Robert J. Flaherty
The life and works of the great artist Michelangelo Buonarroti are shown against the historical background of his time. It begins with his earliest artworks, and follows his life and career as he achieves lasting fame. The documentary includes detailed looks at some of the artist's most renowned creations.
The idyllic life of a young Cajun boy and his pet raccoon is disrupted when the tranquility of the bayou is broken by an oil well drilling near his home.
It's All True is an unfinished Orson Welles feature film comprising three stories about Latin America. "My Friend Bonito" was supervised by Welles and directed by Norman Foster in Mexico in 1941. "Carnaval" (also known as "The Story of Samba") and "Jangadeiros" (also known as "Four Men on a Raft") were directed by Welles in Brazil in 1942. It was to have been Welles's third film for RKO Radio Pictures, after Citizen Kane (1941) and The Magnificent Ambersons (1942). The project was a co-production of RKO and the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs that was later terminated by RKO.
"The Battle of Russia," Chapter V of Frank Capra's "Why We Fight" series, follows the beginning of the end for Adolph Hitler.
Prelude to War was the first film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight propaganda film series, commissioned by the Pentagon and George C. Marshall. It was made to convince American troops of the necessity of combating the Axis Powers during World War II. This film examines the differences between democratic and fascist states.
This black and white movie is based on Rudyard Kipling's "Toomai, of the Elephants", in which a small native lad claims he knows the congregating place of the elephant hordes.
A well known storyteller, Tomas O' Diorain tells tales of the sea around a fire in an old Irish cottage. His storytelling is juxtaposed with images of the sea. This film, thought lost was rediscovered by Houghton Library curators during a cataloging update in 2013.
For the last 200 years the Aran Islands have exercised a powerfully romantic fascination on the outside world which is without equal anywhere else in the country. They were believed to contain the essence of the ancient Irish life, represented by a pure uncorrupted peasant existence centred around the struggle between man and his hostile but magnificent surroundings. This myth, strengthened by the writings of Yeats and especially Synge was hugely expanded by the release in 1934 of Man of Aran, a documentary on the life of the Island people. This film won international acclaim and explained in no small way why so many different nationalities walk the surface of Aran in their thousands between May and October each year.
A short, silent documentary by Robert J. Flaherty about pottery in England.
The youngsters Matahi and Reri are in love with each other. The old warrior Hitu announces that Reri is to be the new chosen virgin for the gods. This means she must stay untouched, otherwise she and her lover will be killed. But Matahi abducts and escapes with her to an island ruled by the white man, where their gods would be harmless and powerless.
Grierson set out to make "propaganda," and this film--with it's voice-over proclaiming the great value of the British industrial worker, without a hint of ambiguity or doubt--fits that category well. The authoritatarian narrator feels out-of-date and unsophisticated, but the footage is well shot and interesting, and the transparency of the propaganda aspect is almost a reflief at a time when so many films have hidden agendas.
A visual celebration of Manhattan and its waterways on the 300th anniversary of purchase from the local Native Americans.
A little girl watches the craftsman at work while inter-titles explain the particulars of pottery-making.
This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.
Illustrated travel lecture directed by Robert J. Flaherty, composed of film shot during his time with the Inuit in 1914-1915. After enthusiastic reception, the entire film stock was burned in an accident in 1916 leaving this a lost film. Soon after, Flaherty would return to the Inuit to reimagine his project as Nanook of the North (1922).
