Bolívar, Faro de América

When We Were Kings

October 1996 •English

It's 1974. Muhammad Ali is 32 and thought by many to be past his prime. George Foreman is ten years younger and the heavyweight champion of the world. Promoter Don King wants to make a name for himself and offers both fighters five million dollars apiece to fight one another, and when they accept, King has only to come up with the money. He finds a willing backer in Mobutu Sese Suko, the dictator of Zaire, and the "Rumble in the Jungle" is set, including a musical festival featuring some of America's top black performers, like James Brown and B.B. King.

Keiko Kishi, Eternally Rebellious

October 2023 •French

Born in 1932, Keiko Kishi has been one of the first Japanese actresses known worldwide. Her decision to move to France and to marry director Yves Ciampi in 1957 – after he filmed her in Typhoon Over Nagasaki starring Jean Marais and Danielle Darrieux – caused a huge scandal in Japan. Despite this transgression, Keiko Kishi continued acting in her home country with Kon Ichikawa, Yasujiro Ozu, Masaki Kobayashi… building unique bridges between Japanese and European cultures. Free and rebellious, she emancipated herself from the many obstacles she encountered in the film industry, and created her own production company in her early twenties. Let’s look back at the story of a pioneer, an inspiration for many generations.

Basquiat

August 1996 •English

The brief life of Jean Michel Basquiat, a world renowned New York street artist struggling with fame, drugs and his identity.

Jane Birkin: Simply an Icon

November 2019 •French

A kaleidoscopic portrait of the English actress and singer Jane Birkin, heroine of pop culture.

Napoleon

January 1927 •French

A biopic of Napoleon Bonaparte, tracing the Corsican's career from his schooldays (where a snowball fight is staged like a military campaign) to his flight from Corsica, through the French Revolution (where a real storm is intercut with a political storm) and the Terror, culminating in his triumphant invasion of Italy in 1797.

Black River

February 1992 •Spanish

Río Negro is the struggle of two men, Osuna and Funes, hungry for power and wealth in a small town in Venezuela, during the dictatorship of Juan Vicente Gómez

Simone Veil, une loi au nom des femmes

February 2010 •French

The debate in France about the abortion laws in 1974.

Periyar

May 2007 •Tamil

Periyar joins the Indian struggle for independence after being disgusted by the injustices of the Hindu caste system. Later, he begins fighting for the rights of Tamilians.

Marcello Mastroianni, the Ideal Italian

May 2015 •French

A portrait of the mythical Italian actor Marcello Mastroianni (1924-96), a unique performer who was one of the kings of European cinema.

Hitler: A Career

July 1977 •German

A keen chronicle of the unlikely rise to power of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) and a dissection of the Third Reich (1933-1945), but also an analysis of mass psychology and how the desperate crowd can be deceived and shepherded to the slaughterhouse.

Isabelle Eberhardt

November 1991 •French

The true story of explorer, journalist and writer Isabelle Eberhardt, originally from Switzerland. She moved to Annaba in Algeria in 1897 with her mother, who preferred to live in the Algerian neighborhoods rather than the European neighborhoods that she hated, and converted to Islam. Her lifestyle shocked the French colonialists: she dressed like a man, frequented cafes and smoke shops. Fascinated by the desert, she traveled the Sahara under the identity of Si Mahmoud, she published articles and books on the world she discovered in southern Algeria, strongly criticizing the colonial authorities. Arriving in El Oued, the soldiers prevent him from continuing his journey. She disobeys and overhears officers shooting Arab prisoners. Arrested, she was accused of espionage and was expelled from Algeria. She married Slimane, a Muslim non-commissioned officer in 1901. Having become French through this marriage, she could now reside in Algeria.

Hitler and the Apostles of Evil

January 2015 •French

This portrait that goes against the grain depicts the Führer as a lazy, isolated leader, cut off from reality, incapable of governing without his "apostles". They are Hitler's essential ministers, advisers, rivals, courtiers. They hate each other, and the Führer puts them in competition, often to get the worst out of them. The portraits of Hermann Goering, Heinrich Himmler, Joseph Goebbels, Albert Speer but also Rudolf Hoess, the commandant of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, and Doctor Joseph Mengele trace the rivalries, hatreds and predations that punctuate the entire frightening epic of Nazism. This documentary is composed of a selection of archive images and testimonies from descendants and specialists of this period.

Schindler

October 1983 •English

The true story of German-Czech businessman Oskar Schindler (1908-74) as told by some of the Jews — more than a thousand people — whose lives he saved from extermination during World War II.

Abbé Pierre - A Century of Devotion

November 2023 •French

The life of Henri Grouès, known as Abbé Pierre, from his time in the Resistance in WWII to his fights against poverty and for the homeless.

In Love with Adolf Hitler

June 2007 •French

This film captures the affair, full of love, lust, and despair, between Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun, from 1932 until their double suicide in 1945.

Mélancolie ouvrière

February 2018 •French

Long live the strike! Lucie Baud, one of the pioneers of the women's movement, went with creativity, fighting spirit and the power of singing against the weapons of male-dominated capitalist society in nineteenth-century France. The film, based on true events, describes the ambitious fight of a silk moth. She stood up for the rights of the female working class to end maltreatment and oppression once and for all. For the revolution in women's rights, she even put her family back and fought to the end for their beliefs.

Simone Veil - Les combats d'une effrontée

October 2023 •French

The Ball Method

May 2020 •English

Alice Ball, a 23 year-old African American Chemist living in 1915 Hawaii fights against racial and gender barriers to find an effective treatment for leprosy before Kalani, a 10-year-old patient is exiled into the leper colony of Molokai.

Happy Birthday, Marsha!

March 2018 •English

It's a hot summer day in June, 1969. Marsha throws herself a birthday party and dreams of performing at a club in town, but no one shows up. Sylvia, Marsha’s best friend, distraught from an unsuccessful introduction between her lover and her family, gets so stoned she forgets about the party. Marsha, Sylvia, and friends eventually meet at the Stonewall Inn to celebrate Marsha's birth. When the police arrive to raid the bar, Marsha and Sylvia are among the first to fight back.

Maria Montessori

November 2023 •French

Set in 1900, Lili d’Alengy, a Parisian cocotte at the height of her fame, flees Paris to hide her “idiot” daughter. There she meets Maria Montessori, who is pioneering a teaching method that may help the child.