A Message from the East (2009)

Francesco

Francesco takes an unsparing look at the most pressing challenges of the 21st-century, asking deep questions about the human condition. The film is guided by Pope Francis who, with tremendous humility, wisdom, and generosity, offers moving lessons from his life that illuminate what it will take to build a better future. In doing so, he addresses issues such as climate change, immigration, peace and religious tolerance, LGBTQ support, gender and identity justice, and economic equality.

The Passion of Joan of Arc

A classic of the silent age, this film tells the story of the doomed but ultimately canonized 15th-century teenage warrior. On trial for claiming she'd spoken to God, Jeanne d'Arc is subjected to inhumane treatment and scare tactics at the hands of church court officials. Initially bullied into changing her story, Jeanne eventually opts for what she sees as the truth. Her punishment, a famously brutal execution, earns her perpetual martyrdom.

Night and Fog

Filmmaker Alain Resnais documents the atrocities behind the walls of Hitler's concentration camps.

Star Trek: Secrets of the Universe

Is building our own starship Enterprise possible? Will we ever travel between the stars as easily as they do in Star Trek? JJ Abrams' new feature, Star Trek Into Darkness, hits the screen in a golden age of scientific discoveries. HISTORY is there, giving viewers a deep look behind the scenes, on the set, and into the science–amazing new exoplanets, the physics of Warp drive, and the ideas behind how we might one day live in a Star Trek Universe.

The Beginning and End of the Universe

Prof. Jim Al-Khalili tackles the biggest subject of all, the universe. Through a series of critical observations and experiments that revolutionised our understanding of our world Jim guides us through the greatest cosmic detective story of all. He takes us from the beginning of the universe to the end time and answers the question: where did the universe come from and how will it end?

The Quran, The Origins Of The Book

The Quran is the Holy Book of Islam, a religion shared by more than a billion followers worldwide. For the Muslim tradition, since its revelation to the Prophet Muhammad between the year 610 and 632 of the Christian era in Mecca and Medina, the Koran is immutable, and has remained maintained. However, recent discoveries of Koranic manuscripts analyzed by scientists, dated around the year 680 - the oldest known in the world - revealed that the Koran has a history. During the first century of Islam, and before the canonical version of the Caliph Uthman imposed itself, the holy book of Islam would have known competing versions, a different organization of the suras, variable readings due to a writing, in its beginnings, very rudimentary… It is to this meeting of knowledge, at the crossroads between the Muslim tradition and scientific research, that this journey to the origins of the Koran invites.

Bloody Sunday

The dramatised story of the Irish civil rights protest march on January 30 1972 which ended in a massacre by British troops.

The Overnighters

Desperate, broken men chase their dreams and run from their demons in the North Dakota oil fields. A local Pastor's decision to help them has extraordinary and unexpected consequences.

Al Djanat, the Original Paradise

The death of a Burkinabé family’s patriarch and the division of his estate unearths conflict between his heirs and larger questions about inheritance, belonging and the communal customs of West Africa versus Westernized courts.

Charlie Wilson's War

In the 1980s U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson, Texas socialite Joanne Herring and CIA agent Gust Avrakotos form an unlikely alliance to boost funding for Afghan freedom fighters in their war against invading Soviets. The trio's successful efforts to finance these covert operations contributes to the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.

The Ten Commandments

Escaping death, a Hebrew infant is raised in a royal household to become a prince. Upon discovery of his true heritage, Moses embarks on a personal quest to reclaim his destiny as the leader and liberator of the Hebrew people.

I, Pastafari: A Flying Spaghetti Monster Story

I, Pastafari is a documentary film about the world's fastest growing religion: The Church of The Flying Spaghetti Monster. R'Amen.

Pop! The Science of Bubbles

Physicist Dr Helen Czerski takes us on a journey into the science of bubbles - not just fun toys, but also powerful tools that push back the boundaries of science.

