Legends of lost continents and civilizations have captivated people throughout time. Philosophers and astronomers like Aristotle and Ptolemy believed that an unknown continent existed in the Southern hemisphere. In the Age of Discovery, renowned explorers like Magellan and Cook searched the Pacific Ocean in vain for a mysterious land they called "Terra Incognita." To this day, ancestral legends throughout Polynesia speak of a lost homeland and a great civilization that disappeared into the sea. Modern science disputes the existence of unknown continents and often dismisses creation myths. But on Rapa Nui, or Easter Island, elders fiercely believe they originate from a continent that sank following a catastrophic upheaval.
In the pre-dawn twilight of an Alaskan shore, a young Native woman reflects on the story of Ada Blackjack, the sole survivor of a disastrous 1921 Arctic expedition, and the loneliness she must have felt waiting for a rescue through the months-long polar night.
The year is 620 A.D., North Lebanon. Living with God is men's privilege and the most unreachable women's right. Stubborn as she is, the 20 year-old revolutionary girl breaks the rules and endures all the consequences.
Pastor Petrelius does not accept the marriage wishes of his young daughter Karoliina and Paavo Paavalinpoika. Paavo wants to prove his manhood to the pastor and enlists in the King's forces, but is wounded in the Battle of Pultava. On his return to Finland, he finds his village besieged by Cossack Captain Voronoff.
During the reign of Oliver Cromwell, Catholic worship is forbidden on pain of death. Three soldiers are arrested as Catholics and condemned to die. Cromwell decides to spare two of them and to determine which should die by chance. The guards bring the first child they meet. Whichever soldier she gives the 'death disc' to shall die. Cromwell is charmed by the girl and gives her his signet ring. By chance the child is the daughter of one of the soldiers and gives the death disc to her father, because she thinks it's pretty. The child is returned home to her mother, who learns of her husband's pending execution and of the power of the ring. She rushes to the place of execution and saves her husband by producing the ring.
Betye Saar’s film Colored Spade is an assemblage of derogatory images gradually replaced with depictions of African-American power and solidarity. The film explores Saar’s interest in deconstructing historical and political narratives through the use of symbolism within found imagery.
One autumn weekend, early in WWII at an aircraft factory at Broughton in North Wales, a group of British workers, men and women, set out to smash a world record for building a bomber from scratch. They managed to build a Wellington Bomber in 23 hours and 50 minutes. They worked so quickly that the test pilot had to be turfed out of bed to take it into the air, 24 hours and 48 minutes after the first part of the airframe had been laid.
The mysterious Koga Ninja crushes the villains who are trying to take over the inheritance of the Omi castle owner using various means! A sword and witchcraft, a mystery and revenge swirl around the mystery of the hood, in the demon tower, in the underground castle, and at the bottom of the lake!
This film examines the mechanisms of Nazi extortion during World War II, and is interspersed with current issues surrounding restitutions. It retraces the incredible stories of 3 major works having belonged to Jewish collectors. From their plundering by the Nazis to their final restitution: Man with a Guitar by Georges Braque, Herbstsonne by Egon Schiele and Sitting Woman by Henri Matisse.
The amazing and tragic life story of the Russian Paralympic judoka Oleg Kretsul. Having lost his sight in a car accident, Kretsul did not give up the sport and was subsequently able to win Olympic gold at the Paralympics in Beijing.
In a long-form interview, Kate recalls how she was wounded by gunfire and narrowly escaped death herself as she and her cameraman remained in the line of fire while an estimated 2,000 pro-democracy demonstrators were shot down by Chinese government troops. Kate reviews the reports she made on the ground, with additional insight from leading historian Professor Steve Tsang, and draws on the BBC's archive to assess how film-makers have portrayed China before and after the upheaval.
Thomas Cromwell has gone down in history as one of the most corrupt and manipulative ruffians ever to hold power in England. A chief minister who used his position to smash the Roman Catholic church in England and loot the monasteries for his own gain. A man who used torture to bring about the execution of the woman who had once been his friend and supporter - Anne Boleyn. Diarmaid MacCulloch, professor of the history of the church at Oxford University, reveals a very different image of Cromwell. He describes Cromwell as an evangelical reformer, determined to break the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic church and introduce the people of England to a new type of Christianity in which each individual makes direct contact with God.
After the end of the GDR, thrashings, threats and hunts were part of everyday life. In the years after the reunification of the early 1990s, hatred, racism and violence against foreigners and supporters of leftist ideology broken out in Eastern Germany. Most of those involved was young people. In many cities and towns, the streets and squares belonged to the right-wing scene, organized in neo-Nazi comradeships. Bomber jackets, combat boots and the Hitler salute showed the intimidated rest where they were. The baseball bat was a popular weapon. There were riots, attacks on asylum seekers' homes, mass brawls and hunt downs to those who look or think differently. It doesn't took long and the first deaths were to be mourned. The majority of the Eastern German population looked the other way or even applauded the deeds. A bad omen for the political development of later years. In six film segments, a team of authors take a look at the time reflected in interviews with contemporary witnesses.
In the 1920-30s, 70% of the indigenous population died from the Great Famine created by the Bolsheviks in Kazakhstan. Overcoming the dreadful fear of death and despair, an eagle hunter's family from a Kazakh village in the highlands is trying to stay alive in the midst of the fierce winter and face a moral choice, to die as human beings or to survive at any cost, transgressing the human decency.