Pompeii and the Roman Villa

Narrated by Sir Derek Jacobi - star of the landmark television series "I, Claudius" - this documentary explores art and culture around the Bay of Naples before Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. The bay was then the most fashionable destination for vacationing Romans. Julius Caesar, emperors, and senators were among those who owned sumptuous villas along its shores. Artists flocked to the region to create frescoes, sculpture, and luxurious objects in gold, silver, and glass for villa owners as well as residents of Pompeii and other towns in the shadow of Vesuvius. The film concludes with the story of the discovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum from the 18th century onward.

Síla lidskosti – Nicholas Winton

A gripping documentary about the courage and determination of a young English stockbroker who saved the lives of 669 children. Between March 13 and August 2, 1939, Nicholas Winton organized 8 transports to take children from Prague to new homes in Great Britain, and kept quiet about it until his wife discovered a scrapbook documenting his unique mission in 1988. Winton was a successful 29-year-old stockbroker in London who "had an intuition" about the fate of the Jews when he visited Prague in 1939. He quietly but decisively got down to the business of saving lives. We learn how only two countries, Sweden and Britain, answered his call to harbor the young refugees; how documents had to be forged and how once foster parents signed for the children on delivery, that was the last he saw of them.

La Sortie de l'usine Lumière à Lyon

Working men and women leave through the main gate of the Lumière factory in Lyon, France. Filmed on 22 March 1895, it is often referred to as the first real motion picture ever made, although Louis Le Prince's 1888 Roundhay Garden Scene pre-dated it by seven years. Three separate versions of this film exist, which differ from one another in numerous ways. The first version features a carriage drawn by one horse, while in the second version the carriage is drawn by two horses, and there is no carriage at all in the third version. The clothing style is also different between the three versions, demonstrating the different seasons in which each was filmed. This film was made in the 35 mm format with an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, and at a speed of 16 frames per second. At that rate, the 17 meters of film length provided a duration of 46 seconds, holding a total of 800 frames.

Moravská Hellas

Karel Vachek’s graduate film offers us a documentary essay which is both a light-hearted and aggressive little piece and also a parody of investigative film journalism. The Strážnice folk festival, backed by the cultural Party apparatus of the time, for years had little to commend itself to authentic folklore. In the film the event assumes the form of a bizarre stage spectacle with almost surrealistic elements that Vachek reinforces with unconventional approaches (commentary appearing as titles on screen, singing, declamations into the camera, feature etudes, the fusion of news coverage and fiction). The result is a stirring film collage depicting various characters, from crowd-pleasers, Easter egg decorators, kitsch artists and peddlers, to museologists and local residents, all of whom come up against the eccentric "identical” twin reporters Karel and Jan Saudek and a bored actress who appears as an extra. Using their special blend of irony and wit, they present us with the sad truth.

Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing

Shut Up and Sing is a documentary about the country band from Texas called the Dixie Chicks and how one tiny comment against President Bush dropped their number one hit off the charts and caused fans to hate them, destroy their CD’s, and protest at their concerts. A film about freedom of speech gone out of control and the three girls lives that were forever changed by a small anti-Bush comment

Charles Ives: A Good Dissonance Like a Man

A thoroughly researched biopic of Charles Ives, America's greatest and most innovative composer (and insurance executive), who combined strikingly futuristic experimentalism with gentle nostalgia. Includes narration taken directly from Ives's own writings, and reminiscence from those who knew him.

Sieben Mal am Tag beklagen wir unser Los und nachts stehen wir auf, um nicht zu träumen

A cinematic devotional book. Based on interviews with an unemployable sufferer (and his fellows), living in the East German countryside. Who lost his memory in 1989 and woke up into several nightmares.

Glenn Gould: Extasis

A collection of recollections and opinions of and about Glenn Gould, interspersed with excerpts of archive footage of the great Canadian pianist speaking and playing.

64 Day Hero

Documentary about the life and career of the 1940s and 1950s boxer Randy Turpin.

What Doesn’t Kill Me: The Life and Music of Vic Chesnutt

A documentary about the singer/songwriter Vic Chesnutt

Cisza I

Five short documental scenes by different directors, each showing their different interpretations of "silence."

Darts in the Dark: An Introduction to W.O. Mitchell

Canadian author, humorist and storyteller W.O. Mitchell talks about his career as a writer and performer. Known for his witty radio and television appearances, Mitchell shows a more serious side as he reveals his personal views on writing and on the meaning of life and death.

Einstein and the Bomb

What happened after Einstein fled Nazi Germany? Using archival footage and his own words, this docudrama dives into the mind of a tortured genius.

Romy et Alain : les amants terribles

Austrian actress Romy Schneider (1938) and French actor Alain Delon (1935), once fervent lovers in the early sixties, maintained a close friendship and a certain working relationship after their breakup until her death in 1984: a universal and eternal love.

One Night Only

A romantic drama about two couples shifting sexual dynamics over one night in a music bar.

The Garden That Doesn't Exist

Once upon a time there was a garden, a refuge, a safe haven - 'The Garden of the Finzi Continis'. It came to life in Giorgio Bassani's 1962 semi-autobiographical novel recounting an unfulfilled love story between two young Jews in Ferrara, while fascism was raging in Italy in the late 1930's. In 1972, Vittorio De Sica's film adaptation of the book won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Since then, the fictional space of the garden became so tangible that people from all over the world come to Ferrara to look for it. Fifty years after winning the Oscar, reality and fiction come together once more, as we walk through an imaginary garden and bring to life the book, its author, its main protagonists, history, love, friendships and betrayals.

Paul McCartney - Eine Beatles-Legende

Heartbreakers Beach Party

Documentary that captures Tom Petty and the band in 1982-1983 as they finish, promote, and tour around the “Long After Dark” album (their final with legendary producer Jimmy Iovine). It aired only once on MTV in 1983. After the long lost 16mm reels were finally found, a restored version with 19 minutes of extra footage was released in 2024.

À la plage

Burn victims get to enjoy a family day at the beach thanks to an outing organized by the Association des grands brûlés.

Fanny Ardant : naissance d'une passion

A portrait of the famous French actress Fanny Ardant, who has worked with great figures of cinema such as Agnès Varda, Alain Resnais, Michelangelo Antonioni, Sydney Pollack and, above all, François Truffaut (1932-84), with whom she had a sentimental relationship and whose death marked the rest of her life.