A chronicle of the period from the departure of Charles Taylor to the election of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, the first African woman head of state, that presents the difficulties of rehabilitating a nation destroyed by war. LIBERIA: A FRAGILE PEACE is a perfect follow-up to Liberia: An Uncivil War, picking up the Liberian saga in October 2003, with the departure of the despotic Charles Taylor, the arrival of interim President Gyude Bryant and the deployment of a U.N. peacekeeping force. More than a historical record, however, this film is an ideal case study in how difficult it is to rebuild a society once it has lapsed into anarchy, a condition afflicting more and more nations around the world. The success or failure of the Liberian experience could have long-lasting impact on peace-keeping missions in the future.
With amateur footage from the Centre National de l'Audiovisuel "D'Schueberfouer" takes the viewer on trip through the history of Luxembourg fairs. The footage is about the rides, the emotions and the fantasy of the children connected through the different eras of the fairs.
A documentary that focuses on how animals born with unusual colours have a much harder struggle than normal. Follow white lions, a white baboon and a yellow crocodile.
Just as the rivers of the Andes mountains twist and coil in a curious maze, so does the grave situation of Peruvian women's health care. Through the compelling story of one Andean woman, Judyth Aguero Vega, we see the horrors and triumphs of Peru's volatile health care situation. Inside a small adobe kitchen, Elsa Romero-Murrado, a midwife in the rural town of Capacmarca, takes us through rarely seen birthing ceremonies. Down the dirt path, her neighbor Judyth, 27, shares her fears of birth as she bestrides the lines of modern and traditional medicine. Their town sits seven hours from the nearest hospital. Cerlia Mendoza, president of the Mother's Club, testifies to a list of 200 women who were bribed by doctors to undergo sterilization.
In the ancient ages, the Hebrew prophets predicted that before the advent of their promised Messiah, there would come specific signs that would signal the end of the age. Today those signs have become crystal clear. Join prophetic scholar Dr. Noah Hutchings and Ken Klein as they take you on a prophetic tour of the Holy Land, explaining 25 Messianic signs that point to the return of Christ.
At the beginning of the 20th century in Jacqueville, near Abidjan in the Côte d'Ivoire, traditional music was forbidden by the missionaries. But the inhabitants' enjoyment of their local festivals proved stronger, and the little town developed its own brass band. This is the story of that brass band, a brass band that isn't at all like a military band. It's a dancing brass band, an African brass band, that accompanies all the big and little moments of life: national festivals, religious ceremonies, funerals, fetes and celebrations, a musical game involving a football, tunes from the famous Mapuka dance, or the experimental use of sacred drums together with the brass band. A lively debate between the musicians, in which a sense of humor is clearly present, as they examine fundamental questions about their tradition and its transformations in the context of the life of people today.
In many ways the heart of indigenous India, mineral-rich Jharkhand is and has been at the core of India's industrial development after independence. There, the indigenous Adivasi people have borne the brunt of what is arguably India's most fundamental developmental conflict, which has pushed them to the verge of extinction as an agricultural people.
Produced in association with Waringarri Aboriginal Arts at Kununurra in Western Australia, this moving documentary features three women who talk about their paintings as an expression of their relationship to their country. The women share a sense of belonging to their place and express this belonging through dance and song and all of their artistic expressions. On a trip into the bush around Cockatoo Lagoon near Kununurra, they explain the stories of their Dreaming and of their land, and talk of their own experiences growing up as workers on stations in the area. Each artist talks about why they paint - to teach and to share stories about their country with others in the community and wider afield. The film also observes them working on paintings, each giving her personal interpretation of a loved environment and a living culture. The paintings are all very different in style but all express a life-affirming sense of identity intimately linked to their own country.
"Elizabeth Murray: 4 Decades" tracks the artist's career and shows her moving forward fearlessly toward new shapes and concepts for her unique style of painting. Inspired by artists of the Abstract Expressionism movement such as Willem de Kooning and Philip Guston, Murray was privy to their technique and motive. Though she may share ideals with her artistic predecessors, Murray has created miraculously original work which she discusses with curator Robert Storr as they explore her MoMA retrospective.
"Brice Marden: 4 Decades" follows the renowned abstract artist as he explores his acclaimed 2006 MoMA retrospective with curator Gary Garrels. Applauded for his bold and contemporary style, Marden speaks openly with Garrels about his approach, beginnings and influences. His fluid and colorful works demand attention but welcome the viewer to choose their own path within the painting itself. Marden's career is mapped out through a tour of the exhibition, as he and Garrels discuss key works of the last forty years.
