Fang Daolong
A surprising look at the past of movie star Jackie Chan and the difficulties of Chinese families during the Culture Revolution.
2003-08-22
6.5
How to combine modernity and fundamentalist Islam. "Saudi Solutions" is a unique and revealing documentary about the lifestyles and attitudes of ambitious career womenin conservative Saudi Arabia - the only country in the Arabworld where women are obliged to cover themselves inabayas and aren't allowed to drive cars. Because of the strong influence of fundamentalist Islam on society, filmingis severely restricted in Saudi Arabia. With unique access to the Kingdom, Backlight had the opportunity to film the daily routines of Saudi working women. This documentaryfeatures a top gyneacologist, a TV news anchor woman, a photographer, and a university professor. It also introducesthe wealthy Prince Al-Waleed, who passionately promotes the acceptance of women into the workforce. He kindly invitesBacklight to his luxury desert camp, but there are no women to be found - only thousands of men.
A desktop documentary that focuses on the Golden Record that NASA sent into space in the late 1970s. The piece reflects on issues such as the power of scientific discourse to produce revisions of the world, the evolution of the concept of the archive and the resignification of borders in the rhetoric of space colonialism.
Good Grief is a short stop motion animated documentary that explores the lessons we learn from dealing with grief and loss. Five real people share their true stories of losing something precious and what it has taught them about living.
From both local and global perspectives, this documentary examines the harsh realities behind the mounting water crisis. Learn how politics, pollution and human rights are intertwined in this important issue that affects every being on Earth. With water drying up around the world and the future of human lives at stake, the film urges a call to arms before more of our most precious natural resource evaporates.
Birth: it's a miracle. A rite of passage. A natural part of life. But more than anything, birth is a business. Compelled to find answers after a disappointing birth experience with her first child, actress Ricki Lake recruits filmmaker Abby Epstein to explore the maternity care system in America
Some 220 miles above Earth lies the International Space Station, a one-of-a-kind outer space laboratory that 16 nations came together to build. Get a behind-the-scenes look at the making of this extraordinary structure in this spectacular IMAX film. Viewers will blast off from Florida's Kennedy Space Center and the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Russia for this incredible journey -- IMAX's first-ever space film. Tom Cruise narrates.
A document of the momentous culmination of a series of world tribunals held in 30 cities around the world, providing testimonials of the war crimes committed by the US and it’s allies in the war in Iraq. This culminating session was held in Istanbul in 2006.
This character-driven film considers the evolving sex trafficking landscape as seen by the main players: the exploited, the pimps, the johns that fuel the business, and the cops who fight to stop it.
After Marta had decided to become a nun at a young age, filmmaker Maud Nycander followed her and her family for ten years.
Kay Mander kept training and social issues to the fore in the 1940s with her innovative documentaries. Mander, now living in Kirkcudbrightshire, recalls her life and work, with clips from many of her films.
This 3-D film chronicles the love, community, and life of festival-goers during Electric Daisy Carnival Las Vegas, the largest music festival in the U.S. Behind-the-scenes footage and exclusive interviews with Insomniac's Pasquale Rotella reveal the magic that makes this three-night, 345,000-person event a global phenomenon.
Documents the life and musical production of Puerto Rican music composer, Tite Curet Alonso. Includes Tite Curet's last interview before his death.
Features the life of feminist Luisa Capetillo in late 19th and early 20th century Puerto Rico.
Documentary on one of Brazil's most controversial personalities: Getúlio Vargas, an ex-president.
This documentary profiles iconic journalist Helen Thomas who has held a front-row seat at White House press conferences for more than 60 years.
While observing others, Paula is also, herself, observed. ' Know the difference between an old maid and a spinster? The old maid does not have a choice. '
Carlos Oliveira's literary universe is re-enacted in a studio using the writer’s personal objects and manuscripts, and with the help of Luis Miguel Cintra and Fernando Lopes. Shot with the purpose to document his work in the same way Carlos de Oliveira documented his hometown in Gândara, the film uses all the creative liberty that new digital technology allows in order to recreate the visual and sound records that were also present in the writer and poet’s own work.
