Top Rated Documentary Movies on Pantaflix - Page 191

Girlfriend in a Coma

2012

Girlfriend in a Coma

2012
6.9
Girlfriend in a Coma is a documentary that exposes the dire situation of Italian politics and the process of economic and social decline the country has suffered during the last two decades, treating the decline as a warning of what might happen elsewhere in the West. The decline has occurred amid a collapse of moral values and the victory of “Mala Italia” over “Buona Italia”. It has been lauded as being ground-breaking in its creative combination of animation, interviews and hard facts, and has caused fierce controversy in Italy.
Flight of the Butterflies

2012

Flight of the Butterflies

2012
6.2
It takes two or three generations for the monarch butterfly to reach the Canadian breeding grounds, but it is one "supergeneration" that makes the 2,000 mile return trip back south into central Mexico. The documentary film covers Dr Fred Urquhart's interest in monarch butterflies, with perspectives of Urquhart as a child wondering where the butterflies went, his years of research and study into their life and migration, to his time decades-later as a senior scientist looking back at his investigations and discoveries about the insect's life pattern.
The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea

2012

The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea

2012
7.4
From the Academy-Award nominated creators of the Broadway show STOMP and the award-winning film Wild Ocean, The Last Reef is an uplifting, inspirational large-format and 3D cinema experience capturing one of nature's more vibrant and diverse wonderlands. Exotic coral reefs, vibrant sea walls in the sub-arctic pulsating with anemones and crustaceans: these biodiversity hot spots are as vital to our lives as the rainforests. Shot on location in Palau, Vancouver Island, French Polynesia, Mexico, and The Bahamas using groundbreaking 3D cinematography, The Last Reef takes us on a global journey to explore the connection of our cities on land with the ocean's complex, parallel world of the coral reefs beneath the sea.
North of the Sun

2012

North of the Sun

2012
8
Two friends discover the perfect beach at a remote Norwegian shore just above the Arctic Circle and decide to spend the winter here – surfing. Building a hut from driftwood and living on expired food only, the young men turn sustainable living into their own Robinson-adventure, keeping their calm even in the face of personal danger.
Pan 699

1974

Pan 699

1974
3.8
A little boy celebrates his frog catch.
Mechanical Principles

1930

Mechanical Principles

1930
6.6
Close up we see pistons move up and down or side to side. Pendulums sway, the small parts of machinery move. Gears drive larger wheels. Gears within gears spin. Shafts turn some mechanism that is out of sight. Screws revolve and move other gears; a bit rotates. More subtle mechanisms move other mechanical parts for unknown purposes. Weights rise and fall. The movements, underscored by sound, are rhythmic. Circles, squares, rods, and teeth are in constant and sometimes asymmetrical motion. These human-made mechanical bits seem benign and reassuring.
Mario Banana I

1964

Mario Banana I

1964
3.7
Mario Montez in drag eats a banana.
A Computer Animated Hand

1972

A Computer Animated Hand

1972
6.7
Archive film showing possibly the first example of digital rendering, made by Pixar co-founders Ed Catmull and Fred Parke in 1972, was stumbled upon by the son of Robert B Ingebretsen, who also set up the world-famous U.S. studio. A six minute version shows additional CGI animation of an artificial heart valve, and human heads.
Thigh Line Lyre Triangular

1961

Thigh Line Lyre Triangular

1961
5.2
Only at a crisis do I see both the scene as I've been trained to see it ( that is, with Renaissance perspective, three-dimensional logic–colors as we've been trained to call a color a color, as so forth) and patterns that move straight out from the inside of the mind through the optic nerves... spots before my eyes, so to speak... and it's very intensive, disturbing, but joyful experience. I've seen that every time a child was born... Now none of that was in WINDOW WATER BABY MOVING; and I wanted a childbirth film which expressed all of my seeing at such a time.
Universal Horror

1998

Universal Horror

1998
7.1
A documentary about the era of classic monster movies that were made at Universal Studios during the 1930s and 1940s.
Moscow Clad in Snow

1909

Moscow Clad in Snow

1909
6.4
The film is in four parts. First, the camera pans the Kremlin and Marshal's Bridge. Sleds are parked in rows. Horse-drawn sleighs run up and down a busy street. Next, we visit the mushroom and fish market where common people work and shop. In Petrovsky Park are the well-to-do. Men are in great coats. A file of six or seven women ski past on a narrow lane. Last, there's a general view of Moscow. A slow pan takes us to a view above the riverfront where the film began.
Westinghouse Works

1904

Westinghouse Works

1904
5.5
Billy Bitzer filmed 21 short actualities inside the Pittsburgh Westinghouse Works in April and May of 1904. Audiences of the day would have been treated to footage of factory panoramas, women winding armatures and turbines being assembled. These industrial films were produced for the American Mutoscope & Biograph Company.
The Steel Road

1929

The Steel Road

1929
5.8
Bold and exhilarating documentary account of the building of the Turkestan-Siberian railway, presented as a heroic triumph of Soviet progress over natural adversity.
Case Study: Heroin

1969

Case Study: Heroin

1969
4.4
A man talks about heroin abuse and withdrawal.
Case Study: Amphetamines

1969

Case Study: Amphetamines

1969
4.6
A man talks about his addiction to amphetamines and illustrates his struggle by his sudden inability to fix a radio.
The Spanish Earth

1937

The Spanish Earth

1937
6.5
Joris Ivens’s advocacy documentary for the Republican cause intercuts a besieged Madrid with a nearby village digging an irrigation canal, linking the war to bread, land, and survival. Produced by the writers’ collective Contemporary Historians, edited by Helen van Dongen, scored by Marc Blitzstein, and narrated in its U.S. version by Ernest Hemingway (after an initial Orson Welles track), it blends frontline reportage with persuasion against Franco’s forces and their German–Italian backers.
Echoes from a Sombre Empire

1990

Echoes from a Sombre Empire

1990
7.1
Documentary examining Bokassa's rule in the Central African Republic using the testimony of witnesses and visits to key sites.
Serpentine Dance by Mme. Bob Walter

1897

Serpentine Dance by Mme. Bob Walter

1897
5.3
Mme. Bob Walter performs the serpentine dance.
Bathing in a Stream

1897

Bathing in a Stream

1897
4.4
A group of kids play in a stream.
Palms

1994

Palms

1994
5.7
A portrait of people who live on the margins of life and exist outside normal society.