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The Swedish dansband Barbados travels to the country they've taken their name from to learn more about the culture and music of that place.

A discovery of the pictorial art that Ndebele women traditionally practice in South Africa: painting the walls of their houses.

A chronicle of the heavy metal band Pantera's 1992 tour, behind the "Vulgar Display of Power" album, that chronicles all of the band's excesses with groupies, drinking and drugs. Also featured in the video are members of White Zombie, Megadeth and Metallica.

Musical documentary directed by Canibal / Mabuse.

An investigative biography originally broadcast in 1993 for BBC Timewatch about the man at the center of the political crime of the 20th century. At the heart of the assassination lies the puzzle of Lee Harvey Oswald: Was he an emotionally disturbed lone gunman? Was he part of a broader conspiracy? Or was he an unwitting fall guy, the patsy, as Oswald himself claimed? This was subsequently broadcast on PBS in America as Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald?

Early 90s London gets a vibrant dose of African culture in this mini odyssey fusing dance, music and fashion.

Enjoy Comedic Superstar Sinbad as he gives us one of his most stellar stand up performances, shot on the beautiful island of Aruba at the Guillermo P. Trinidad Theatre. As always, Sinbad shows why he’s a veteran in comedy since the 80’s, with an entertaining show that the entire family can enjoy.

The first part of this documentary deals with the Portuguese neurologist António Egas Moniz, Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1949, one of the first surgeons to apply the technique called lobotomy for the treatment of schizophrenia. The second part deals with the everyday life of people with schizophrenia today: behavior and relationships, and treatment for the disease.

A family tells what they had to do to get to the fifth floor of their home

On April 11, 1992, The Grand Opening of Euro Disney aired on CBS, offering viewers a spectacular, entertainment-filled evening as well as a special “sneak preview” of the Euro Disney Theme Park and Resort. The special was simulcast live across Europe in five languages and broadcast later the same day in the United States. Each country’s customized broadcast was hosted by popular local celebrities, introducing entertainers from their own countries.

A true story of four Jewish intellectuals born in New York and educated at City College during the 1930s, and their divergent paths over the next six decades.

Twenty years ago, a hard-drinking, fiery British immigrant called Gordon Bennett, came to the remote Australian territory of Christmas Island to become General Secretary of the Union of Christmas Island Workers. By the time he died in 1991, he was known as 'Tai Ko Seng' which, roughly translated, means "big brother who delivers". Every year since his death, people gather on 30 July at the Island's Chinese cemetery, to pay tribute to Bennett as they would to their honoured ancestors. Big Brother of Christmas Island tells the moving story of how the legend of the "Tai Ko Seng" was born.

Henryk Greenberg is a Polish-born American who lost much of his family in the Holocaust. Certain of the location where his father and younger brother were murdered, Greenberg returns to find most of his former neighbors predictably claiming foggy memories at first; but soon their recollections come more easily.

Portrait of the Swedish writer Sven Delblanc made up of interviews with friends and family along with excerpts of his writing read by Max von Sydow.

On 2nd August 1995, a woman in a red dress travelled from London to Blackpool. Did you see her? Do you remember her? Was she there?

A multifaceted portrait of science fiction writer Stanislaw Lem.

For the first time in 40 years African skies resound to the roar of a flying boat. Alexander Frater boards a wartime Catalina in search of the romance and adventure of Imperial Airways' legendary route from Cairo to the Cape - down the White Nile to the Rift Valley lakes of Kenya and on to the astonishing Ilha de Mocambique - the forgotten jewel of the Indian Ocean.

Evgeny Igorevich Kissin was born in Moscow on the 10th of October 1971. He started to play the piano at the age of two, as soon as he was tall enough to reach the keyboard and he has not looked back from that day to this. His is a very rare story of continued success that has had the simultaneous blessing of critics, the public and musicians alike. This film by Christopher Nupen shows Kissin in preparation, interview, rehearsal and performance, with several dazzling performances shot live on stage, in true concert conditions. It also contains all the encores from Kissin's memorable Promenade concert at the Royal Albert Hall, London, in August, 1997—the first Prom concert by a soloist, it attracted the biggest audience in all the 103 year history, very nearly six thousand people. The music is by Liszt, Gluck, Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Paganini, Kissin himself and Chopin, the composer for whom Kissin feels the closest affinity.