"Monday's Girls" explores the conflict between modern individualism and traditional communities in today's Africa through the eyes of two young Waikiriki women from the Niger delta. Although both come from leading families in the same large island town, Florence looks at the iria women's initiation ceremony as an honor, while Azikiwe, who has lived in the city for ten years, sees it as an indignity.
A meditative and philosophical exploration of rhythm and synchronization. A complex, artfully constructed and densely layered film that creates an immersive experience that can, at times, make the viewer feel almost in situ with the images and sounds on the screen. Interview subjects span a broad range of disciplines. As individuals and as a society, we have a tendency to keep in step.
A video-verité manifesto made with self-identified gender outlaw, author and activist, Leslie Feinberg (1949-2014). Raw and confrontational, this videotape asks its audience to examine their assumptions about the "nature" of gender, challenging any nead certainties and calling for more sensitivity and awareness of the human rights and dignity of trans people.
After the death of his master, martial arts student Tong Huo-wan travels with his adoptive family to seek redress from the man responsible but finds himself torn between righteousness and filial piety after becoming entangled in a feud between a local clan and gangsters.
Yuusuke Yamamoto has a crippling phobia of women, and understandably so—the twin girls living next door tried to cut off his penis as a child. Unfortunately, Yuusuke's father is a gynecologist and needs him to overcome his fear so he can inherit the family business. To accomplish this, Yuusuke's father offers sanctuary to sisters Rika and Yuka Nakamura in their home while the girls are studying at the nearby college. In a terrible twist of fate, when Yuusuke realizes that their guest room is too small for two people, he is forced to choose which of the sisters is allowed to stay. Desperate to win his favor, the brazen Yuka and the more reserved Rika are willing to do whatever it takes to impress and eventually sway Yuusuke—even if it means making things physical and personal. This two-episode OVA, 28 minutes per episode, is a seinen anime (typically targeted toward an older audience), which in addition to the harem genre is an ecchi comedy romance.
Heinrich George plays Henner who lives with his wife and child on a tugboat, going on the river to Berlin. There he meets the attractive Gescha (Betty Amann), and a story of love, betrayal and sadness ensues.
Sodade is an emotionally charged drama set on the picturesque island of Fogo, Cape Verde, where two young lovers, Kevin and Linda, find their relationship tested by hidden family secrets and a deep-rooted feud that threatens to tear them apart.
One of the world’s greatest ancient enigmas, the Nazca lines are a dense network of criss-crossing lines, geometric shapes, and animal figures etched across 200 square miles of Peruvian desert. Who created them and why? Ever since they were discovered in the 1920s, scholars and enthusiasts have raised countless theories about their purpose. Now, archaeologists have discovered hundreds of long-hidden lines and figures as well as evidence of ancient rituals, offering new clues to the origins and motivations behind the giant desert symbols.
An anthology of brief comic sketches based on manias, mainly sexual, featuring several figures of Italian society.
Since his wife Mei-yun was left comatose after nearly drowning, CHEN You-ming has been raising his three sons alone in their seaside village. And since the mechanical digger he drives broke down, Chen has had more time on his hands than he likes. His life is suddenly disrupted by the appearance of a disturbed young woman who calls herself XIE Hui-zhen (“Zhen” for short) and says that Chen is her father. To uncover the facts behind Zhen’s wild claim, CHEN has to contact his old girlfriend KE Li-jia, last seen twenty years ago. Before the truth about Zhen’s inner turmoil emerges, CHEN has to deal with the death of his wife in hospital and the stresses in his relationships with his sons Wei, Ting and Liang.
Rose, an icy photographer, encounters a mysterious old woman who plunges her headfirst into a psychedelic nightmare.
A man, with the help of his two best friends, helps his third friend to elope with his lover. However, when the couple parts ways, they decide to teach them a lesson.
A wild boar hunt, a taxidermist’s skill and the loyal reproduction of Etienne-Jules Marey’s chronophotographic gun, all these the premises for an intimate voyage. An interior voice questions images far off and close. It questions the confusion felt when faced with images. Those images “to part ways with “and those “to invent”. As if this invention could render a lost beauty. Not an exercise in nostalgia, but an unplanned incursion into a universe where all things untangle themselves.
A love story between a Polish guestworker and a farmer's daughter in the strawberry fields of Sweden.