A Bear Named Jesus

At Archer’s Aunty Gladys’ funeral, he hears a tap on the window — it’s a bear named Jesus, who has come for Archer’s mom. “A Bear Named Jesus” is an allegory for religious interference, with an aching yet humorous look at estrangement and mourning for the loss of someone still living.

Four-Point Conics

An experimental mathematics film designed to elucidate the study of four-line conics.

Pope John Paul II

Bio-drama tracing the life and career of Polish cardinal Karol Wojtyla from his days as a young activist in Poland to his rise and installation in 1978 as Pope of the Catholic world.

Zen, in Search of Enlightenment

A documentary exploring the rigorous training and meditation practices found at the Shōgen-ji, a Zen Buddhist monastery of the Rinzai school in Shimizu-ku, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan.

The Strange Case of the Cosmic Rays

Part of acclaimed filmmaker Frank Capra's "Wonders of Life" series of science-based films (which won an Emmy Award for Best Editing) teaches kids about the power of gamma rays and radiation.

Cotolay

A loose retelling of the 13th century Galician legend of the boy Cotolay who helped three pilgrims establish the Convent of San Francisco near Santiago de Compostela.

The Doors

The story of the famous and influential 1960s rock band and its lead singer and composer, Jim Morrison.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Isolated bell-ringer Quasimodo wishes to leave Notre Dame tower against the wishes of Judge Claude Frollo, his stern guardian and Paris' strait-laced Minister of Justice. His first venture to the outside world finds him Esmeralda, a kind-hearted and fearless Romani woman who openly stands up to Frollo's tyranny.

Friends of Mine: “Boys and Girls”

A birdwatching trip inspires Max to ask questions about the different expectations we have for boys and girls. His friend Moira helps him challenge what we think it means to be a boy by teaching him a few ballet moves.

Friends of Mine: “The Places We Come From”

Max learns about immigration and the meaning of home from his friend Srijoni, who shares her story of moving to Canada from Bangladesh when she was young.

The New World of Xi Jinping

Behind his polite exterior lies a formidable leader with a ruthless character, ready to do anything to make China the world's leading power by the People’s Republic’s centenary in 2049. This well-documented portrait of the Chinese president gives an unprecedented insight into his politics and shows how Xi Jinping's personal journey has shaped his choices as he steers China towards world domination.

Flame & Citron

Gunman Flame and his partner Citron assassinate Nazi collaborators for the Danish resistance. Assigned targets by their Allies-connected leader, Aksel Winther, they relish the opportunity to begin targeting the Nazis themselves. When they begin to doubt the validity of their assignments, their morally complicated task becomes even more labyrinthine.

Mirza Ghalib

This is the about the most admired poet in the History of Urdu and Persian writings, Mirza Ghalib

Dear Frankie

Nine-year-old Frankie and his single mum Lizzie have been on the move ever since Frankie can remember, most recently arriving in a seaside Scottish town. Wanting to protect her deaf son from the truth that they've run away from his father, Lizzie has invented a story that he is away at sea on the HMS Accra. Every few weeks, Lizzie writes Frankie a make-believe letter from his father, telling of his adventures in exotic lands. As Frankie tracks the ship's progress around the globe, he discovers that it is due to dock in his hometown. With the real HMS Accra arriving in only a fortnight, Lizzie must choose between telling Frankie the truth or finding the perfect stranger to play Frankie's father for just one day...

The Magdalene Sisters

Three young Irish women struggle to maintain their spirits while they endure dehumanizing abuse as inmates of a Magdalene Sisters Asylum.

The Wild Blue Yonder

An alien narrates the story of his dying planet, his and his people's visitations to Earth and Earth's self-made demise, while human astronauts in space are attempting to find an alternate planet for surviving humans to live on.