Even big stars need to stand in front of the director and audition for their roles, and some of the best screen tests are from the early years of legends. See some of Hollywood's top names and greatest talents in their very first appearances on celluloid. From Dustin Hoffman's 1966 stock and personality tests to Raquel Welch and James Coburn cavorting for Our Man Flint, from The Three Stooges to Rock Hudson, see stars trying to get on film.

Utilizing a combination of professional actors and man-on-the-street interviews, French director Raymond Depardon has created a film about filmmaking that centers on a rather discriminating director's search for the perfect leading lady. The main problem is that the helmer (Luc Delahaye) doesn't really know what his next film will be about, let alone what kind of woman should be his star. Looking for inspiration, the director and his casting agent (Sylvie Peyre) visit the Saint Lazare train station in Paris and shoot some footage of passengers entering and exiting the trains. Later he encounters a few actresses, but rather than asking about their professional experiences, the director focuses on their personal lives. After several fruitless interviews, the director confesses to the casting agent that he really wants to utilize a non-professional actress.

A documentary about the Newfoundland fiddling legend Rufus Guinchard

A portrait of Athens, Georgia singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt.

A documentary film by Georgiy Gongadze made in 1993. He dedicated this film to Ukrainians - members of the UNA-UNSO who died in Georgia during the war in Abkhazia.

These were the years Frank Sinatra led a group made up of talented rowdies called the Rat Pack. The members include Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford, and Joey Bishop. They always had a ball performing together and even more fun off screen. Never have such a collection of name stars worked and played together so long.

This documentary is very much in the style of Pumping Iron, but like Arnold Schwarzenegger's Total Rebuild it is centered around its "Star", Lou Ferrigno. It charts his early years as a kid from Brooklyn, New York who had to deal with having 85% hearing loss due to ear infections in his infancy. He fought against low self esteem by working out with weights in his father's garage, and boy did he win that battle with Mr. Universe (twice), and Mr. World among his physique title wins. Internationally known as a world class bodybuilder and star of The Incredible Hulk, we see him once again step up to the challenge of trying to win the Master's Olympia title in his '40's!

The turquoise coast of Turkey is the picturesque setting for a naturist sailing holiday aboard the ship Cockatoo. Discover a beach of tortoises, and hunt for ancient treasure underwater. Explore Turkey, a country with a rich and fascinating culture into which you can dip.

Documentary on Alain Robbe-Grillet, part of the TV series "Un Siècle d'écrivain"

Other essential predecessors of film were those devices that created the illusion of motion by taking advantage of the persistence of vision and the stroboscopic effect, such as the thaumatrope, phenakistoscope or wheel of life, zoetrope or magic drum and praxinoscope and later on, the more sophisticated flip-books such as the kinora and mutoscope.

Documentary film in memory of Sergey Timofeev (10.05.1959 — 5.06.1993), founder of the Beijing Row-Row group, participant of the Art or Death partnership

Six life stories of German, Austrian and Ashkenazi Jews which intersect in exile in Shanghai. Out of narratives, photographs, documents and new images of the biggest and most contradictory metropolis of the Far East an entity develops in which the historic exile takes and turns on a completely current power and appeal.

This avant-garde, associative collage equates the system’s relationship to Filipino citizens as a marriage. But instead of a wedding full of majestic gestures, we witness a tyrannical system led by a conductor-like figure representing colonial domination and a military regime. The work, which was created under German cinematographer Christoph Janetzko's direction, borrows on archived records from such classic Filipino documentary filmmakers as Nick Deocampo and Ricky Orellana.

When twenty-six-year-olds Shainee Gabel and Kristin Hahn quit their Hollywood jobs, packed up a borrowed car and hit the road, it was with the deeply felt conviction that somewhere, shrouded in the din of talk shows and tabloid headlines, they'd discover the real America, alive and well in all of its regions and demographics.