The Garifuna are a Central American people of West African and Native American descent. One of their most popular rituals is wanaragua, a three-fold system of masked Christmas processionals commonly called Jankunú. This ritual is a unique blend of African, European, and Native American (Arawak and Carib) art traditions in which social and cultural identities are expressed through music, dance, and costume. As dancers adorn themselves in colorful regalia to mimic past foreign oppressors they symbolically affirm their identity. They perform stylized movements to the accompaniment of drums and social commentary songs composed by men. Descriptions of the three processions and dance styles are interspersed with interviews by Garifuna singers, drummers, dancers, cultural advocates, and scholars on the significance of rituals.
Ride along on a rustic, and rusting, Polynesian cargo boat as it makes deliveries to 21 of the globe's most isolated coral reef atolls, in the heart of the South Pacific Ocean. Along the 3,000-mile route meet black pearl divers, the man who found the Kon Tiki, Marlon Brando's 'Mutiny' girlfriend, a ship laden with NFL-sized crewman and many more - all set against the backdrop of a fast-and-forever changing Paradise. I jumped on the cargo boat for one of its monthly, 3,000-mile delivery jobs, taking us to ports-of-call that were literally just piles of sand and rock washed up on rims of coral, halfway between Australia and South America, each home to populations ranging from seven to two hundred fifty people. The trip took us through the Tuamotus, a chain of 78 atolls that sailors going back to Magellan dubbed the dangerous archipelago for its low-lying, barely visible, wooden-boat-sinking reefs.
Long suppressed by missionaries and then by Soviet anti-religious campaigns, Siberian shamanism has experienced an unprecedented revival following the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the number of shamans continues to rise. But who are these new shamans? Are they tricksters, magicians, businessmen, or cultural activists? This film takes a behind-the-scenes look at a Buryat shaman living on an island in the Lake Baikal as he moves between intimate shamanic rituals performed for local clientele and shows performed at various resorts for Western tourists in search of "primitive" cultures.
In March 2004, one of the world's last voluntarily isolated groups of hunter-gatherers walked out of the forest in northern Paraguay, fleeing ranchers' bulldozers. They formed a new village with their more settled relatives, where they confronted the complexities of learning how to become "Ayoreo Indians" and more critically, how to survive in a rapidly changing world. This documentary provides an intimate portrait of a divided community four months after this historical event, and their efforts to chart a collective future in a context shaped by deforestation, NGO activity, anthropologists and evangelical Christianity. Self-consciously engaging a history of ethnographic representations and tropes of "first contact," the reflexive video uses the filmmaker's narration to reflect on the experiences and confusions of a process that remains ultimately opaque for the "new people," for their relatives, and for the anthropologist.
A story about the life and turbulent times of Lisa Meitner and Otto Hahn, two exceptional scientists whose remarkable collaboration culminated in the discovery of nuclear fission, the division of the atom that changed the future. The show traces the development of nuclear science in the first half of the twentieth century, Meitner's early struggle for education and her quest to gain a foothold in the world of male-dominated physics, Hahn's initial research and independent discoveries, the collaborative discovery of the two scientists, as co-discoverers and the award of the Nobel Prize only to Hahn.
Narrated by Academy Award-winner Ben Kingsley, this multi-award-winning program is the most complete portrait of C.S. Lewis (1898-1963), widely known for his children's book series, The Chronicles of Narnia, was also one of the supreme Christian apologists and adult novelists of the 20th century.
Explores the intimidating terrain of girlhood by following three 12-year-olds over the period of one year. As these girls move from childhood to maturity, it's clear that peer pressure is an important influence, but as the films shows, the greatest influence in a young girl's life is family.
The core of this haunting meditation on war, land, the Bible, and filmmaking is a portrait of Revital Ohayon, an Israeli filmmaker and mother killed near the West Bank. Director Lynne Sachs creates a film on the violence of the Middle East by exchanging letters with an Israeli friend. Together, they reveal Revital's story through her films, news reports, and interviews, culminating in heartbreaking footage of children discussing the violence they've witnessed. Without taking sides or casting blame, the film becomes a cine-essay on fear and filmmaking, tragedy and transformation, violence and the land of Israel/Palestine.
A look at three U.S. cities, which were part of many communities that violently forced African American families to flee in post-reconstruction America.