and Reconciliation commission
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Amílcar Cabral
🇨🇻 Cabo VerdeDocumentary about African freedom fighter Amílcar Cabral, whose story is told by his relatives and friends. Amílcar, besides being a humanist and nationalist, was also a brilliant poet.
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Cry Freetown
🇸🇱 Sierra Leone The 1990sAn account of the victims of the Sierra Leone Civil War and depicts the most brutal period with the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebels capturing the capital city on January 1999.
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Anarchists
🇦🇷 Argentina 🇺🇾 Uruguay The 1910s The 1920s The 1930sArmed based on photography, period films, archival materials and testimonies of survivors, family members and historians, the documentary accurately and exquisitely reconstructs the course of the “expropriating anarchists” in the Río de la Plata and specifically in Montevideo del First third of the 20th century.
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The Lost Gods of Easter Island
🇨🇱 ChileA simple, carved figure bought at an auction in New York leads David Attenborough on a global journey from Russia to Australia, from England back to the Pacific. On the way he delves into a history of the stunning stones on Easter Island.
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Buena Vista Social Club
🇨🇺 Cuba 🇳🇱 Netherlands New York The 1990sIn Havana, music isn't a pastime, it's a way of life. — In this fascinating Oscar-nominated documentary, American guitarist Ry Cooder brings together a group of legendary Cuban folk musicians (some in their 90s) to record a Grammy-winning CD in their native city of Havana. The result is a spectacular compilation of concert footage from the group's gigs in Amsterdam and New York City's famed Carnegie Hall, with director Wim Wenders capturing not only the music -- but also the musicians' life stories.
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American Movie
Wisconsin The 1990sAmerican Movie is the story of filmmaker Mark Borchardt, his mission, and his dream. Spanning over two years of intense struggle with his film, his family, financial decline, and spiritual crisis, American Movie is a portrayal of ambition, obsession, excess, and one man's quest for the American Dream.
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Genghis Blues
🇲🇳 Mongolia The 1990sBlind blues musician Paul Pena is perhaps best known for his song "Jet Airliner". In 1993, Pena heard Tuvan throat singing over his shortwave radio and subsequently taught himself how to reproduce these extraordinary sounds. This documentary follows him to Tuva, where he takes part in a throat singing competition.
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One Day in September
🇩🇪 Germany The 1970s1972. The Munich Olympic Games. 121 Nations. 7,123 Competitors. Over a billion vieweres ... and 8 Palestinian Terrorists. For the first time in 25 years, the truth is revealed. — The full story of the 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre and the Israeli revenge operation 'Wrath of God.' The 1972 Munich Olympics were interrupted by Palestinian terrorists taking Israeli athletes hostage. Besides footage taken at the time, we see interviews with the surviving terrorist, Jamal Al Gashey, and various officials detailing exactly how the police, lacking an anti-terrorist squad and turning down help from the Israelis, botched the operation
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Instrument
Maryland District of Columbia The 1980s The 1990sInstrument is a documentary film directed by Jem Cohen about the band Fugazi. Cohen's relationship with band member Ian MacKaye extends back to the 1970s when the two met in high school in Washington, D.C.. The film takes its title from the Fugazi song of the same name, from their 1993 album, In on the Kill Taker. Editing of the film was done by both Cohen and the members of the band over the course of five years. It was shot from 1987 through 1998 on super 8, 16mm and video and is composed mainly of footage of concerts, interviews with the band members, practices, tours and time spent in the studio recording their 1995 album, Red Medicine. The film also includes portraits of fans as well as interviews with them at various Fugazi shows around the United States throughout the years.
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Wisconsin Death Trip
Wisconsin The 1890sWisconsin Death Trip is an intimate, shocking and sometimes hilarious account of the disasters that befell one small town in Wisconsin during the final decade of the 19th century. The film is inspired by Michael Lesy's book of the same name which was first published in 1973. Lesy discovered a striking archive of black and white photographs in the town of Black River Falls dating from the 1890s and married a selection of these images to extracts from the town's newspaper from the same decade. The effect was surprising and disturbing. The town of Black River Falls seems gripped by some peculiar malaise and the weekly news is dominated by bizarre tales of madness, eccentricity and violence amongst the local population.
