A Time There Was: Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony

Trek - Spy on the Wildebeest

January 2007 •English

Each year over 1.2 million wildebeest travel across the vast Serengeti plains and Kenya's Masai Mara on a 1,800 kilometer circular journey, relentlessly followed by every big African predator. Revolutionary spy cams - airborne, swimming or disguised as rocks, skulls or dung - reveal the Great Wildebeest Migration from entirely new perspectives. This 2-part series focuses on the growing-up of a calf as he takes his first steps, faces his first deadly perils and tries to cross crocodile-infested rivers. It combines natural humor with exciting drama and gripping music.

Hollywood Rated 'R'

June 1997 •English

A roller-coaster ride through the history of American exploitation films, ranging from Roger Corman's sci-fi and horror monster movies, 1960s beach movies, H.G. Lewis' gore-fests, William Castle's schlocky theatrical gimmicks, to 1970s blaxploitation, pre-"Deep Throat" sex tease films, Russ Meyer's bosom-heavy masterpieces, etc, etc. Over 25 interviews of the greatest purveyors of weird films of all kind from 1940 to 1975. Illustrated with dozens of films clips, trailers, extra footage, etc. This documentary as a shorter companion piece focusing on exploitation king David F. Friedman.

Wild Daze

September 2020 •English

In Africa, poachers brutally maim and kill elephants for their ivory, much of which is exported to China or smuggled into the United States. The profits help fund terrorist organisations, and are used to buy guns and artillery. WILD DAZE takes an unflinching look at these problems from various perspectives, and shows how the slaughter has decimated the elephant population, left survivors traumatised, and seriously harmed the forests of Eastern and Southern Africa.

Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist

October 1987 •English

This one-hour film, narrated by Actor BURT LANCASTER, explores the lingering effects of The Hollywood Blacklist, which occurred in the late forties and early fifties as part of the Anti-Communist witch-hunts that terrorized the nation. This film is seen through the eyes of the wives and children of the now deceased Hollywood figures whose careers were destroyed when studio bosses, along with guild and union officials capitulated to the demands of the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Stolen Education

April 2013 •English

"Stolen Education" documents the untold story of Mexican-American school children who challenged discrimination in Texas schools in the 1950s and changed the face of education in the Southwest.

TEN MONTHS

November 2022 •Swahili

MIEZI KUMI (TEN MONTHS) is a short documentary of the love between Zacharia Mutai, his family and the last two northern white rhinos, which he has to take care of for ten months in a year.

Running With The Beest

October 2022 •English

Murder At Cinema North

September 2020 •English

A young Holocaust survivor who descends into crime; an Italian-Jewish engineer who wants to see a movie; a German Christian who forgives her husband’s murderer because of her Buddhist faith; and a Jewish woman who carries on an affair with a Nazi and exposes members of the resistance so that she and her children may survive: their fates intersect when two bullets are fired into a queue of people waiting to see “A Man Escaped” at Tel Aviv’s Cinema North in 1957.

I Am Not Your Negro

February 2017 •English

Working from the text of James Baldwin’s unfinished final novel, director Raoul Peck creates a meditation on what it means to be Black in the United States.

Pornotropic

September 2020 •French

When French writer Marguerite Duras (1914-96) published her novel The Sea Wall in 1950, she came very close to winning the prestigious Prix Goncourt. Meanwhile, in Indochina, France was suffering its first military defeats in its war against the Việt Minh, the rebel movement for independence.

Cured

August 2020 •English

Mentally ill. Deviant. Diseased. And in need of a cure. These were among the terms psychiatrists used to describe gay women and men in the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s. And as long as they were “sick”, progress toward equality was impossible. This documentary chronicles the battle waged by a small group of activists who declared war against a formidable institution – and won a crucial victory in the modern movement for LGBTQIA+ equality.

Still Alive - Dramma Sul Monte Kenya

July 2016 •Italian

Maasai Daughters

July 2015 •English

Short documentary about the lives of three girls and the women who rescued them from retrogressive cultural practices in their own Maasai community at the AIC Girls School and Rescue Center in Kajiado, Kenya. It is an intimate portrait of these women as they sacrifice everything to make a stand against female genital mutilation and early forced marriage happening within their own culture.

Far Out!

January 2005 •Dutch

Humorous, melancholy documentary about copywriter, photo model and poet Frans Vogel (1935-2016). A handsome kid who became involved in the art world of the 1950s. Thanks to his absurd humor and provocative behavior, Vogel became a familiar face on the Rotterdam art scene.

Shepherds of the Earth

February 2022 •English

The region of Lake Turkana, located in Kenya and Ethiopia, is considered to be “the Cradle of Humankind”. Among other finds, primate fossils from millions of years ago have been discovered in the region. But what about the region’s modern inhabitants and their relationship to their environment? Iiris Härmä, whose previous work includes the award-winning Leaving Africa, had the chance of joining Helsinki University’s researchers, Álvaro Fernández-Llamazares and Mar Cabeza, on their pre-pandemic trip to study the Daasanach people’s relationship to their environment through traditional animal tales. The researchers hope that storytelling would help to bridge the gap between people’s everyday lives and conservation efforts.

Cinema Dadaab

September 2018 •Somali

In one of the world's largest and oldest refugee camps, Dadaab, the inhabitans survive by watching films and dreaming. The refugees cannot leave the camp, but they let their minds escape the harsh reality: by going to the simple cinema hall run by Abdikafi Mohamed, the film's protagonist.

Murder Remembered - Norfolk County 1950.

January 1997 •English

The recounting of a deadly Canadian bank robbery in the 1950's and the resulting massive man hunt for the killer.

The Fifties in Luxembourg

October 2013 •Luxembourgish

The nostalgic retrospective of the time from a very candid perspective, over five chapters.

The Trials of Alger Hiss

March 1980 •English

Documentary by lifelong friend that supports the innocence of Alger Hiss (convicted in January 1950 on two counts of espionage-related perjury)

De Gaulle, histoire d'un géant

November 2020 •French

50 years after the death of General De Gaulle, this film retraces his life, from his birth in 1890 to his burial at Colombey-Les-Deux-Eglises in 1970.