On June 5, 1989, one day after Chinese troops expelled thousands of demonstrators from Tiananmen Square in Beijing, a solitary, unarmed protester stood his ground before a column of tanks advancing down the Avenue of Eternal Peace. Captured by Western photographers watching nearby, this extraordinary confrontation became an icon of the fight for freedom around the world. FRONTLINE investigates the mystery of the tank man — his identity, his fate, and his significance for the Chinese leadership.
On June 5, 1989, one day after Chinese troops expelled thousands of demonstrators from Tiananmen Square in Beijing, a solitary, unarmed protester stood his ground before a column of tanks advancing down the Avenue of Eternal Peace. Captured by Western photographers watching nearby, this extraordinary confrontation became an icon of the fight for freedom around the world. FRONTLINE investigates the mystery of the tank man — his identity, his fate, and his significance for the Chinese leadership.
2006-04-11
8
Five oddball criminals planning a bank robbery rent rooms on a cul-de-sac from an octogenarian widow under the pretext that they are classical musicians.
Jacek climbs into the taxi driven by Waldemar, tells him to drive to a remote location, then brutally strangles him, seemingly without motive.
After blowing his professional ballet career, John's only way to redeem himself is to concoct the demise of his former partner, Leah, who he blames for his downfall; he rehearses his salvation in his mind in the way that he rehearses a dance, but being able to break from the routine will be the key to his success.
The Marx Brothers take on high society and the opera world to bring two lovers together. A sly business manager and two wacky friends of two opera singers help them achieve success while humiliating their stuffy and snobbish enemies.
Four prison inmates have been hatching a plan to literally dig out of jail when another prisoner, Claude Gaspard, is moved into their cell. They take a risk and share their plan with the newcomer. Over the course of three days, the prisoners and friends break through the concrete floor using a bed post and begin to make their way through the sewer system -- yet their escape is anything but assured.
The story of Elwood P. Dowd who makes friends with a spirit taking the form of a human-sized rabbit named Harvey that only he sees (and a few privileged others on occasion also.) After his sister tries to commit him to a mental institution, a comedy of errors ensues. Elwood and Harvey become the catalysts for a family mending its wounds and for romance blossoming in unexpected places.
A seductive woman gets an innocent professor mixed up in murder.
A man entranced by his dreams and imagination is lovestruck with a French woman and feels he can show her his world.
A Russian poet and his interpreter travel to Italy to research the life of an 18th-century composer.
It's a dreary Christmas 1944 for the American POWs in Stalag 17 and the men in Barracks 4, all sergeants, have to deal with a grave problem—there seems to be a security leak.
Doctor Sanada treats gangster Matsunaga after he is wounded in a gunfight, and discovers that he is suffering from tuberculosis. Sanada tries to convince Matsunaga to stay for treatment, which would drastically change his lifestyle. They form an uneasy friendship until Matsunaga's old boss Okada returns from prison.
Notorious Baltimore criminal and underground figure Divine goes up against Connie & Raymond Marble, a sleazy married couple who make a passionate attempt to humiliate her and seize her tabloid-given title as "The Filthiest Person Alive".
A group of Serbian socialists prepares for the war in a surreal underground filled by parties, tragedies, love and hate.
A fading music hall comedian tries to help a despondent ballet dancer learn to walk and to again feel confident about life.
Renowned filmmaker John Wilson travels to Africa to direct a new movie, but constantly leaves to hunt elephants and other game, to the dismay of his cast and crew. He eventually becomes obsessed with hunting down and killing one specific elephant.
Holden and Banky are comic book artists. Everything is going good for them until they meet Alyssa, also a comic book artist. Holden falls for her, but his hopes are crushed when he finds out she's a lesbian.
Italy, 1916. Oreste Jacovacci and Giovanni Busacca are called, as all the Italian youths, to serve the army in the WWI. They both try in every way to avoid serving the army.