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Sing Faster: The Stagehands' Ring Cycle
California The 1990sInfidelity, Lies, Betrayal. And that's just what's happening on stage. — With its four operas, seventeen-hour running time and months of rehearsal, Wagner's "Ring Cycle" is a daunting undertaking for any opera company. Jon Else goes backstage to show this rare event entirely from the point of view of union stagehands at the San Francisco Opera.
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Siegfried & Roy: The Magic Box
Nevada 🇩🇪 Germany The 20th CenturyA story of hope. A journey of dreams. A life of magic.
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Island of the Sharks
🇨🇷 Costa RicaThe Beauty. The Wonder. The Danger. (IMAX) — A magnificent expedition 300 miles west of Costa Rica spotlights the remote animal sanctuary of Cocos Island. Its amazing underwater world has some of the ocean's most-feared, most-misunderstood predators. Manta rays, barracudas, giant sea turtles, porpoises and hundreds of sharks swim past on the giant IMAX screen.
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On the Ropes
New York The 1990sThe real fight is outside the ring. — The story of three young boxers and their coach who is determined to guide them in a positive direction in and out of the ring.
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Regret to Inform
🇻🇳 Vietnam The 1960s The 1990sIn this film made over ten years, filmmaker Barbara Sonneborn goes on a pilgrimage to the Vietnamese countryside where her husband was killed. She and translator (and fellow war widow) Xuan Ngoc Nguyen explore the meaning of war and loss on a human level. The film weaves interviews with Vietnamese and American widows into a vivid testament to the legacy of war.
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Welcome to Australia
New South Wales The 1990sWelcome to Australia is a 1999 Carlton Television documentary, written and presented by John Pilger, which was directed and produced by Alan Lowery, and charts the history of injustice endured by indigenous Australians in the context of the build-up to the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympic Games.
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South
Texas Alabama Georgia The 1990sChantal Akerman investigates the American Deep South through the story of a lynching and grisly murder of an African-American man that took place in Texas in 1998.
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Through a Blue Lens
British ColumbiaThis documentary, set in the Lower East End of Vancouver's downtown core, is a pretty honest account of life on the streets in urban Canada. It is aimed at educating high school kids on the dangers of addiction to hard drugs and is the brainchild of a group of city police officers who videotape their interactions with local homeless personalities.
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Adwa
🇪🇹 Ethiopia The 1890sIn 1896, Ethiopia, an African nation, largely armed with spears and knives, defeats a well-equipped and organized Italian military bent on colonization.
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Bye Bye Africa
🇹🇩 ChadA Chadian film director who lives and works in France (Haroun) returns home upon the death of his mother. He is shocked at the degraded state of the country and the national cinema. The filmmaker decides to make a film dedicated to his mother entitled Bye Bye Africa but immediately encounters major problems. Cinemas have closed and financing is impossible to secure. The director reunites with an old girlfriend (Yelena), who was shunned by Chadians who could not distinguish between film and reality after appearing in one of his previous films as an HIV victim. Haroun learns about the destruction of the African cinema from directors in neighboring countries, but also finds Issa Serge Coelo shooting his first film, Daressalam. Things go badly and, convinced that it is impossible to make films in Africa, Haroun departs Chad in despair, leaving his film camera to a young boy who had been assisting him.
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Alaska: Spirit of the Wild
AlaskaAlaska... Here, in this vast and spectacularly beautiful land teeming with abundant wildlife, discover the "Spirit of the Wild." Experience it in the explosive calving of glaciers, the celestial fires of the Aurora Borealis. Witness it in the thundering stampede of caribou, the beauty of the polar bear and the stealthful, deadly hunt of the wolf pack.
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Kurt & Courtney
Washington The 1990sAfter rocker Kurt Cobain's death, ruled a suicide, a film crew arrives in Seattle to make a documentary. Director Nick Broomfield talks to lots of people. Portraits emerge: a shy, slight Kurt, weary of touring, embarrassed by fame, hooked on heroin; an out-going Courtney, dramatic, controlling, moving from groupie to star.
