Top Rated History Movies on Kanopy - Page 21

Reel Injun

2010

Reel Injun

2010
7
The evolution of the depiction of the various Native American peoples in cinema, from the silent era to the present day: how their image on the screen has changed the way to understand their history and culture.
Leap

2020

Leap

2020
6.5
After 12 years, the Chinese women's volleyball team again reached the Olympic final. The ups and downs of the Chinese women's volleyball team for more than three decades have slowly spread away.
Paradise in Service

2014

Paradise in Service

2014
6.7
Set in the island Kinmen, often seen as the most dangerous military base because it’s geographically close to China, "Paradise in Service" follows the adventure of a boy who serves his military service in Unit 831 from 1969 to 1972, in preparation for a war that could erupt anytime. Through an unlucky lottery draw result, Pao, a twenty-something young man from Southern Taiwan has to serve the military in the remote and perilous Kinmen. Moreover, he is assigned to the Sea Dragon (ARB), a unit noted for the toughest physical training. It never occurs to Pao, however, that the greatest challenge in his military service lies not in the Sea Dragon but in Unit 831, a special task he is later appointed to… In this peculiar assignment, Pao vows to keep his virginity against all odds.
Fire Over England

1937

Fire Over England

1937
6.2
The film is a historical drama set during the reign of Elizabeth I (Flora Robson), focusing on the English defeat of the Spanish Armada, whence the title. In 1588, relations between Spain and England are at the breaking point. With the support of Queen Elizabeth I, British sea raiders such as Sir Francis Drake regularly capture Spanish merchantmen bringing gold from the New World.
Enfant Terrible

2020

Enfant Terrible

2020
4.3
When 22-year-old Rainer Werner Fassbinder storms the stage of a small, progressive theatre in Munich 1967, and seizes the production without further ado, nobody suspects this brazen young rebel to become one of the most important post-war German filmmakers. Despite early setbacks, many of his films breakout at the most renowned films festivals and polarise audience, critics and filmmakers alike. His radical views and self-exploitation, as well as his longing for love, have made him one of the most fascinating film directors of this time.
The Russian Woodpecker

2015

The Russian Woodpecker

2015
6.3
As his country is gripped by revolution and war, a Ukrainian victim of the Chornobyl nuclear disaster discovers a dark secret and must decide whether to risk his life and play his part in the revolution by revealing it.
The Man in the Iron Mask

1939

The Man in the Iron Mask

1939
7.1
Years have passed since the Three Musketeers, Aramis, Athos and Porthos, have fought together with their friend, D'Artagnan. But with the tyrannical King Louis using his power to wreak havoc in the kingdom while his twin brother, Philippe, remains imprisoned, the Musketeers reunite to abduct Louis and replace him with Philippe.
The Soviet Story

2008

The Soviet Story

2008
7.3
“The Soviet Story” is a story of an Allied power, which helped the Nazis to fight Jews and which slaughtered its own people on an industrial scale. Assisted by the West, this power triumphed on May 9th, 1945. Its crimes were made taboo, and the complete story of Europe’s most murderous regime has never been told. Until now...
Mapplethorpe

2019

Mapplethorpe

2019
6.3
A look at the life of photographer Robert Mapplethorpe from his rise to fame in the 1970s to his untimely death in 1989.
Mad to Be Normal

2017

Mad to Be Normal

2017
5.9
The story of Scottish psychiatrist RD Laing and his unique community at Kingsley Hall, East London in the 1960s.
How to Change the World

2014

How to Change the World

2014
7.1
In 1971, a group of friends sail into a nuclear test zone, and their protest captures the world's imagination. Using never before seen archive that brings their extraordinary world to life, How To Change The World is the story of the pioneers who founded Greenpeace and defined the modern green movement.
Paragraph 175

2000

Paragraph 175

2000
6.5
During the Nazi regime, there was widespread persecution of homosexual men, which started in 1871 with the Paragraph 175 of the German Penal Code. Thousands were murdered in concentration camps. This powerful and disturbing documentary, narrated by Rupert Everett, presents for the first time the largely untold testimonies of some of those who survived.
Paulo Coelho's Best Story

2014

Paulo Coelho's Best Story

2014
6.9
Paulo Coelho is the world’s most translated living author, his books having sold over 165 million copies. But he was not always the inspirational global phenomenon he is today. Like the heroes in his spiritual classics THE ALCHEMIST and THE PILGRIMAGE, he long-searched for his calling, flirting with death, escaping madness, falling in love, and making rock ’n’ roll history in Brazil, all-the-while striving for success as a writer. A wild ride through a lifetime of stranger-than-fiction adventures, PAULO COELHO’S BEST STORY is a profoundly moving film that goes straight to the heart of the most beloved literary guru of our time, revealing the most incredible wonder of all: the man behind the masterpieces.
Lumumba

2000

Lumumba

2000
6.8
The true story of the rise to power and brutal assassination of the formerly vilified and later redeemed leader of the independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba. Using newly discovered historical evidence, Haitian-born and later Congo-raised writer and director Raoul Peck renders an emotional and tautly woven account of the mail clerk and beer salesman with a flair for oratory and an uncompromising belief in the capacity of his homeland to build a prosperous nation independent of its former Belgian overlords. Lumumba emerges here as the heroic sacrificial lamb dubiously portrayed by the international media and led to slaughter by commercial and political interests in Belgium, the United States, the international community, and Lumumba's own administration; a true story of political intrigue and murder where political entities, captains of commerce, and the military dovetail in their quest for economic and political hegemony.
Not the Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy)

2010

Not the Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy)

2010
6.9
Not The Messiah (He's a Very Naughty Boy) is a comic oratorio based on Monty Python's Life of Brian, which retells the tragic tale of Mandy, impregnated by a Roman soldier, giving birth to Brian, a reluctant revolutionary of the People's Front of Judea who falls in love with Judith, gets mistaken for a Messiah and is arrested by the Romans and sentenced to be crucified. It ranges in reference from Handel, through a naughty Mozart duet, to the Festival of Nine Carols, Bob Dylan, and the classic finale "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life".
Set Fire to the Stars

2014

Set Fire to the Stars

2014
5.6
An aspiring poet in 1950s New York has his ordered world shaken when he embarks on a week-long retreat to save his hell raising hero, Dylan Thomas.
A Film Unfinished

2010

A Film Unfinished

2010
6.4
Yael Hersonski's powerful documentary achieves a remarkable feat through its penetrating look at another film-the now-infamous Nazi-produced film about the Warsaw Ghetto. Discovered after the war, the unfinished work, with no soundtrack, quickly became a resource for historians seeking an authentic record, despite its elaborate propagandistic construction. The later discovery of a long-missing reel complicated earlier readings, showing the manipulations of camera crews in these "everyday" scenes. Well-heeled Jews attending elegant dinners and theatricals (while callously stepping over the dead bodies of compatriots) now appeared as unwilling, but complicit, actors, alternately fearful and in denial of their looming fate.
Screwball

2019

Screwball

2019
6.2
Investigates the MLB's infamous doping scandal involving a nefarious clinician and his most famous client: the New York Yankees' Alex Rodriguez.
Eternal Winter

2018

Eternal Winter

2018
6.8
The true story of an unlikely romance in a Soviet labor camp.
Hitler's Hollywood

2017

Hitler's Hollywood

2017
6.4
Film journalist and critic Rüdiger Suchsland examines German cinema from 1933, when the Nazis came into power, until 1945, when the Third Reich collapsed. (A sequel to From Caligari to Hitler, 2015.)