The Locals
2025 Β· Documentary Β· History
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Sound of Nomad: Koryo Arirang
2017
The documentary starts with a diva of a tragic family history related to a history of migration. The rare archival footage reanimates her history reverberating with the current world crisis. Sound of Nomad: Koryo Arirang is a testimonial β a witness to injustice and tragedy, but it is also a declaration of survival β a survival that is not static but transformative β not brittle but fluid. The trains that displace, the deserts that separate form one harsh horizon β a historical limit β but within that limit, against it and across it are people, are a culture, not escaping but flourishing unofficially, with the affective majesty of a melody, a rhythm, an Arirang
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Cherry Sprout
2024
The cherry trees planted where waves of history passed bear abundant fruit. Raisa, Tamara, Rafael, Sonya, Vladimir, Lera, Konstantin. We will not forget the names of the people we met on this journey. Nor the bittersweet taste of the cherries.
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Leto
2018 Β· β 7.4
Leningrad, one summer in the early eighties. Smuggling LPs by Lou Reed and David Bowie, the underground rock scene is boiling ahead of the Perestroika. Mike and his beautiful wife Natasha meet with young Viktor Tsoi. Together with friends, they will change the destiny of rockβnβroll in the Soviet Union.
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Hanaan
2012 Β· β 7
Stas is a young third generation Koryo-saram, a member of the Korean minority in Central Asia that was deported from the Russian Far East by Stalin. He and his three friends Kasoy, Shin and Said try to escape from the grim life in Tashkent, the Uzbek capital, and one day, they also try heroin. Then, however, Kasoy gets killed by a gang. 6 years later, Shin has emigrated to South Korea, Said has become a drug addict and Stas is now a police officer. Said commits suicide by overdosing and Stas, who has has since then also become a drug addict, decides to turn over a new leaf. He follows Shin to South Korea, but can this be Hanaan for him, the Promised Land?
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The Miracle Worker
1962 Β· β 7.9
The true story of the frightening, lonely world of silence and darkness of 7-year-old Helen Keller who, since infancy, has never seen the sky, heard her mother's voice or expressed her innermost feelings. Then Annie Sullivan, a 20-year-old teacher from Boston, arrives. Having just recently regained her own sight, the no-nonsense Annie reaches out to Helen through the power of touch, the only tool they have in common, and leads her bold pupil on a miraculous journey from fear and isolation to happiness and light.
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The Forgotten Refugees
2005
The documentary explores the history, culture, and forced exodus of Middle Eastern and North African Jewish communities in the second half of the 20th century. Using extensive testimony of refugees from Egypt, Yemen, Libya, Iraq, and Morocco, the film weaves personal stories with dramatic archival footage of rescue missions, historic images of exodus and resettlement, and analyses by contemporary scholars to tell the story of how and why the Jewish population in the Middle East and North Africa declined from one million in 1945 to several thousand today.
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Microorganisms: The Air We Breathe
2023
Bacteria, viruses, but also fungus spores, algae, pollen, and even insects: microorganisms are constantly drifting through the sky. How can so many living beings find their way into the air and be circulating in our atmosphere? How do they survive? What is their influence on our lives and our entire living world? Biodiversity, health, climate - scientists are only now discovering just how much this discreet airborne "plankton" affects our lives and the entire ecosystem on Earth. But despite its many virtues, this magic matter is now under threat from human activity. With help from experts and using 3D visual effects, this scientific investigation will take us to the heart of a world that is still very little understood, and will reveal the diversity and fragility of the air we breathe.
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City Dream
2019
The struggles of Wang Tiancheng, an elderly and cantakerous street vendor in Wuhan, China, whose business is threatened by the development of a new retail district.
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Peter Pandrew
2015 Β· β 1
Created as a mini-series pitch, this docu-dramedy recreates the life of author Andrew Cristi (author of memoir series; "The Peter Pandrew Trilogy"), documenting his hardships from 1999 to present day as he embraces the nickname "Peter Pandrew" while refusing coming of age. Afflicted with bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder (amongst other ailments), the anti-hero shows an accurate depiction of his diagnosis while flip-flopping and fighting with friends and lovers and trying to recruit them into his "Neverland" in his desperate attempts to build a stable family. The characters that he meets along the way are just as colorful and complex and all take on different issues as the film deals with everything from Mental Illness and Bipolar Disorder, Borderline PD, OCPD, Antisocial PD, Histrionic PD, Narcissistic PD, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Feminism, Gender equality, LGBTQ stigmas, race, coming of age and refusal of coming of age.
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Sea Fort
1940
The operation of a floating sea fort during WWII, and the lives of those who work on board.
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