The 99 Names of God

Arab-American filmmaker Yumna Al-Arashi embraces the rhythmic rituals that have run alongside Islamic tradition throughout the centuries in this surreal and poetic short film. Piecing together old and new, Al-Rashi's dream-like imagery breathes fresh air to a subject hardly seen in positive light.

China: The Uighur Tragedy

A relentless chronicle of the tragedy of the Uighurs, an ethnic minority of some eleven million people who live in the Xinjiang region of northwest China, speak a Turkic language and practice the Muslim religion. The Uighurs suffer brutal cultural and political oppression by Xin Jinping's tyrannical government: torture, disappearances, forced labor, re-education of children and adults, mass sterilizations, extensive surveillance and destruction of historical heritage.

A Road in India

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

The Lost Seahorse

A stop-motion short film about a seahorse that is swept away from its coral reef and must survive the journey home.

Manufacturing Ignorance

Tobacco, climate change, pesticides,... Never has scientific knowledge seemed so vast, detailed and shared. And yet it appears to be increasingly challenged. It is no longer surprising to see private corporations put strategies in place to confuse the public debate and paralyze political decision-making. Overwhelmed by excess of information, how can we, as citizens, sort out fact from fiction? One by one, this film dismantles the workings of this clever manoeuvre that aims to turn science against itself. Thanks to declassified archives, graphic animations and testimonies from experts, lobbyists and politicians, this investigation plunges us into the science of doubt. Along with a team of experts (philosophers, economists, cognitive scientists, political men, or even agnotologists), we explore concrete examples of doubt making and try to understand the whole process and the issues behind it.

Up the Yangtze

A luxury cruise boat motors up the Yangtze - navigating the mythic waterway known in China simply as "The River." The Yangtze is about to be transformed by the biggest hydroelectric dam in history. At the river's edge - a young woman says goodbye to her family as the floodwaters rise towards their small homestead. The Three Gorges Dam - contested symbol of the Chinese economic miracle - provides the epic backdrop for Up the Yangtze, a dramatic feature documentary on life inside modern China.

Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West

Obsession is a film about the threat of Radical Islam to Western civilization. Using unique footage from Arab television, it reveals an 'insider's view' of the hatred the Radicals are teaching, their incitement of global jihad, and their goal of world domination.

Cirque du Soleil: Quidam

A young girl has already seen everything there is to see and her world has lost all meaning. Her anger shatters her world and she finds herself in the universe of QUIDAM, where she is joined by a playful companion, as well as another mysterious character who attempts to seduce her with the marvelous, the unsettling and the terrifying.

Mission to Mir

This film shows how far we have come since the cold-war days of the 50s and 60s. Back then the Russians were our "enemies". And to them the Americans were their "enemies" who couldn't be trusted. Somewhere in all this a young girl in Oklahoma named Shannon set her sights on becoming one of those space explorers, even though she was told "girls can't do that." But she did.

For the Bible Tells Me So

An exploration of the intersection between religion and homosexuality in the U.S. and how the religious right has used its interpretation of the Bible to stigmatize the gay community.

Actor in Law

An aspiring actor succumbs to pressure from his father and takes up the role of lawyer.

The School of Tomorrow

The correlation between social class and school performance is a major issue across the world. This miniseries is an attempt to go beyond ideological approaches of the problem. It is a pragmatic, scientific, and international exploration of education techniques. Two thirds of students will hold jobs that have not been invented yet and 47% of current jobs are expected to be replaced by machines.

We Feed the World

A documentary that exposes the shocking truths behind industrial food production and food wastage, focusing on fishing, livestock and crop farming. A must-see for anyone interested in the true cost of the food on their plate.

Into Great Silence

An intimate portrayal of the everyday lives of Carthusian monks of the Grande Chartreuse, high in the French Alps (Chartreuse Mountains). The idea for the film was proposed to the monks in 1984, but the Carthusians said they wanted time to think about it. The Carthusians finally contacted Gröning 16 years later to say they were now willing to permit Gröning to shoot the movie, if he was still interested.