Paradies der Tiere (1979)

Becoming Black

In the 1960s, a white couple living in East Germany tells their dark-skinned child that her skin color is merely a coincidence. As a teenager, she accidentally discovers the truth. Years before, a group of African men came to study in a village nearby. Sigrid, an East German woman, fell in love with Lucien from Togo and became pregnant. But she was already married to Armin. The child is Togolese-East German filmmaker Ines Johnson-Spain. In interviews with Armin and others from her childhood years, she tracks the astonishing strategies of denial her parents, striving for normality, developed following her birth. What sounds like fieldwork about social dislocation becomes an autobiographical essay film and a reflection on themes such as identity, social norms and family ties, viewed from a very personal perspective.

What The Durrells Did Next

Hosted by Keeley Hawes, star of the popular television series The Durrells, this documentary reveals the adventures of the eccentric Durrell family once they left Corfu, Greece.

Dominion

Exposing the dark underbelly of modern animal agriculture through drones, hidden & handheld cameras, the feature-length film explores the morality and validity of our dominion over the animal kingdom.

Born to Be Wild

Born to Be Wild observes various orphaned jungle animals and their day-to-day behavioural interactions with the individuals who rescue them and raise them to adulthood. The film unfurls in two separate geographic spheres. Half of it takes place in the rain forests of Borneo, where celebrated primatologist Dr. Birute Galdikas assists baby orangutans; the other half takes place on the arid savannahs of Kenya, where zoologist Dame Daphne Sheldrick works with baby elephant calves.

Koko: A Talking Gorilla

A documentary that follows Dr. Penny Patterson's current scientific study of Koko, a gorilla who communicates through American Sign Language.

The Invisible Zoo

Across the seasons, the film gives an account of life and work and the animals and visitors at Zurich Zoo, an institution that is one of the leading zoological gardens in Europe. Animals in their cages, humans in the cinema. What lies between them?

Night on Earth: Shot in the Dark

This look behind the scenes shows how worldwide camera crews climbed, dived and froze to capture the documentary's groundbreaking night footage.

So klang die DEFA - Filmmusik aus Babelsberg

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Look Out!

Hard, harder, hardest! This film orders you from the start to turn up the volume and pay attention. "Look out! We're Coming to Get You!" is a flood of images driven by a tempest of guitars. The film's creators jam 20 years of German music history into 120 minutes of film. Musicians from BLIND PASSENGERS, DIE SKEPTIKER, SANDOW and other bands explode their way through the film. Fans of the DEFA documentary "Flüstern und Schreien" ("Whisper and Shout") already know the stars of that film, Aljoscha, Paul and Flake of the band Feeling B. Here they have a chance to see how these musicians survived the period after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the "escalation of possibilities" that came with it. And you're allowed to laugh, too!

Mysore

Two sides of Mysore: down to earth with the field workers and an Indian spectacle for the Maharaja.

The Zoo

A perfect, fast and hilarious montage. Using images from Artis (Amsterdam Zoo), Bert Haanstra shows that a couple of similarities can be discovered between human and animal. Particularly the manner in which human and ape are confronted with each other, is significant. The images speak for themselves, human voices or commentary is absent. The ironic music of Pim Jacobs does add an extra dimension to the whole. With regards to human and animal Haanstra limits himself for the time being to this short film, recorded with a hidden camera. Later on, in several big films, he would return to this subject.

Les Champions d'Hitler

In the three years leading up to the Olympics, the Nazi regime saw sport as an invaluable mobilisation and propaganda tool to motivate the `master race'. Whether sympathisers or followers, German athletes went along with it; however, a number of them came to regret their decisions.

Lion, London Zoological Gardens

A male lion, right next to bars that are about 6 or 8 inches apart, keenly watches a uniformed zoo attendant toss small morsels of food into the cage. The lion alternates between finding the food on the cage floor and reaching through the bars to swipe at the man, who stays alarmingly close to the beast. In the background are the large rocks and brick wall at the back of the lion's habitat.