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Everest
🇳🇵 Nepal Tibet The 1990sTowering above everything you have seen before. — An international team of climbers ascends Mt. Everest in the spring of 1996. The film depicts their lengthy preparations for the climb, their trek to the summit, and their successful return to Base Camp. It also shows many of the challenges the group faced, including avalanches, lack of oxygen, treacherous ice walls, and a deadly blizzard.
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Party Monster: The Shockumentary
New YorkHe came. He partied. He killed. — "Party Monster: The Shockumentary" tells the story of the rise and fall of Michael Alig, a kid from Middle America who aspired to take the place of Andy Warhol. Michael quickly rose to become the biggest party promoter in New York and King of the so-called Club Kids. But after spiraling into drug addiction, Michael brutally murdered his roommate Angel Melendez.
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A Place Called Chiapas
🇲🇽 Mexico The 1990sInside the world's first postmodern revolution — In 1994, the Zapatista National Liberation Army, made up of impoverished Mayan Indians from the state of Chiapas, took over five towns and 500 ranches in southern Mexico. The government deployed its troops and at least 145 people died in the ensuing battle. Filmmaker Nettie Wild travelled to the country's jungle canyons to film the elusive and fragile life of this uprising.
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The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg
Michigan The 1940s The 1930sWhen America Needed Heroes, A Jewish Slugger Stepped To The Plate. — The story of Baseball Hall-of-Famer Hank Greenberg, the first major Jewish baseball star in the Major Leagues, is told through archival film footage and interviews with fans, former teammates, friends, and family. As a great first baseman with the Detroit Tigers, Greenberg endured antisemitism and became a hero and source of inspiration throughout the Jewish community, not incidentally leading the Tigers to Major League dominance in the 1930s.
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The Decline of Western Civilization Part III
California The 1990sThe Decline of Western Civilization III is a 1998 documentary film directed by Penelope Spheeris that chronicles the 'gutter punk' lifestyle of homeless teens in Los Angeles.
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Divine Trash
Maryland The 1970s The 1980s The 1990sThe life and times of Baltimore film maker and midnight movie pioneer, John Waters.
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Frat House
New York Pennsylvania The 1990sFrat House is a documentary film exploring the darker side of fraternity life, largely filmed at Allentown, Pennsylvania's Muhlenberg College; the majority of the film was shot in the house of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity, whose charter was revoked in 2000 and reinstated in 2011. The opening fraternity, that drove the filmmakers out of the college and the town, is the Beta Chi fraternity on the State University of New York College at Oneonta campus in Oneonta New York. Beta Chi is an unrecognized fraternity in Oneonta, and was kicked off the Oneonta campus after reports of severe hazing. It continues to operate as a rogue, unrecognized chapter in the town to this day
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World War III
🇩🇪 Germany 🇵🇱 Poland 🇷🇺 Russia The 1980sThis mock documentary uses archival footage, interviews and reports taken out of context and staged interviews to highlight a possible escalation into a nuclear war. In this feature, tension in East Germany, and an uprising triggered by a visit by Gorbachev sees a successful military coup taking place in the USSR. Western actions against brutal crack-downs on civilians involved increases tension between the sides, finally resulting in nuclear war.
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Woubi Chéri
🇨🇮 Côte dIvoireThis documentary shows a few days in the life of various members of Abdijan, Ivory Coast's gay and transgendered community. We get to meet a variety of woubis, yossis, etc. The hero/heroine of the film is a statuesque young man named Barbara who is organising the annual year-end party of the Ivory Coast Tranvestite Association, to be held December 27, 1997.
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An Alan Smithee Film: Burn, Hollywood, Burn
CaliforniaBurn, Hollywood, Burn — Filmmaker Alan Smithee finds himself the unwilling puppet of a potentially bad, big budget action film which he proceeds to steal the reels and leave the cast and crew in a frenzy.
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Africa's Elephant Kingdom
🇰🇪 Kenya 🇹🇿 TanzaniaThis film explores an elephant clan's search for food and water as seen through the eyes of one old bull.
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The Farm: Angola, USA
Louisiana The 1990sDocumentary depicting day to day life in Angola Prison mostly from an inmate's perspective. Interviews are with several inmates including one with a life sentence who is about to die.
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