On his request, the sensitive sister of a real estate agent visits a house he intends to put up for sale, only to cross paths with its resident curse.
A human body gradually reconstructs itself as its various component parts crowd themselves into a small room and eventually, after much experimentation, sort out which part goes where.
When his boss is killed, Detroit cop Axel Foley finds evidence that the murderer had ties to a California amusement park called Wonder World. Returning to sunny Beverly Hills once more, Foley reunites with Detective Billy Rosewood to solve the case. Along with Billy's new partner, Detective Jon Flint, they discover that Wonder World is being used as a front for a massive counterfeiting ring.
A beautiful temptress re-kindles an old romance while trying to escape her past during a tension-packed train journey.
The supermarket chains used to seem unbeatable, capturing the lion’s share of the grocery market. But for some years now they have been in crisis. In the wake of a fierce price war, retailers are resorting to increasingly aggressive commercial negotiation methods at the expense of suppliers, farmers and producers. Further competition is coming from the tech giants as Amazon and Alibaba invest in the food industry. What are the implications of all these changes on working conditions, the quality of our food and the future of our planet?
“Bored in Heaven” follows New Years celebrations in Putian, Fujian, Southeast China. An experiential project based on 20 years of research by Kenneth Dean and Zheng Zhenman, this film illustrates the growing intensity of local traditions, as rural villages and their temples transition into a new century. Villages in this part of China are undergoing radical transformations. As land that was once public and agricultural is rebuilt and changes hands, the intricate temple system has responded. During the Cultural Revolution temples were torn down—now they are being built up into ritual alliances.
In her public persona, Eleanor “Tussy” Marx was a translator, actress, a children’s rights activist and a persuasive labour organizer, a tireless powerhouse determined to carry on her father’s work. She held her own with twentieth century gods, including both her father and his colleague Engels. In her privately life, however, she was vulnerable and her attraction to the self-indulgent and self-important Edward Aveling led her into misery and ultimately proved fatal.
The story of J. Robert Oppenheimer's role in the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.
The film tells the story of Roman Kwiatkowski, who founded the Association of Roma in Poland in Oświęcim in 1992. It also presents political decisions about Roma in Poland, from the resolution on the assimilation of Gypsies of May 24, 1952, to the start of a detailed record of the Roma population in the country in 1960.
The Mayo Clinic tells the story of a unique medical institution that has been called a "Medical Mecca," the "Supreme Court of Medicine," and the "place for hope where there is no hope." The Mayo Clinic began in 1883 as an unlikely partnership between the Sisters of Saint Francis and a country doctor named William Worrall Mayo after a devastating tornado in rural Minnesota. Since then, it has grown into an organization that treats more than a million patients a year from all 50 states and 150 countries. Dr. Mayo had a simple philosophy he imparted to his sons Will and Charlie: "the needs of the patient come first." They wouldn't treat diseases...they would treat people. In a world where healthcare delivery is typically fragmented among individual specialties, the Mayo Clinic practices a multi-specialty, team-based approach that has, from its beginnings, created a culture that thrives on collaboration.
Political thriller based on a story of coup against Bolsheviks by the Left Socialist Revolutionary Party in Moscow on 6–7 July 1918. They assassinate German ambassador in Moscow in hope of gaining public support and dragging the country into new war with Germany.
In Hillary's America, bestselling author and influential filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza reveals the sordid truth about Hillary Clinton and the secret history of the Democratic Party. This important and controversial film releases at a critical time leading up to the 2016 Presidential campaign and challenges the state of American politics.
In the 1990s HIV/AIDS came to Wenlou through a blood purchasing program. To supplement their income many poor villagers sold their blood and 60% of those who sold blood contracted HIV/AIDS from unsanitary equipment. Many have died from the disease. In his documentary film, To Live is Better than to Die, Wiejun Chen tells of the impact AIDS has had in parts of rural China by showing how it has affected the Ma family. It is spring when the film takes up the family’s story.
