Defining Hope

Alene Duerk: First Woman to Make Admiral

January 2020 •English

Following the tradition of military service in her family, Alene Duerk enlisted as a Navy nurse in 1943. During her eventful 32 year career, she served in WWII on a hospital ship in the Sea of Japan, and trained others in the Korean War. She became the Director of the Navy Nursing Corps during the Vietnam War before finally attaining the rank of Admiral in the U.S. Navy. Despite having no other women as mentors (or peers), Admiral Duerk always looked for challenging opportunities that women had not previously held. Her consistently high level of performance led to her ultimate rise to become the first woman Admiral.

Click to Ransom

October 2022 •English

A small rural hospital in Japan battles an international cybercriminal gang that is holding them ransom with their stolen patient data.

Der lange Weg ans Licht

February 2008 •German

Edeltraut Hertel - a midwife caught between two worlds. She has been working as a midwife in a small village near Chemnitz for almost 20 years, supporting expectant mothers before, during and after the birth of their offspring. However, working as a midwife brings with it social problems such as a decline in birth rates and migration from the provinces. Competition for babies between birthing centers has become fierce, particularly in financial terms. Obstetrics in Tanzania, Africa, Edeltraud's second place of work, is completely different. Here, the midwife not only delivers babies, she also trains successors, carries out educational and development work and struggles with the country's cultural and social problems.

The First Wave

November 2021 •English

When Covid-19 hit New York City in 2020, filmmaker Matthew Heineman gained unique access to one of New York’s hardest-hit hospital systems. The resulting film focuses on the doctors, nurses, and patients on the frontlines during the “first wave” from March to June 2020. Their distinct storylines each serve as a microcosm to understand how the city persevered through the worst pandemic in a century

Sicko

May 2007 •English

A documentary about the corrupt health care system in The United States who's main goal is to make profit even if it means losing people’s lives. "The more people you deny health insurance the more money we make" is the business model for health care providers in America.

Urgences : Soigne et tais-toi

November 2019 •French

Phases of Matter

January 2020 •Turkish

Phases of Matter follows living and inanimate residents of a teaching hospital in Istanbul, moving from the operating room to the morgue, between life and other states, the real and the virtual.

Hospital City

September 2004 •English

As debate in Canada and the world rages over health care, Hospital City offers a moving, human portrait of the people whom the issues touch most closely.

Love Again

December 2020 •Japanese

Enjoy the sexy images of Mizuki Hoshina. This work is the strongest move based on her reunion with a childhood friend plus the nurse setting, and it will grab your heart again!!

The Heart of the Emergency Room

January 2024 •Japanese

A variety of patients are brought in by ambulance 24 hours everyday. In Japan, ambulance as a part of municipal fire departments, do not charge for transportation to hospitals. Under the motto of "emergency care that never refuses," the Ekisaikai Hospital in Nagoya accepts everyone from the elderly with no relatives to those in need. However, the number of ambulances carrying critically ill patients reached a record high due to the pandemic. Patients rejected by other hospitals are pouring into the Ekisaikai Hospital, and the beds are filling up fast... Documentary filmmaker Takuro Adachi observes doctors and patients in various generations and background, and listens to their real voices.

On Call

March 2016 •French

At the consulting service for immigrants at the Avicenne Hospital in suburban Paris, we observe the sorrow and powerlessness of the immigrants who come here.

Waiting Room

March 1975 •

Short Croatian documentary from the former Yugoslavia by Ante Babaja that captures the different faces in a waiting room.

Our Body

August 2023 •French

In a Parisian public hospital, Claire Simon questions what it means to live in women’s bodies, filming their diversity, singularity and their beauty in all stages throughout life. Unique stories of desires, fears and struggles unfold, including the one of the filmmaker herself.

Letter from a Yellow Cherry Blossom

April 2002 •Japanese

Naomi Kawase's documentary about Nishii Kazuo, a photo critic. He is the last chief editor for the Camera Mainichi magazine, rushing through his time with Araki Nobuyoshi and Moriyama Daido as provocative artists in the photograph world.

Madame Hofmann

April 2024 •French

"Welcome to my life", Sylvie Hofmann repeats this sentence almost all day long. Sylvie has been a nurse for 40 years at the North Hospital of Marseille. Her life is running. Between patients, her sick mother, her husband and her daughter, she has always devoted her life to helping others. What if she decided to think a little about herself? To retire? Does she have the right, but above all, does she really want to?

Coma

July 2007 •English

Four young Americans who've each suffered a Traumatic Brain Injury emerge from their comas at a New Jersey medical facility. Their eyes may be open, but now the real challenge for each of the patients, their families, their doctors and their therapists begins. Brain healing isn't predictable, we're told, and certainly is not guaranteed. So with each 'major' step forward that is observed (opening one's eyes, bending a thumb upon command, vocalizing a word, answering a question correctly) comes a sense of jubilant relief and hope from the families of these patients, but as we soon see, the more a patient progresses, the more difficult things can be for all involved. Moments of faith & hope contrast with disappointments & frustrations, moments of confidence with moments of doubt. It's difficult to watch, and unimaginable to have to ever live through.

Correspondance privée sur un lieu public

August 1988 •French

I started from the assumption that the discourse about the hospital could be the objective pretext for communication between two people, the link that allows them to continue writing to each other, the intermediary between two desires.

Emergency Ward

January 1959 •English

This 1959 documentary short is a frank portrait of the daily operations inside the Montreal General Hospital’s emergency ward.

Capturing the Killer Nurse

November 2022 •English

Charlie Cullen was an experienced registered nurse, trusted and beloved by his colleagues at Somerset Medical Center in New Jersey. He was also one of history’s most prolific serial killers, with a body count potentially numbering in the hundreds across multiple medical facilities in the Northeast.

Her Honor, the Nurse

January 1956 •English

This RKO-Pathe Screenliner short looks at the duties of the modern nurse. The story tracks the education of a student nurse as she works toward graduation and shows the earning of her cap during her student days, in retrospect. At the beginning, she wears the Student Nurse uniform dress and apron only, with no cap. She appears later in the movie as a more experienced Senior student with her cap already wearing a stripe. This was frequently done in the three year hospital programs to differentiate the Junior level students from the Seniors, more experienced and closer to Graduation. The capping ceremony illustrated shows the bare headed students receiving their plain white cap, and addressing it as something from her past that she will remember fondly.