Hidden Beauty - The Orchids of the Saale Valley (2017)

0004ngel

To support his mother in Mexico, Angel, a nude dancer, turns the web into his new stage.

A Native Street in India

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

Your Friend, Ranger Doug

A 94-year-old Glacier National Park ranger confronts the decline of the park he calls home as he reflects on his life and the legacy he will leave behind.

Land Without Bread

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.

Night and Fog

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

Grizzly Man

Follows the story of "Grizzly Man" Timothy Treadwell and what the thirteen summers in a National Park in Alaska were like in his attempt to protect the grizzly bears. The film is full of unique images and a look into the spirit of a man who sacrificed himself for nature.

The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat

A group of people are standing along the platform of a railway station in La Ciotat, waiting for a train. One is seen coming, at some distance, and eventually stops at the platform. Doors of the railway-cars open and attendants help passengers off and on. Popular legend has it that, when this film was shown, the first-night audience fled the café in terror, fearing being run over by the "approaching" train. This legend has since been identified as promotional embellishment, though there is evidence to suggest that people were astounded at the capabilities of the Lumières' cinématographe.

The Presence

Two old men enter an abandoned synagogue, look at the decay around them, and pray.

The Presence II

An exploration of a decaying synagogue.

The Presence III

Two rabbis show the ruins of an abandoned synagogue to a group of primary school-age Jewish children, and stand by as the children dip bread in honey, drink wine, pray, and sing.

How Do You Measure a Year?

For 17 years, filmmaker Jay Rosenblatt filmed his daughter Ella on her birthday in the same spot, asking her the same questions. In just 29 minutes, we watch her grow from a toddler to a young woman with all the beautiful and sometimes awkward stages in between. Each phase is captured fleetingly but makes an indelible mark. Her responses to her father’s questions are just a backdrop for a deeper story of parental love, acceptance, and ultimately, independence.

Bucolic

Danusia and her daughter Basia live far away from the modern world, in tune with the rhythm and laws of nature, among animals and the spirits of the dead. The peace and sense of security offered by their enclave come at a price - the women increasingly long for contact with other people. Bucolic is an affectionate observation of people who live in a different way. It evokes a curiosity about their world and a desire to take a closer look.

No Otter Zone

The Southern Sea Otter was historically abundant along the California coastline until intense hunting pressures reduced their numbers to near-extinction levels. But now the otters are coming back, and with them they bring the potential for drastic change to the modern-day economics and ecology of the Santa Barbara Channel.

Threatened: The Controversial Struggle of the Southern Sea Otter

Sea otters are once again in peril after being brought back from the brink of extinction. An unprecedented number of sea otter deaths have occurred along the California coast in the last three years. Meanwhile, the Fish & Wildlife Services decision to eliminate their No Otter Zone from Southern California waters remains controversial. This fragile species threatened by pollution, infectious diseases, starvation, and competition with fishermen struggles for survival.

Half a Life

After a traumatic encounter, a young gay Egyptian joins the LGBT rights movement. When his safety is jeopardized, he must choose whether to stay in the country he loves or seek asylum elsewhere as a refugee. "Half a Life" is a timely story of activism and hope, set in the increasingly dangerous, oppressive, and unstable social climate of Egypt today.

Under an Arctic Sky

Six fearless surfers travel to the north coast of Iceland to ride waves unlike anything they've ever experienced, captured with high-tech cameras.

A Common Sequence

An interconnected look at tradition, colonialism, property, faith, and science, as seen through labor practices that link an endangered salamander, mass-produced apples, and the evolving fields of genomics and machine learning.

XY Anatomy of a Boy

Can you be a virgin, gay and into girls? This film is an intimate study of six homosexual boys. In the changing room some of the uncertainties and embarrassment's of youth emerge, such as the tale of hunky Peter, romance and the naff value of losing your virginity during a Disney movie.

Preghiera della sera (Diario di una passeggiata)

The film recounts an experience, that of a director and his two actors at grips with a play: from the first meeting to the initial readings, the rehearsals done at home, the ones done on stage and finally the first performance. But an experience that took place in the peculiar situation in which the whole of Italian culture found itself in the days between the first and second wave of the pandemic, when it really seemed possible to restart and the feeling of euphoria was accompanied by the illusion that the worst was behind us. Once again we were suddenly checked in our desire for beauty, for life.

Strudel Sisters

Two elderly sisters share the delicate art of making traditional Hungarian strudel and reveal a deeply personal family story about their mother, who taught them everything they know.

