Wedding of Maharaj Kumar Shri Meghrajji Shaeb of Kutch and Maharaj Shri of Kishangarh (1933)

State Entry into Delhi of Lord Curzon, the Viceroy

Film showing the Viceregal party entering Delhi on lavishly decorated elephants, as part of the Coronation durbar of 1903.

Our King Emperor and Queen Empress Hold a Durbar in Delhi

King George V and Queen Mary hold ceremonial court in Delhi.

Writing with Fire

In a cluttered news landscape dominated by men, emerges India’s only newspaper run by Dalit women. Armed with smartphones, Chief Reporter Meera and her journalists break traditions on the frontlines of India’s biggest issues and within the confines of their own homes, redefining what it means to be powerful.

A Road in India

Life on the road in India, showing the traffic, people and animals.

Temples of India

Hindu temples at Benares and Belur and the mythologies associated with them.

Mind of Clay

In a poetic hour and a half, director Mani Kaul looks at the ancient art of making pottery from a wide variety of perspectives.

Machines

This portrayal of the rhythm of life and work in a gigantic textile factory in Gujarat, India, moves through the corridors and bowels of the enormously disorienting structure—taking the viewer on a journey of dehumanizing physical labor and intense hardship.

About Love

Three generations of the Phadke family live and work together in South Bombay. As they prepare for a family wedding, director Archana Atul Phadke, who is not in any hurry to marry, observes the shifting, often very funny household dynamics, as both her mother and grandmother wonder how they have tolerated their husbands for so long.

Day at St Christopher's College and School

Behind the scenes at a Chennai teachers training college.

Wild Karnataka

An unprecedented UHD film on Karnataka's rich biodiversity narrated by David Attenborough. Portraying the state with highest number of tigers and elephants using the latest technology - a masterpiece showcasing the state, its flora, fauna.

Fascinating India

"Fascinating India" spreads an impressive panorama of India’s historical and contemporary world. The film presents the most important cities, royal residences and temple precincts. It follows the trail of different religious denominations, which have influenced India up to the present day. Simon Busch and Alexander Sass travelled for months through the north of the Indian subcontinent to discover what is hidden under India’s exotic and enigmatic surface, and to show what is rarely revealed to foreigners. The film deals with daily life in India. In Varanasi, people burn their dead to ashes. At the Kumbh Mela, the biggest religious gathering of the world, 35 million pilgrims bathe in holy River Ganges. This is the first time India is presented in such an alluring and engaging fashion on screen.

A Punjab Village

Richly detailed amateur ethnographic film on the agrarian economy and society in rural Punjab.

The Power of Utopia: Living with Le Corbusier in Chandigarh

With the construction of the Indian planned city of Chandigarh, the Swiss and French architect Le Corbusier completed his life's work 70 years ago. Chandigarh is a controversial synthesis of the arts, a bold utopia of modernity. The film accompanies four cultural workers who live in the planned city and reflects on Le Corbusier's legacy, utopian urban ideas and the cultural differences between East and West in an atmospherically dense narrative.

Delhi Durbar and Coronation

Jaw-dropping pomp and pageantry at the 1911 Delhi Durbar

Maya, la tigresse du Maharashtra

Plot unavailable

The Search for the Meaning

"The Search for the Meaning" is a collective experience, carried out with the audiovisual contribution of countless people who record their testimonies and spiritual experiences in 19 countries, to show a new spirituality that is being born...

A Suitable Girl

A Suitable Girl follows three young women in India struggling to maintain their identities and follow their dreams amid intense pressure to get married. The film examines the women's complex relationship with marriage, family, and society.

Picturesque India or, In and About Calcutta

Botanical gardens in Bombay plus the highly decorative Jain Temple in Calcutta.

India Cabaret

A documentary exploring the "respectable" and "immoral" stereotypes of women in Indian society told from the point of view of 2 strip-tease dancers in a cabaret house in Bombay.

Auroville: L'esquisse d'un monde

Plot unavailable

Marzia & Felix

Footage from the Marzia and Felix Kjellberg’s wedding.

Dams: The Lethal Water Bombs

Documentary short about the disastrous dangers of aging, ailing dams.

Wheel of Time

Wheel of Time is Werner Herzog's photographed look at the largest Buddhist ritual in Bodh Gaya, India.

The Wedding in Monaco

Exclusive footage captures the wedding of American screen star Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier of Monaco.

India on Film: 1899 – 1947

As part of the 2017 UK-India Year of Culture, the British Council and British Film Institute share a unique collection of films documenting the sights and culture of a bygone India. Filmed between 1899-1947, and preserved in the BFI National Archive since then, these rare films capture many glimpses of life in India, from dances and markets, to hunts and pageantry.

Variations on Iserois Landscapes

Thirty-three shots based on the landscapes of the Isère region near Vienne. A work of observation on light, the dilation of Time, wind, calm and storm.

Hearts Know * the Runaway Brides

Nineteen brides, scattered over four continents, run off on their wedding day. Reality and fiction merge when random people from different cultures contemplate why the brides run away.

Veteran Car Rally, Brighton

Vintage vehicles on parade in this amateur film record of the longest-running motor event in the world.

A Rifle and a Bag

Somi is pregnant with her second child. A girl, she hopes. Together with her husband she prepares for this new phase of their parenthood. It means that their son has to go to school, but as an ex-Naxalite that is tough to achieve in contemporary India, where people like them are third-rate citizens. They lack the certificates and an opaque bureaucratic process doesn't help. Directors Isabella Rinaldi, Cristina Hanes and Arya Rothe of the NoCut Film Collective concentrate on Somi's close family ties, painting a portrait of ex-Naxalites in India. Once, Somi and her husband were communist rebels fighting for the rights of Indian tribes. However, to safeguard their family's welfare, they surrendered to the government in exchange for marginal compensation and simple accommodation.

Legends in Love

Take your seat on the aisle for weddings the world will never forget: the stunningly beautiful Jacqueline Bouvier to the strikingly charismatic John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the shy yet buoyant Lady Diana Spencer to the mischievous yet maturing Prince Charles, Hollywood's queen Grace Kelly bringing a fantasy to life in a glorious Monaco cathedral, and Elizabeth Taylor to a series of handsome beaus, bridal gowns and wedding bouquets. Legends in Love. Stories to behold, stories to be told. With all the enchantment, elegance, excitement - and mystery - that surrounds the lovestyles of the rich and famous.

A Native Street in India

Early film of a crowded street scene in an unidentified Indian city.

Purdah

The inspiring story of a young Indian Muslim woman who trades her burka for dreams of playing on the Mumbai Senior Women's Cricket Team and how the harsh realities for women in her country creates an unexpected outcome for her own family, ultimately shattering and fueling aspirations.

Ladakh

A stunning trek from the vale of Kashmir, via Sind Valley and Kargil and Lamayaru Monastry.