The worldwide Nazi search for archaeological and historical support for their beliefs in the Aryan (German) master race.

Robinson is commissioned to investigate the unspecified "problem of England." The narrator describes his seven excursions, with the unseen Robinson, around the country. They mainly concentrate on ports, power stations, prisons, and manufacturing plants, but they also bring in various literary connections, as well as a few conventional landscapes.

The story of Darwin's finches and their relationship with other creatures of the Galapagos; tracing their evolution, how the islands were formed and how it's main inhabitants got there.

Documentary film about four families in Pori, Finland, all struggling with unemployment and poverty.

In 1862, when Minnesota was still a young state, the people of the Eastern Dakota Nation had been relegated to a reservation on a narrow strip of land along the Minnesota River. Times were hard and Dakota families went hungry. When the U.S. government broke its promises and failed to send treaty payments, some of the Dakota went to war against the white settlers. Many Dakota did not join in, choosing to aid and protect settlers instead. The fighting lasted six weeks and many people on both sides were killed or fled the state. 1600 Dakota were imprisoned in a camp below Fort Snelling in present day Minneapolis. Dakota men were tried in a military court and on December 26, 1862, thirty-eight were hanged in Mankato in the largest mass execution in U.S. history.

Short documentary / tribute to the late, truly great American stand-up comedian Bill Hicks, included as an extra in several box sets. Bill Hicks passed away in 1994, taken tragically young aged only 32. His legend and reputation, however, continue to grow. "It's Just a Ride" is a celebration of his life and work, featuring numerous clips of Bill's many recorded stand-up performances, along with trbutes from Sean Hughes, Eric Bogosian, David Letterman and Eddie Izzard, amongst others.

The film's protagonist is Colonel Jerzy Ryszard Kukliński of the Polish People's Army, one of the most controversial figures in modern Polish history. For some, he was a national hero who saved Poland from Soviet invasion, for others, he was just a spy and a traitor. The documentary shows his career path: from joining the army in 1947 at the age of 17, through his appointment to a high position in the General Staff in 1964, his graduation in 1976 from the Military Academy in Moscow, where top-ranking officers were trained, to his promotion in the same year to head of the strategic defense planning department. After the West learned of plans to impose martial law in Poland, Kukliński, who was in danger of being exposed, was evacuated by the Americans to Berlin in November 1981.

The film is dedicated to the historical period of the XI-XIII centuries, the times of Kyivan Rus and the Galician principality.

"These portraits are encounters I wanted to be kept from oblivion, even if it is only while you are watching them. They are women who work, who have children, and who, at the same time, keep their independence of mind. I shot 24 portraits of 13 minutes each. I have chosen this short running time for several reasons: not becoming a bother, escape tv adds cuts, shoot the movie quickly, in one pace and without too many scratches. I am not a documentaries maker. I am more like a faces, hands and things lover. To show reality is not my goal. “Reality” is just a word, just like its twin sister “fiction”, which I practice as well, but with a different delight." (Alain Cavalier)

An in-depth look at the making of John Carpenter's cult classic sci-fi horror The Thing, telling the story of a group of researchers in Antarctica who encounter a parasitic extra-terrestrial life-form that assimilates, then imitates other organisms.

Santiago, 1996. A renowned drag queen, a sex worker, a bisexual man, a homophobic and various characters gives their honest and stark opinions regarding homosexuality, facing us with the repressive situation in Chile during the nineties.

Though very polite and British, this feature-length documentary about German filmmaker Wim Wenders offers the most penetrating insights and the best overall critique of his work that I have encountered anywhere. Paul Joyce, who directed it, has also made documentaries about Nicolas Roeg, David Cronenberg, Nagisa Oshima, and Dennis Hopper, and he knows the conventional format well enough to get the most out of it. There are good clips and interesting commentaries from the interviewed subjects, who include Wenders himself, cinematographer Robby Muller, filmmaker Sam Fuller, novelist Patricia Highsmith, musician Ry Cooder, actors Harry Dean Stanton, Peter Falk, and Hanns Zischler, and critic Kraft Wetzel, who is especially provocative. A must-see for Wenders fans, highly recommended for everyone else. –Jonathan Rosenbaum, 1989

Teatro Amazonas is an elaborate, intriguing formalist experiment investigating the cinematic gaze and cultural exchange, and offering an unconventional ethnographic record of its Amazonian subjects engaged (and disengaged) in the act of spectatorship.