A new look at the public and private life of one of the most important statesmen in the history of Europe: Winston Churchill (1874-1965), soldier, politician, writer, painter, leader of his country in the darkest hours, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, a myth, a giant of the 20th century.
In 1375, China was in chaos between Yuan Dynasty and Ming Dynasty. Coryo (an ancient kingdom of Korea then) sent a delegation of many diplomats, soldiers and a silent slave to make peace with the new Chinese government. However, this delegation got charged as spies and sent in exile to a remote desert.
This timely, bold set of one-on-one interviews presents two of the most venerable figures from the American Left—renowned historian Howard Zinn and linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky—each reflecting upon his own life and political beliefs. At the age of 88, Howard Zinn reflects upon the Civil Rights and anti–Vietnam War movements, political empires, history, art, activism, and his political stance. Setting forth his personal views, Noam Chomsky explains the evolution of his libertarian socialist ideals, his vision for a future postcapitalist society, the Enlightenment, the state and empire, and the future of the planet.
The life and work of stage designer ADOLPHE APPIA, originator of the most profound agitations in contemporary theatre. Through the dynamic alternation of animated drawings and choreographies specially conceived for the film, we discover the steps of his artistic evolution.
Walter Bonatti is THE mountaineering legend, capable of meeting the great challenges of mountaineering: K2, Drus, G4, Matterhorn, to name a few. But the summits reached are not points of arrival, they are intermediate stages which then push him on a journey around the world, in search of himself. His exploration, starting from the vertical walls, then moved towards horizontal paths and was always expressed towards the interior space where our fears and our desires reside. Where the man, sitting alone in front of himself, must decide to surpass himself or to adapt. And Walter never complied with them, he wrote his own rules and followed them all his life, allowing himself no loopholes or shortcuts. He built himself as a mountaineer, as an explorer, as a photojournalist and as a writer, but always and only with the intention of being an uncompromising man with his hands, his muscles, his heart and his head.
This beautiful film about the immigrant experience is a San Francisco film about Eritrea. Sephora Woldu plays "Sephora" who, like the director, is an architecture student but also a filmmaker. She is pitching to her traditional mother a film she wants to make about a man who fled their home country and ended up in San Francisco. As a recently arrived immigrant, he is terribly homesick for his native Eritrea, but will not admit it due to unease towards speaking ill of the country; and more consciously in hesitance of admitting hard truths about his culture and himself. "It’s colorful and visually whimsical in a way that can only be described as if the Wizard of Oz went to Africa," said Woldu.
1925 (Soviet Union)
To recover a silver lion ornament for singer Emma Bunton Tim travels back to the court of Henry Vlll where Anne Boleyn (Emma again) asks jester Tim to send invitations to the guests for her Christmas party. However Cardinal Wolsey aims to steal them so that they will come to his own party and Tim must thwart him.
In 1910, the Pennsylvania Railroad successfully accomplished the enormous engineering feat of building tunnels under New York City's Hudson and East Rivers, connecting the railroad to New York and New England, knitting together the entire eastern half of the United States. The tunnels terminated in what was one of the greatest architectural achievements of its time, Pennsylvania Station. Penn Station covered nearly eight acres, extended two city blocks, and housed one of the largest public spaces in the world. But just 53 years after the station’s opening, the monumental building that was supposed to last forever, to herald and represent the American Empire, was slated to be destroyed.
The crusades come to life in Egyptian artist Wael Shawky’s beautiful Cabaret Crusades. Inspired by the writings of Lebanese writer Amin Maalouf, Shawky’s film trilogy explores the horrors of the medieval holy wars in the Middle-East – from an Arab perspective. With a cast made up entirely of puppets, the third part, The Secrets of Karbala (2014), centres on the period between the 7th and 12th centuries, covering the crusades as well as a dispute between two Islamic sects. Beautifully made of handblown Murano glass, the puppets have amazing expressive power, making the scenes full of violence, repression and torture all the more awe-inspiring.