Chantal Akerman reads a script detailing the woes that befell her on the day she thought about "The Future of Cinema". The camera continuously rotates 360 degrees around her apartment as she rereads the script at an exponentially increasing speed. At its heart, an homage to Godard.
An intimate view of the panorama of African wildlife, giving a sense of what it is really like to be there, and in a dramatic climax makes a poignant plea for conservation. Filmed in Zaire, Kenya and Tanzania, the film takes the viewer from deep inside an anthill, to the majestic giraffes suckling their young. African storms, dung beetle ritual dances, duels for supremacy, feeding time, and playtime all end as the animals disappear one by one while the sound of a rifle shatters the existing magic of life. Winner of the Academy Award for Documentary Short Subject, 1976.
Comprising train and track footage quickly shot just before a heavy winter's snowfall was melting, the multi-award-winning classic that emerged from the cutting-room compresses British Rail's dedication to blizzard-battling into a thrilling eight-minute montage cut to music. Tough-as-boots workers struggling to keep the line clear are counterpointed with passengers' buffet-car comforts.
An Oscar-nominated film with no narration showing the Exploratorium (The Palace of Arts and Science) in San Francisco. It shows many of the exhibits and the reaction of visitors to many of these. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive.
The Arkansas school integration crisis and the changes wrought in subsequent years. This film profiles the lives of the nine African-American students who integrated Central High in Little Rock, Arkansas, during the fall of 1957. The film documents the perspective of Jefferson Thomas and his fellow students seven years after their historic achievement. Central to this story is their quiet but brave entrance into Little Rock High, escorted by armed troops under the intense pressure of the on looking crowd. We learn first hand their impressions of the past and present and their hopes for the future. Their selfless heroism broke the integration crisis and pioneered a new era. This film went on to win an Academy Award® for Best Documentary Short in 1964.
Thirty Million Letters is a 1963 short documentary film directed by James Ritchie and made by British Transport Films. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short.
The Ax Fight (1975) is an ethnographic film by anthropologist and filmmaker Tim Asch and anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon about a conflict in a Yanomami village called Mishimishimabowei-teri, in southern Venezuela. It is best known as an iconic and idiosyncratic ethnographic film about the Yanomamo and is frequently shown in classroom settings.
Jenny is a Good Thing is a 1969 American short documentary film about children and poverty, directed by Joan Horvath. Produced by Project Head Start, it shows the importance of good nutrition for underprivileged nursery school children. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short.
This documentary shows how an Inuit artist's drawings are transferred to stone, printed and sold. Kenojuak Ashevak became the first woman involved with the printmaking co-operative in Cape Dorset. This film was nominated for the 1963 Documentary Short Subject Oscar.
Follows Iwao Ichikawa, a second-generation Japanese Mexican, navigating racial segregation in Mexicali, Baja California during WWII, offering a poignant exploration of identity and belonging amidst adversity.
A short documentary depicting a typical day in the life of a 1940s era flying stewardess.
A music documentary about Olivier Messiaen's transcendent masterpiece, that he composed in a World War II prison camp, and debuted there on January 15, 1941. This film was completed on the 75th Anniversary of that historic premiere, and features "The President's Own" United States Marine Band Ensemble performing in rehearsal and at The Phillips Collection, in Washington, D.C. (Note by H. Paul Moon)
A short film about the curse of making plans.
This experimental short film deals with anguish, as imagined by Claude Péloquin, author, poet, performer and filmmaker, in the early 1970s. Vertiginous camera angles, oppressive places and a disturbing soundtrack, the filmmaker uses his sound environment and the words of the interpreter Josée Vanasse to express this generalized disease at a time of great acceleration and fury for life.
A study of the behavior of monkeys in the African jungle.
The courtship behavior of Great Bustards is studied. The male Great Bustard is considerably larger than the female. This impression is reinforced during courtship when the male dances in front of the female, showing the light undersides of its wings and inflating its throat pouch.
Examines the mesmerising construction of clear crystal glass pieces created by the craftsmen of Waterford. The process from the intense heat of the furnace to glass blowing, shaping, cutting, honing, filling and finishing is all depicted in this celebration of the art of creation of Waterford Glass. Academy Award Nominee: Best Live Action Short - 1976.
Longtime playwrights and performers of the Abbey Theatre share colourful reminiscences of the national institution founded by W.B. Yeats and Lady Gregory in 1904. Oscar Nominee: Best Documentary Short