A brief account of the Spanish-American War (1898) and the end of the Spanish Empire in the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean.

A cold odyssey over more than 8,000 km through contrasting territories, from the mountains of Mongolia to Lake Baikal, from the taiga to the Siberian tondra: this is the challenge that Nicolas Vanier has set himself. The adventure will last 18 months, 18 months during which Nicolas and his team face one of the most hostile regions of the globe before reaching the Arctic ice. An exceptional route, where only traditional modes of transport are used to overcome the constraints, each time different, of the regions crossed...

A quick overview of Swedish film history, featuring a breathtaking cavalry of scenes from about 170 films.

This is a documentary about a well-known figure in Polish politics - Wladyslaw Bartoszewski. The hero of the film is a man with a very rich resume. He was born and raised in Warsaw. He was a prisoner of Auschwitz, a soldier of the Home Army, an activist of the Polish Underground State, a participant in the Warsaw Uprising, twice served as foreign minister, and finally a publicist, writer and scientist. In a forty-two-minute documentary it would be impossible to present the full biography of this man - that's why this film selects only the more important episodes from Bartoszewski's life. His life is narrated by the hero himself. Stories about him are also spun in front of the camera: Jerzy Sienkiewicz, Jerzy Turowicz, Krzysztof Kozłowski, Israel Gutman, Jan Nowak Jeziorański, Stanisław Lem and Stefan Kisielewski.

A documentary that chronicles the life of South African leader Nelson Mandela. Mandela is probably best known for his 27 years of imprisonment, and for bringing an end to apartheid. But this film also sheds light on the little-known early period of Mandela's life.

The origins of Halloween are explored in this engrossing program on the subject. A ghoulish array of costumes, make up, and decoration descend on communities every year on October 31st, but few people are aware of how the celebration came to exist. Harry Smith attempts to get to the bottom of the mystery in THE HAUNTED HISTORY OF HALLOWEEN, which delves into the 3,000 years of hoopla that traditionally unfolds when October comes around. As the history is explained, so are various failed attempts to co-opt the festival by various religious groups; but the most compelling revelation is how little the festival has changed over the centuries. A marvelous way to gain a historical perspective on this entertaining holiday, Smith's program is almost as fun as carving a pumpkin, donning a spooky costume, and undertaking a little trick or treating!

At the Vienna Art Academy in 1994, an unidentified person painted over 27 works by Austrian painter Arnulf Rainer. Rainer had become world-famous for his abstract art and, in particular, for his over-layering of photographs and overpainting of his own and other artists’ works. But who painted over the “overpainter”? Speculation rages: Did he attack his works himself? A year later, an unsigned letter surfaces claiming responsibility for the act directed against Rainer – and modern art in general – and accusing the artist of being complicit with “destructive modernism.” At the same time, Austria is shaken by a series of mail bombs by the Bajuwarian Liberation Army, in response to the supposed threat to Austria’s “German identity.” Are there connections between the overpainting event and the mail bombs? Or is this all just a game? A dream? Or perhaps a hallucination?

Three vacuum cleaner salesmen go door-to-door selling dreams of dust-free homes and personal ambitions in a bleak Finland hit by the worst recession in history.

Spago restaurant maître d’ Bernard Erpicum hosts this program featuring Hollywood stars as they share tips for choosing the best wine for any occasion. Dudley Moore, Whoopi Goldberg, Steven Seagal, and Peter Weller are among the guests. Added advice is provided by Robert Loggia, Kelly LeBrock, Herbie Hancock, and Shelley Hack. Other topics covered include quickly ordering from a restaurant's lengthy wine list and selecting the proper stemware for home entertaining.

Cast and crew discuss the 1973 film The Wicker Man, directed by Robin Hardy.