The Story That Couldn't Be Printed

Flag of Mercy

1942 · ★ 7.5

The 1939 dramatic short "Angel of Mercy," about Red Cross founder Clara Barton, is reedited to relate the story to America's involvement in World War II. Edited from Angel of Mercy (1939)

Forgotten Treasure

1943 · ★ 7.3

This John Nesbitt's Passing Parade series short highlights the film preservation efforts of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Several scenes from early newsreels are shown.

Strange Testament

1941 · ★ 7.5

This MGM Passing Parade series short tells the story of Julian Poydras, whose encounter with a girl at Mardi Gras had a profound effect on his later life.

Obaida

2019

OBAIDA, a short film by Matthew Cassel, explores a Palestinian child’s experience of Israeli military arrest. Each year, some 700 Palestinian children undergo military detention in a system where ill-treatment is widespread and institutionalized. For these young detainees, few rights are guaranteed, even on paper. After release, the experience of detention continues to shape and mark former child prisoners’ path forward.

Madero of Mexico

1942 · ★ 7

This Passing Parade series short chronicles the political life of Francisco Madero, who tried to bring democracy and land reform to Mexico.

Clues to Adventure

1949 · ★ 7.3

This MGM Passing Parade series short presents how separate events led to the creation of three provisions - freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and prohibition of the infliction of cruel and unusual punishments - in the U.S. Constitution's Bill of Rights.

Mr. Whitney Had a Notion

1949 · ★ 6.3

Historical short showing how Eli Whitney (best known for the invention of the cotton gin) played a significant role in the introduction of mass production techniques to the USA in the late 18th century.

The Story of Alfred Nobel

1939 · ★ 7

This John Nesbitt's Passing Parade short tells the story of Alfred Nobel, who invented dynamite, and later established the Nobel Prize.

Angel of Mercy

1939 · ★ 7.7

This MGM Passing Parade series short tells the story of Clara Barton, the founder of the Red Cross.

Operation Teak

On the 10th anniversary of his band Rall Tide’s debut album, artist Peter Kotas takes you on a flowering multimedia tour of Detroit musicians trying to survive in a world where you can’t even enjoy a baseball game without supporting The Bay of Pigs. Along the way he shows you how the band’s abrupt break-up led to his career as a political journalist peeking behind the curtains of Kansas to find diplomatic wizard Mike Pompeo, Trump’s CIA Director and Secretary of State, wears no clothes. Iowa Writer’s Workshop hero Kurt Vonnegut (or some entity that knows all about his life) hosts this documentary as the ideal human from his 1985 novel Galapagos: a penguin with flippers unable to pull triggers or press buttons to bomb and kill people.

Magic on a Stick

1946 · ★ 8

This MGM Passing Parade series short recounts how English chemist John Walker invented the wooden friction match during the 1820s.

American Spoken Here

1940 · ★ 9

This MGM John Nesbitt's Passing Parade series short takes a look at the origins of North American slang.