How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin

Closing Gambit: 1978 Korchnoi versus Karpov and the Kremlin

October 2018 •English

The story of the 1978 World Chess Championship between the Soviet Communist Party's protege, Anatoly Karpov and the traitor and Soviet defector, Viktor Korchnoi. One of those instances in life where truth is stranger than fiction.

The Wall

November 1962 •English

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.

The World's Biggest Bomb Revealed

July 2011 •English

National Geographic 2011 Documentary on the World's Biggest Bomb (UK).

The Good Shepherd

December 2006 •English

Edward Wilson, the only witness to his father's suicide and member of the Skull and Bones Society while a student at Yale, is a morally upright young man who values honor and discretion, qualities that help him to be recruited for a career in the newly founded OSS. His dedication to his work does not come without a price though, leading him to sacrifice his ideals and eventually his family.

Nuclear Nightmares

November 1979 •English

Peter Ustinov hosts this haunting 1980 documentary exploring the world's nuclear weaponry and the fragile system that deters either side from initiating the first nuclear strike. Although the world's political climate has mellowed since the Cold War era, Nuclear Nightmares takes the viewer back in time to gain a perspective of what it was like to live under a very real nuclear threat.

Land of White Alice

January 1960 •English

Film sponsored by Western Electric (AT&T's equipment manufacturing division), the builder of the United States Air Force's White Alice Communications System in Alaska. Introduces the people and geography of the new state as well as the Western Electric radio-relay system, which links far-flung military sites, alert stations, and missile-warning facilities. Ralph Caplan praised the film's "intrinsically dramatic and highly photogenic" portrayal of communications equipment.

Iran: The Hundred Year War

February 2009 •French

What kind of world power is Iran becoming, and how will Western countries deal with it?

The Cars We Drove into Capitalism

October 2021 •Bulgarian

A cinematic, character-driven insight to what it meant to produce and to own a car in communist times: the Socialist propaganda dreams and the hard reality of living that dream. The freedom that these slow and clumsy vehicles were giving to their owners; the cars as an instrument in the Cold War battle; legends and homemade tune-ups as an attempt to stand at least a little bit off the crowd.

The Right Stuff

October 1983 •English

As the Space Race ensues, seven pilots set off on a path to become the first American astronauts to enter space. However, the road to making history brings forth momentous challenges.

The Atom And Us

May 2020 •English

Charlie Wilson's War

December 2007 •English

In the 1980s U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson, Texas socialite Joanne Herring and CIA agent Gust Avrakotos form an unlikely alliance to boost funding for Afghan freedom fighters in their war against invading Soviets. The trio's successful efforts to finance these covert operations contributes to the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.

The Man Who Saved the World

October 2012 •English

During the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, Soviet Navy officer Vasily Arkhipov refused to launch a nuclear strike and saved the world from nuclear war and total destruction.

K-19: The Widowmaker

July 2002 •English

When Russia's first nuclear submarine malfunctions on its maiden voyage, the crew must race to save the ship and prevent a nuclear disaster.

Combat in the Air - Anti-Ship Strike

April 1997 •English

Combat in the Air - Attack Helikopters

April 1997 •English

Combat in the Air - Search and Rescue

April 1997 •English

Lessons in Red

April 2020 •English

When a junior high student in 1963 suspects his teacher of being a communist, he investigates the truth to gain approval from his father.

Nuclear Armageddon: How Close Are We?

January 2024 •English

With the Doomsday Clock the closest it's ever been to midnight, Jane Corbin investigates the proliferation of nuclear weapons across the globe. She visits Los Alamos, home to the United States’ nuclear weapons development facility and the historic home of Oppenheimer’s Manhattan Project. In Scotland, she reveals the strategy behind Britain’s nuclear deterrent, and speaks to campaigners in Suffolk fighting against US weapons they fear will be based on UK soil. Jane also discovers how many of the global agreements and safeguards that have constrained the spread of nuclear weapons since the 1970s are breaking down. This is a story told by the scientists, investigators and diplomats who set the clock and have fought to ensure that the ultimate deterrent has not been used in over 70 years.

Nukes in Space

January 1999 •English

U.S. nuclear tests in space, and the development of the military intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

Atomic Pilgrimage: Ghost Towns, Nuclear Relics, and Lost Civilizations on the Road to the Trinity Site

June 2019 •English

A 40-day, 40-night road trip to the Trinity Site—where the first atomic bomb was detonated in the summer of 1945—covering many other atomic destinations and driving deep into the natural and social history of the American southwest.