Nostalgies of the Far West

Even Today He’d Speak His Mind(de)

Documentary about the German poet Erich Weinert.

Posted by: İlhan Sami Çomak(tr)

The story puts İlhan Çomak at the center, even though he is not physically present in the film. It focuses on the 21 years that İlhan spent in prison and his family’s experience of those years without him. The narrative is constructed through the letters İlhan wrote and aims to describe his life, his emotions and longings. The film constructs İlhan’s history through a chronology in the prison but refrains from restricting it only to a “prisoner’s quest for justice”, and rather tells a story of the situations he finds himself in over the years and his emotions and their equivalents in life.

A Carta(pt)

Sono Guido e non Guido(it)

Bowery(en)

A compelling portrait of New Yorkers living on the streets as they struggle with mental health, addiction, and the onset of a global pandemic. This powerful documentary offers an unfiltered, at times mesmerizing glimpse into life on the margins, drawing viewers into the raw, human stories behind a deepening crisis.

Leopardi. The Infinity Poet(it)

Showcases the life of Giacomo Leopardi, an Italian poet known for his melancholic verses on fleeting happiness, existentialism, and human suffering.

Merton: A Film Biography(en)

In his lifetime, Thomas Merton was hailed as a prophet and censured for his outspoken social criticism. For nearly 27 years he was a monk of the austere Trappist order, where he became an eloquent spiritual writer and mystic as well as an anti-war advocate and witness to peace. Merton: A Film Biography provides the first comprehensive look at this remarkable 20th century religious philosopher who wrote, in addition to his immensely popular autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain, over 60 books on some of the most pressing social issues of our time, some of which are excerpted here. Merton offers an engaging profile of a man whose presence in the world touched millions of people and whose words and thoughts continue to have a profound impact and relevance today.

Ralph Ellison: Invisible Man, Celebrated Writer(en)

Ralph Ellison was an African-American writer and essayist, who's only novel Invisible Man (1953) gained a wide critical success. Ellison's ambitious journey from a childhood of hardship and poverty to celebrated African American writer is chronicled in this inspiring program through exclusive interviews and personal recollection.

Van Morrison: One Irish Rover(en)

One Irish Rover, a documentary focusing on the words and music of Van Morrison, was broadcast in 1991 on BBC 2 Arena TV special and on A&E cable television program. It is a series of live songs with commentary by Morrison about music and poetry, it has some truly amazing performances. It includes the footage of Morrison and Dylan in Greece, Georgie Fame at Ronnie Scott’s, John Lee Hooker, The Chieftains and Danish Radio Big Band.

Who's Afraid of Kathy Acker?(en)

Documentary tracing the extreme life of outlaw writer, performance artist and punk icon, Kathy Acker. Through animation, archival footage, interviews and dramatic reenactments, director Barbara Caspar explores Acker's colorful history, from her well-heeled upbringing to her role as the scribe of society's fringe.

Waiting for Beckett(en)

Biography and in-depth look of Beckett and his work.

This Beggar's Description(en)

It's a sensitive, moving doc chronicling the life of Tétrault's brother Philip , a Montreal poet, musician and diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. A promising athlete as a child, Philip began experiencing mood swings in his early 20s. His extended family, including his daughter, share their conflicted feelings love, guilt, shame, anger with the camera. They want to make sure he's safe, but how much can they take?

Edgar Allan Poe: Buried Alive(en)

How the inventor of the detective story became his own greatest mystery.

Genesis Breyer P-Orridge: Write Your Own Code(en)

As Genesis and I were working on the documentary film "Change Itself” (released in 2016), we agreed that it would be great to also have Genesis reading poetry in the film. One clip was eventually used. "Write Your Own Code" contains all of the material we shot in Oslo, Norway, 2014. These sessions also became the creative ignition for the spoken word album we made together in 2017, and which was released in 2019 by Ideal Recordings: "Loyalty Does Not End With Death." I have left the casual tone of the sessions, including some mishaps, as untouched as possible. Write Your Own Code! – Carl Abrahamsson, 2021

Nobody(es)

Half blind and half deaf, ostraziced Cuban writer Rafael Alcides tries to finish his unpublished novels to discover that after several decades, the home made ink from the typewriter he used to write them has faded. The Cuban revolution as a love story and eventual deception is seen through the eyes of a man who is living an inner exile.

Something About Halfdan(da)

A moving portrait of one of the most loved and read Danish poets, Halfdan Rasmussen. The film covers both the early years with poverty and wartime on to success and the humorous nonsense verses that has made Rasmussen one of the most read authors in Denmark.

Good Hair(en)

An exposé of comic proportions that only Chris Rock could pull off, GOOD HAIR visits beauty salons and hairstyling battles, scientific laboratories and Indian temples to explore the way hairstyles impact the activities, pocketbooks, sexual relationships, and self-esteem of the black community.

Albert Camus, la tragédie du bonheur(fr)

Rope Ladder to the Moon(en)

Tony Palmer directs this 1970 documentary about Scottish bass player and former Cream member Jack Bruce. The film tracks Bruce's life from his childhood in the Gorbals to the height of his fame with Cream and beyond.

This Is How a Child Becomes a Poet(fr)

The last day of Patrizia Cavalli’s home. Before it’s all gone.