Baka

For months filmmaker Thierry Knauff lived with the Cameroonian tribe, the Baka. This is his document of that time.

Color-Blind

A synaesthetic portrait made between French Polynesia and Brittany, Color-blind follows the restless ghost of Gauguin in excavating the colonial legacy of a post-postcolonial present.

Las Hurdes, país de leyenda

An account of the journey that King Alfonso XIII of Spain made to the impoverished shire of Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in the region of Extremadura, in 1922.

Saynatakuna: Masks and Transfigurations in Paukartambo

An ethnographic film that tells the story of the mask makers and dancers during the festival of the Virgen del Carmen in Paukartambo, Cuzco. The dancers reinterpret their history and socio-political forces that drive them to perform their rituals of magic and resistance. The 18 dance troupes reenact and satirize the different ethnic groups that passed through Paukartambo since the beginning of time. They connect and tell a story of the past, the present, and the future wearing hand-made colorful masks and intricate beaded costumes.

The River in Me

Traversing 700,000 square kilometers over 700 days, the filmmakers bring the stories of five people who crisscross the Yellow River to perform their art. At the center of the web is Su Yang, a contemporary artist and musician and his exchange with traditional practitioners of Qin Opera, Shadow Puppetry, Hua’er, and Shaanbei Storytelling.​

Gringo Trails

Are tourists destroying the planet-or saving it? How do travelers change the remote places they visit, and how are they changed? From the Bolivian jungle to the party beaches of Thailand, and from the deserts of Timbuktu, Mali to the breathtaking beauty of Bhutan, GRINGO TRAILS traces stories over 30 years to show the dramatic long-term impact of tourism on cultures, economies, and the environment.

Land Rush

A partnership between the Government of Mali and an American agricultural investor may see 200-square kilometers of Malian land transformed into a large-scale sugar cane plantation. Land Rush documents the hopes, fears, wishes, and demands of small-scale subsistence farmers in the region who look to benefit, or lose out, from the deal.

Pam Kuso Kar (Briser les poteries de Pam)

In February 1974, Pam Sambo Zima, the oldest of the priests of possession in Niamey, Niger, died at the age of seventy-plus years. In his backyard, the followers from the possession cult symbolically break the dead priest's ritual vases and cry for the deceased while dividing up the clothes of the divinities.

Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti

This intimate ethnographic study of Voudoun dances and rituals was shot by Maya Deren during her years in Haiti (1947-1951); she never edited the footage, so this “finished” version was made by Teiji Ito and Cherel Ito after Deren’s death.

A Wife Among Wives

David and Judith MacDougall are exploring the marriage rituals and roles of Turkana women in this ethnographic documentary. The film's biggest part is taken up by talks between the Turkana people. As one of the first ethnographic documentaries "A Wife Among Wives" subtitles these talks so that the viewer can get a better and probably more personal understanding of the life of the Turkana.

Hommage à Marcel Mauss. Germaine Dieterlen

Germaine Dierterlen talks about Dogon mythology at a conference on the Bandiagara cliffs. The Songo canopy is a sacred site in Bandiagara. Its walls are covered with paintings depicting the different phases of creation. A little further on, in a cave near the village of Bongo, symposium participants are discussing the Tellem, the people who lived in the houses built into the cliffs before the arrival of the Dogon. The archaeological remains and migratory movements of these two peoples are discussed.

Germaine et ses copains

In Sangha, through the window of her house, Germaine greets Djamgouno, her main informant. He then translates for her a conversation she has with a half-blind old man. She recounts her memories of a past party at which Amadigné worked with her as an informant. Later, in front of the cliff, Germaine, Djamgouno and Pangalé are sitting on rocks, and Germaine talks about the many caves that can be visited by climbing small spelunking ladders. Rouch intervenes during the interview, asking the protagonists about the settlement of the cliff by the Dogon, who learned from the Tellem how to climb the cliff. Rouch then asks about the Tellem's predecessors who lived there 2,400 years ago. Germaine admits the ignorance of researchers on the subject, and Rouch concludes by joking about the new task that now falls to Germaine Dieterlen.

Le Hampi - Le ciel est posé sur la terre

A ritual vase, the hampi, is placed in the center of the Musée de plein air de la République du Niger in Niamey, during a ritual ceremony featuring possession dances. With this film, Jean Rouch continues his ethnological and cinematographic study of Songhay ritual objects. He demonstrates that, in a particular context, the transfer of a hampi vase to a museum requires the organization of a ritual ceremony to obtain the gods' approval. At the time, however, reservations about filming a possession dance for the opening of a shrine in a museum made the move "questionable from a museological point of view".

Jours d’après

In Isère, in the mountainous region of Trièves, is the Tournesol farm, an experiential farm totally autonomous in energy, a veritable laboratory for renewable energies. Jean-Philippe and his family live there from sheep farming and organic market gardening. But in September 2017, a violent fire destroyed the farm and its facilities. While the family has lost everything, a surge of solidarity is taking place so that the Tournesol farm is reborn from its ashes.

Savage Memory

Founding father of Anthropology, Bronislaw Malinowski's work raises powerful and disturbing questions today. This is a look at his legacy and the imprints it has made on the generations that followed.

El canto de los dioses

Road documentary that delves into the musical and religious expressions of sub-Saharan Africa. Through Mauritania and Mali, the film documents the lives of Dogon, griots, musicians and instrument makers who, through oral accounts, explain why music plays a fundamental role in the socio-religious organization of peoples. The film culminates its search with the recording of the performance of the traditional Dogon mask dance, in Begnematou, a small village lost in the desert.

Afghan Nomads (The Maldar)

At dawn a nomad caravan descends on Aq Kupruk from the foothills of the Hindu Kush. In their camp, and in commerce with the townspeople, the Maldar reveal the mixture of faith and distrust that has kept nomads and sedentary people separate and interdependent over the centuries. The theme of the film focuses on political and religious beliefs. The film and accompanying instructor notes in this series embrace five different and complex units of analysis concerning how political change occurs; individual attitudes, ethnic identity, national loyalties, institutional affiliations, and ideological beliefs.

Los Toques del Tambor Afro Montevideano

The Nuer

Portrays the Nuer, Nilotic herdsmen of the Nile basin. Shows how their daily lives revolve about their cattle, and depicts the psychological bonds between them. Includes extensive use of Nuer music and poetry.

Moana

Robert J. Flaherty's South Seas follow-up to Nanook of the North is a Gauguin idyll moved by "pride of beauty... pride of strength."