Noel Burch’s fascinating and well-made (if at times historically contestable) six-part BBC television series, about early silent cinema in Denmark, England, the Soviet Union, France, Germany, and the U.S., mixes beautiful clips of rare films with various social theories about their significance.
What are Ilona Herfurt and her boyfriend Dietmar Freistrath doing in the old mine? Where does the money come from that her son Jimmy finds under the newspaper? Where have the unique and intricately carved works of art, often passed down for generations, disappeared to from the village in the Ore Mountains? What do the carver Gerlach and his foster daughter llona have to do with it? Questions upon questions that are burning under the detective's nails.
Beate Klarsfeld, a German Protestant housewife, who, with the help of her Jewish law-student husband, Serge, begins an unrelenting campaign after World War II to bring Nazi war criminals to justice.
Milly and Louis, and their recently-widowed mom, Charlene, move to a new neighborhood. Once there, they all deal with a variety of personal problems, but Milly finds a friend in Eric, her autistic next door neighbor.
Ripley, the sole survivor of the Nostromo's deadly encounter with the monstrous Alien, returns to Earth after drifting through space in hypersleep for 57 years.
Maria since childhood was directed by her father to become a nun. As a result of her father's cultivation of a rigid appreciation, Maria always feels awkward, including the delinquency that is common for a girl.
Jessica's promising debut as a young artist is shattered by a sudden and violent death. She escapes into a restless succession of journeys whose encounters along the way bring humour, some comfort, but also danger.
This film deals with the contrasts of the Wilhelminian era in Berlin: the splendor of the monarchy, the economic and intellectual vitality of the up-and-coming imperial capital on the one hand, and the misery of the proletarians in the tenements on the other.
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Have you watched What Do Those Old Films Mean? yet? What did you think about it?