Curiosity and Control

Curiosity and Control examines our complex relationship to nature itself. A multi layered look at the world of Museums of Natural History and Zoological gardens, with voices from historians, authors, architects and zoo managers. It raises questions about how we perceive nature and our contradictory behavior of caging what we fear may be lost.

Savages: The Story of Human Zoos

For more than a century the great colonial powers put human beings, taken by force from their native lands, on show as entertainment, just like animals in zoos; a shameful, outrageous and savage treatment of people who were considered subhuman.

Cher & the Loneliest Elephant

"The World's Loneliest Elephant" Kaavan will finally experience freedom, thanks to his biggest champion, the one & only Cher. We'll follow Cher, Free The Wild, Four Paws International, and Kaavan on every step of the trip.

An Apology to Elephants

Elephants are among the most majestic and intelligent creatures on Earth--but for hundreds of years, they have suffered at the hands of humans. Narrated by Lily Tomlin, this documentary short traces our long history with elephants and explores the many problems that arise when they are brought to live in captivity in zoos and circuses.

Zoofobia

The tragic death of a polar bear triggers the end of the Buenos Aires Zoo. A superhero lover lawyer asks a court to declare the orangutan Sandra a Non-Human Person and revolutionizes the planet. A very Argentine story, full of passions, embarrassing missteps and memorable characters.

Garden, Zoological

The keepers are kept busy with animals under their care. These animals, although they've got the hint of their natural instinct left, are unlikely to survive if released back to the wild. It'd be difficult for them to take part in the pack and they lack the skills to find food. Nevertheless, the ultimate goal for everyone at the zoo is to send the animals back to where they truly belong.

Poto and Cabengo

Documentary by Jean-Pierre Gorin about twin girls who spontaneously developed their own unique language as children.

Hotel Astoria

At Hotel Astoria, the former hotspot of Leipzig, guests were served champagne and turtle soup while the Stasi listened in. Animated memories from times gone by.

In Syrien auf Montage

The film is a reportage showing the help of workers from the GDR in the industrial reconstruction of Syria. We witness the friendly relationship between workers from both countries, who are jointly involved in the construction of the cotton spinning mill in Homs. In impressive pictures the exoticism of the environment and the mentality of the Syrian hosts is shown. At the same time it becomes clear that the workers from the GDR become 'ambassadors of the GDR' through their collegial behaviour and good work.

Go Trabi Go forever

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Drei Frauen

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Kommen Rührgeräte in den Himmel?

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Hanna's Ark Christmas Special

The Hanna family sit around the Christmas tree and reflect back on scenes from the show Hanna's Ark. Co-starred Jack Hanna and his daughter Kathaleen – with regular appearances by his wife Suzi and younger daughters Suzanne and Julie.

London Zoo at Christmas

An exclusive, festive behind-the-scenes look at the iconic London Zoo, as they prepare for the most wonderful time of the year and make the holiday magic happen.

In a Lion

On a particular day at a Danish zoo, a remarkable, mystic and unique attraction involving the body of a young lion awaits its spectator.

Fotoshooting DDR - Bilder zwischen Propaganda und Alltag

Life in the GDR was not only documented on behalf of the state, but also by photographic artists and journalists. The documentary goes on a journey through time with some of them and shows little-known aspects of the GDR from its foundation to the fall of the Wall. Photographers in the GDR had a surprising amount of freedom; there was no explicit censorship of images. This allowed them to make visible what the state wanted to hide. This documentary presents two photographers who observed life in the GDR and whose work has been rediscovered in recent years.

Tiergarten

A film portrait of Schönbrunn Zoo, a modern zoo that represents the radical change in the relationship between humans and animals like no other.

The New Artis

Artis, the Netherlands’ oldest zoo, is about to undergo its most radical renovation in its 178 years of existence. The inspired managing director has a very clear mission – but, is this mission at the same time not a threat to himself, his employees and his animals? And also: how can we look after our environment whilst at the same time we wish to reduce our influence on it?

