The Decline of Western Civilization
★ 7.2 · 1981 · 100m · Documentary · Music
The Los Angeles punk music scene circa 1980 is the focus of this film. With Alice Bag Band, Black Flag, Catholic Discipline, Circle Jerks, Fear, Germs, and X.
More Like This
On Sugar Workers' Quarters
1971 · ★ 8
Documentary about the history of the bateyes, informal settlements surrounding the mills to house workers. Throughout the film, Sara Gómez recovers the political and cultural relevance of black migrants.
More info →
Elvis by the Presleys
2005 · ★ 5.6
Priscilla Presley, her daughter, their family and their friends open their hearts in the backdrop of Graceland's memories with much modesty and emotion.
More info →
Step Up
2006 · ★ 6.9
Delinquent Tyler Gage receives the opportunity of a lifetime after vandalizing a performing arts school, gaining him the chance to earn a scholarship and dance with up-and-coming dancer Nora.
More info →
Detroit Rock City
1999 · ★ 6.8
In 1978, a Kiss concert was an epoch-making event. For the four teen fans in Detroit Rock City getting tickets to the sold-out show becomes the focal point of their existence. They'll do anything for tickets -- compete in a strip club's amateur-night contest, take on religious protesters, even rob a convenience store!
More info →
I'm Not the Girl Who Misses Much
1986 · ★ 3.9
This video work was made while Rist was still an art student at the School of Design in Basel, Switzerland. It was produced in an unlimited edition and is intended to be shown on a domestic-style monitor, although it may also be displayed as a projection with special permission from the artist. The video depicts the artist, an attractive young woman dancing manically around the room while repeatedly singing ‘I’m not the girl who misses much’. The phrase is an adaptation of the first line of the Beatles song ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun'. Referring to her childhood Rist has said, ‘In my village in Switzerland I had a small window on the art world through the mass media; through John Lennon/Yoko Ono I moved from pop music to contemporary art. In return, I will always be grateful to popular culture’ (quoted in ‘I rist, you rist, she rists, he rists, we rist, you rist, they rist, tourist: Hans Ulrich Obrist in Conversation with Pipilotti Rist’, Pipilotti Rist, p.16).
More info →
Dither: The D.I.Y. Sound
2013
Dither: The D.I.Y. Sound is not your conventional punk rock documentary. In this documentary we explore the ideologies created by cornerstones of the early punk community such as Ian Mackaye of Minor Threat, Fugazi and Dischord Records. But beyond that, we explore the communities and people that have adopted these ideologies and created their own version of what it means to be D.I.Y. This is not a documentary about just music, it's a documentary about the communities that surround the music and embrace it as a way of identification and brotherhood. But this documentary doesn't just ask questions about the culture, it asks questions about how it's possible to maintain a culture that is, at it's core, so opposite of the modern economic and social system.
More info →
La Mami
2020 · ★ 7.2
One of the rooms inside the legendary Barba Azul Cabaret has become a shelter for the girls working there: the women's bathroom. Every night La Mami, who's in charge of the bathrooms, offers them the warmth and the advice they need to take on the challenge they face in the dance hall.
More info →
The Domino Effect
2014 · ★ 5.6
Rafael - the minister of sports of an unrecognized country, and Natasha - a Russian opera singer, try living together in Abkhazia - a war-torn future-less country. Observing their difficult relations, we see life in a place marked by war and nationalism. The film portrays trapped people dreaming of peace, normality and happiness.
More info →
Bizet: Carmen
2013
With the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra and conductor Brian Castles-Onion, a gritty set design, sumptuous bold costumes, stunning choreography, and the inestimable direction of Gale Edwards and Bizet's glorious opera is brought to life like never before in this second Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour.
More info →
Mothers of Life
2002 · ★ 6.5
A documentary on the experiences of the Nubetya Yaptiks nomadic family in the Yamal Peninsula, Eastern Siberia, from 1992 to 2001.
More info →