The isolated, hermit kingdom of the DPRK is shrouded in secrecy, It's nearly impossible to get any reliable information from behind the bamboo curtain. Nonetheless, every week, on T.V. and online, we are bombarded by the bizarre media-spectacle of North Korea. From nuclear apocalypse and prison camps to banned sarcasm and compulsory identical haircuts - any shred of information regarding North Korea becomes a viral media hit, regardless of how dubious the story is. But that's all about to change. Two Aussie boys decided to take matters into their own hands and go to North Korea to find out the truth for themselves. Join us as we look past the click-bait and unpack the forces behind the way our media represents the "Democratic People's Republic of North Korea".
The isolated, hermit kingdom of the DPRK is shrouded in secrecy, It's nearly impossible to get any reliable information from behind the bamboo curtain. Nonetheless, every week, on T.V. and online, we are bombarded by the bizarre media-spectacle of North Korea. From nuclear apocalypse and prison camps to banned sarcasm and compulsory identical haircuts - any shred of information regarding North Korea becomes a viral media hit, regardless of how dubious the story is. But that's all about to change. Two Aussie boys decided to take matters into their own hands and go to North Korea to find out the truth for themselves. Join us as we look past the click-bait and unpack the forces behind the way our media represents the "Democratic People's Republic of North Korea".
2017-04-22
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A North Korean Adventure
The documentary AMERICAN REDS provides a historical overview of 20th century Communism and the growth, decline and contemporary relevance of the Communist Party, USA (CPUSA). Since its founding in 1919, the CPUSA has championed the struggles for democracy, labor rights, women’s equality, and racial justice. During its heyday in the 1930s and 1940s, it attracted millions of Americans to support its causes and almost 100,000 men and women to enlist in its ranks. The film begins with the Party's emergence as a small militant sect in the 1920s and documents its rise to the foremost radical group in the United States during the Great Depression, fighting against racism, sexism and fascism, as well as for the rights of workers to organize. It ends with the decline of the Party during the Cold War under the assaults of the FBI and anti- communist crusades.
The story of Fred Paterson, member for Bowen in the Queensland parliament in the 1940s and the only Communist Party member ever elected to any Australian parliament.
Michael Moore's view on how the Bush administration allegedly used the tragic events on 9/11 to push forward its agenda for unjust wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
French documentary from 2013. Mao Zedong and his fourth wife Jiang Qing were married for 37 years, from 1939 until Mao's death in 1976. After his death, she was tried and imprisoned where, at the age of 77, she committed suicide. All the official portraits of her were removed after her death and she became a scapegoat of the things for which Mao was ultimately responsible.
Torre David, a 45-story office tower in Caracas, was almost complete when it was abandoned following the death of its developer and collapse of the Venezuelan economy. Today, it is the improvised home of more than 750 families, living in an extra-legal occupation that some call a vertical slum.
Marion Stokes secretly recorded television 24 hours a day for 30 years from 1975 until her death in 2012. For Marion taping was a form of activism to seek the truth, and she believed that a comprehensive archive of the media would be invaluable for future generations. Her visionary and maddening project nearly tore her family apart, but now her 70,000 VHS tapes are being digitized and they'll be searchable online.
Like the best USIA films, The Wall distills political events into an emotionally clear and compelling ideological "story". In 1962 Walter de Hoog gathered footage from U.S. and German newsreel sources and crafted this taut short film about the first year of the Berlin Wall. Straightforward, keenly balanced narration portrays Berliners as "accepting the wall but never resigned to it". The extraordinary footage of the first escapes was propaganda enough-- His challenge was to make the politics human.
March 9th, 1953, 5 million people attend Stalin’s funeral. A revolutionary lacking in both charisma and stature, Stalin came to power almost by chance, and his 30-year reign saw him become the most Machiavellian and bloodthirsty of dictators. The man who insisted on being called “The Father of the People” massacred his own countrymen, and was responsible for the death of some 20 million people. Soon forgetting his former ideological stance, he mercilessly crushed anyone who opposed him, in both word and deed. His camps for reform through hard labor – known as “gulags” – turned 18 million Russians into slaves. He not only murdered his opponents but his best friends too, and even sometimes members of his own family. His cruelty knew no bounds. Through colorized archive material rich in previously unseen footage, and many accounts from the period including some from Stalin himself, this documentary tells the story of a man who turned a dream into a nightmare.
A documentary on the late American entertainer Dean Reed, who became a huge star in East Germany after settling there in 1973.
This is a journey like no other, after several months of wrangling with North Korean authorities in Paris reporters Michaël Sztanke and Julien Alri obtained a visa for Pyongyang but as soon as they arrived the scene was set by a compulsory photo shoot. Journalists are kept under close surveillance and to go to North Korea is to accept the presence of guides who provide supervision 24 hours a day, their primary role is to protect the countries image. In North Korea’s eyes every foreigner is a potential enemy who must be closely watched, this being said Sztanke and Alri attempt to delve deeper into the inner workings of the hermit kingdom, discovering the real nature of this political regime and how life is for your everyday North Korean.
Documentary about a Finnish reporter, Hannu Karpo. The movie follows Karpo's decades-long career as a journalist, and how he became a phenomenon and known by the whole nation.
Portrait of Mrs. B., a tough charismatic North Korean woman who smuggles between North Korea, China and South Korea. With the money she gets, she plans to reunite with her two North Korean sons after years of separation.
A film about the dramatic and extraordinary fate of the lonely man who confronted the meat grinder of the communist regime. Georgy Konstantinov, 19 years old, blew up Stalin's monument in Sofia and death passed him by only because the dictator died two days later. He miraculously survived 10 years in prison and psychiatric wards and managed to escape to France. His State Security file numbers more than 40,000 pages. Even today, he does not cease to expose the crimes of the regime with the strength of truth and of his character.
Battered, bandaged and playing croquet on crutches, wounded First World War soldiers get a break from the Western Front.
In the run-up to parliamentary elections in mid-October, Polish filmmaker Marcin Wierzchowski travelled across his country to gauge the atmosphere in a society that is more divided than ever.
It was the biggest escape in the history of the Berlin Wall: in one historic night of October 1964, 57 East-Berliners try their luck through a tunnel into West Berlin. Just before the last few reach the other side, the East German border guards notice the escape and open fire. Remarkably, all the refugees and their escape agents make it out of the tunnel unscathed, but one border guard is dead: 21-year-old officer Egon Schultz.
Born in Austria in 1903, Jacob Rosenfeld was imprisoned in Dachau. He manages to flee and takes refuge in Shanghai, like 30,000 other people. He exercised his profession there and sought to get involved in 1941 alongside the revolutionaries of the Chinese Communist Party. Rosenfeld becomes a surgeon on the war front between China and Japan. Thanks to his talents as a doctor and an organizer, he soon became close to Mao Tsé-Toung. In 1945, he was appointed general, responsible for the health of the armies and the entire liberated area. He is now called General Luo. Later, he became the Minister of Health of the first communist government. Thanks to his journal found in 2001, this documentary traces its extraordinary destiny.
What images do we associate with abortion and why? Where do these images and the emotional scripts in our head come from? How do they influence women who (want to) have an abortion, how do they shape the general discussion? Franzis Kabisch’s personal desktop documentary investigates these questions with great precision, clarity and humour (yes, humour, too!).