Ocean with David Attenborough

David Attenborough takes viewers on a breathtaking journey showing there is nowhere more vital for our survival, more full of life, wonder, or surprise, than the ocean. Through spectacular sequences featuring coral reefs, kelp forests and the open ocean, Attenborough shares why a healthy ocean keeps the entire planet stable and flourishing.

Dead Heart

The Australians call the endless deserts in the interior of the continent the "dead heart". Here lies the town of Birdsville, 23 houses and a bar with a liquor license. The long-awaited telephone connection arrived in 1979, 90 years after it had been applied for. For one weekend, this place at the end of the world turns into a cauldron when 5,000 Australians, tired of civilization, invade for the annual horse race, the "Birdsville Cup". They come in buses, off-road vehicles, motorcycles and sports planes and have become a veritable plague. Because here, everyone can do what they've always wanted to do: for example, get drunk until they drop and never get up again. The collective mass drinking reaches its peak on Saturday night. By Monday morning, the fun is over. What remains is a village with 23 houses, a bar and a street littered with 80,000 empty beer cans.

A Night at the Garden

Archival footage of an American Nazi rally that attracted 20,000 people at Madison Square Garden in 1939, shortly before the beginning of World War II.

Lord Howe Island: Pacific Eden

A place of biological superlatives with a flora and fauna that have only just begun to be researched: Lord Howe Island, between Australia and New Zealand. This is the first documentary on what may be the most isolated nature reserve on the planet.

Dirty Harry: The Original

A retrospective look at the five Dirty Harry films (1971-88), starring Clint Eastwood.

Dearest Ghost

A poetic journey through the inner world of a grieving filmmaker who tries to find solace in talking to her ghost. Different stages of grief are visually linked to seasonal changes in nature. The filmmaker finds reflections of her mindscape in the surrounding scenery and wildlife.

Avenida

A place with stairs, but that leads to walls. A place with lots of space, but no one fights for it. And a place with lots of owners, but so empty that no one wants to enter.

What We Ask of a Statue is That It Doesn’t Move

Athens. Nothing seems to move. The locals seem as still as statues. While at the same time, somewhere, a caryatid is escaping from a museum and a small group of people demands the destruction of all antiques. Would film be the only way to avoid stone-cold indifference?

What Killed the Whale?

In this critical investigation into the most arresting victims of the climate emergency, biologist Ella Al-Shamahi joins a specialist autopsy into the death of a 40-foot sei whale, which washed up near Edinburgh. Across the 90-minute single doc, Ella sets out to uncover why whales are dying in record numbers and whether or not the crisis is man-made.

Lentejuelas de sangre

Antonio Gracia José (1942-2011), known as “Pierrot,” was a prominent member of the Barcelona art scene, a pioneer in the filmmaking of underground short films and Fantaterror movies, writer and playwright, magazine editor, movie poster painter, cartoonist and cabaret showman.

put the goat in the goat boat

“Let’s think of nature as a big room. Nature is a room you know you’ll have to leave some day, most likely not by choice”. Heather Phillipson’s hallucinatory video put the goat in the goat boat explores endless declinations of nature—natural, naturing, finding a better nature, the nature construction, nature on loan, nature’s lack of nudity...—while revealing humanity’s ambiguous relationship to it.

Mr. Fox

Sr. Raposo is a staged documentary about the daily life of Acácio, who found out he was HIV+ in 1995.

Interstellar: Nolan's Odyssey

A look behind the lens of Christopher Nolan's space epic.

Starlight

A golden sunrise brings light to the foggy hills and meadows of late summer.

Birdsong and Coffee: A Wake-Up Call

Documentary exploring economic and environmental connections between farmers in Latin America, coffee drinkers in the U.S., and the fate of migratory songbirds throughout the Americas. Illustrates how coffee drinkers in this and other developed countries hold in their hands the fate of farm families, farming communities, and entire ecosystems in coffee-growing regions worldwide.

Winter's End

A short film shot on Super 8 which captures the last days of winter.

Fog on the Mountain

Fog surrounds the peak of a mountain as summer wildflowers bloom.

Tide Pools

The sun rises over the tide pools of coastal Maine.

Early Spring Wetlands

Wildlife in an early spring wetland.

Correspondence

In the form of a filmed epistolary conversation, two young, experienced filmmakers discuss film, present and past family, heritage and maternity. The personal and profound reflections—which are embodied in the graceful images taken day-to-day—are suddenly echoed by the political emergency of a country.