Bowlingtreff

The “Bowlingtreff” is a bowling alley situated right in the centre of Leipzig opened in July 1987. At that time the quality of life in Leipzig and the whole GDR got worse. Houses collapsed because of poor conditions, public life and amusement was on a very low level. The “Bowlingtreff” was not merely an urban entertainment centre but a revolution in those days. Built with the help of hundreds of volunteers without permission of the state authorities in Berlin the building expresses a free and international architecture known as postmodernism. It is an architecture that was never seen before in Leipzig. Marble and parquet on the floor, a glass roof and beautiful pink pillars. The atmosphere was western as time witnesses remember it.

Milwaukee County Zoo

Take a tour with the staff of the Milwaukee County Zoo.

Bringing Up Baby

David Huxley is waiting to get a bone he needs for his museum collection. Through a series of strange circumstances, he meets Susan Vance, and the duo have a series of misadventures which include a leopard called Baby.

Madagascar

Four animal friends get a taste of the wild life when they break out of captivity at the Central Park Zoo and wash ashore on the island of Madagascar.

Bird on a Wire

An FBI informant has kept his new identity secret for 15 years. Now an old flame has recognised him, and the bad guys are back for revenge.

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

Alex, Marty, and other zoo animals find a way to escape from Madagascar when the penguins reassemble a wrecked airplane. The precariously repaired craft stays airborne just long enough to make it to the African continent. There the New Yorkers encounter members of their own species for the first time. Africa proves to be a wild place, but Alex and company wonder if it is better than their Central Park home.

The Madagascar Penguins in a Christmas Caper

During the holiday season, when the animals of the Central Park Zoo are preparing for Christmas, Private, the youngest of the penguins notices that the Polar Bear is all alone. Assured that nobody should have to spend Christmas alone, Private goes into the city for some last-minute Christmas shopping. Along the way, he gets stuffed into a stocking

Alone

Maria is a student at the university of Essen, Germany, living and working in a gray, unpleasant, and anonymous environment. While she has little problem finding someone for a one night stand, she rebuffs her lovers in such a rude way that they actually don't know what's going on. But what seems to be a negative attitude at first glance is in fact much worse: Maria is suffering from borderline syndrome, a serious psychotic disease that makes her fail to develop a continuous, reliable personality, from her own perspective as well as from the perspective of those she meets. Then one day, she bumps into Jan, a student who falls in love with her without delay. He's awaiting a hard time when he has to learn how hard it is to stay loyal and faithful to a person who, in her own words, "has a different world inside of her head" and who feels that "there is something inside of me that eats me up."

The Wild

An adolescent lion is accidentally shipped from the New York Zoo to Africa. Now running free, his zoo pals must put aside their differences to help bring him back.

Happy Feet

Into the world of the Emperor Penguins, who find their soul mates through song, a penguin is born who cannot sing. But he can tap dance something fierce!

Zoo

Martina lives in the Rome's zoo, because her father is the guardian. She becomes friend with a young Slavic escaped from a gypsy camp. When the police arrives searching for the kid, they run away riding an elephant!

Fierce Creatures

Ex-policeman Rollo Lee is sent to run Marwood Zoo, the newly acquired business of a New Zealand tycoon. In order to meet high profit targets and keep the zoo open, Rollo enforces a new 'fierce creatures' policy, whereby only the most impressive and dangerous animals are allowed to remain in the zoo. However, the keepers are less enthusiastic about complying with these demands.

The Penguins of Madagascar: New to the Zoo

The madcap pack of Penguins and everyone's favourite lemur, King Julien star in episodes which each introduce a new character to the zoo. Episodes included are: In The Line Of Doody, The Big Squeeze, Out Of The Groove, Skorka!, The Red Squirrel, Jiggles, Untouchable and Cat's Cradle.

Penguins of Madagascar

Skipper, Kowalski, Rico and Private join forces with undercover organization The North Wind to stop the villainous Dr. Octavius Brine from destroying the world as we know it.