Dschungel Berlin 1986

Urwelt im Urwald

January 1925 •German

German documentary about the Brazilian jungle

Curse of the Mayan Temple

January 1977 •English

A documentary exploring the ruins of a Mayan temple in Mexico and a "cursed" medallion that was found there.

The White Diamond

November 2004 •English

This 2004 documentary by Werner Herzog diaries the struggle of a passionate English inventor to design and test a unique airship during its maiden flight above the jungle canopy.

Bancoco

May 2023 •English

A New Yorker journeys to the jungle in the Darien Gap of Panama to reconnect with an indigenous tribe he met and photographed 20 years ago. Their reunion highlights the profound power of photos and the human connection that transcends cultural barriers.

Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness

April 1927 •English

Elephants disrupt the lives of a family deep in the jungles of Northern Siam, and an entire village.

Tears in the Amazon

March 2010 •Korean

A documentary about environment destruction in the Amazon and the tribes living there. Produced for the 48th anniversary of MBC, Korea. A brilliant records of the itinerary for 250 days through the Amazon.

The Inflated Jungle

May 2015 •Spanish

A series of suicides among youths who had to travel far from home to go to school, shocked their indigenous community in the Colombian Amazon. They are different cultures in the frantic friction of our time, it is a generation of young people born from the meeting of both cultures who are hanging before the mirages of a foreign world.

The Amazon Head Hunters

November 1932 •French

The Marquis de Wavrin, a Belgian explorer, spends four years in the Amazon jungle in Ecuador looking for a lost friend who may have fallen victim to headhunters.

Dragan Wende - West Berlin

November 2014 •German

Dragan Wende has lived in Berlin since the '70s and has seen the city change through the years. His nephew comes to live with him as Dragan remembers the better days he lived as a Yugoslavian immigrant in a divided city.

Baldiga: Unlocked Heart

November 2024 •German

Using diary excerpts, photographs and memories from companions, the film paints the portrait of the artist Jürgen Baldiga who sensitively and authentically captured the West Berlin queer scene of the 1980s and early 1990s with his camera.

Island of the Hungry Ghosts

January 2019 •English

Christmas Island, Australia is home to one of the largest land migrations on earth—that of forty million crabs journeying from jungle to sea. But the jungle holds another secret: a high-security facility that indefinitely detains individuals seeking asylum.

B-Movie: Lust & Sound in West-Berlin 1979-1989

February 2015 •English

The wild West Berlin of the 1980s became the creative melting pot of pop subcultures: music, art and chaos. Before the Iron Curtain fell, anything and everything seemed possible.

Bring 'Em Back Alive

June 1932 •English

American animal trapper Frank Buck travels with Ali, his "number one boy," on an expedition into the Malayan jungle. From their jungle headquarters just north of Singapore, Frank, Ali and a team of native helpers roam the area from Northern Johore to Perak in search of interesting wild animals, reptiles and birds. Hoping to find a tiger, Buck captures a monitor lizard and a black leopard, while another black leopard narrowly escapes an encounter with a giant python and then battles a bigger and stronger tiger. After trapping a spotted leopard, Frank adopts a baby honey bear and a baby elephant. The team catches an orangutan, but the tiger eludes their camouflaged pit. Meanwhile, Frank visits the "bathing festival" of a local tribe and watches as tribesmen kill an intruding spotted leopard with blow darts. The tiger then meets an enormous regal python, who has just crushed a crocodile, and fights to a draw with it.

The Devil's Island: Journey Into Jungle Alcatraz

August 2001 •English

Imagine the prison of Alcatraz, only 10 times worse, built on tropical, hellish and deadly islands, lost to the rest of the world. Three tiny castaway islands rise away from the coast of French Guyana, in South America: The Devil's Islands. Now buried under an impenetrable jungle, lay the lost remains of what had been for a hundred years the most storied convict prison in history. There, while most of the prisoners faded into oblivion, a few became legends. Some because they were innocent, as in the scandalous Dreyfus Affair, some because they somehow escaped the islands of nightmare, as did the "butterfly", Henry Charrière, immortalized by Steve McQueen in Papillon. Now 50 years after the prison doors slammed shut for the last time, we explore what's left of the Devil's Islands' unbelievably dark and oppressive realm.

Jungle Cavalcade

July 1941 •English

Compilation of footage from three Frank Buck films about his adventures capturing animals for the world's zoos: "Bring 'Em Back Alive" (1933); "Wild Cargo" (1934); and "Fang And Claw" (1935).

Wings of Hope

October 1999 •German

Werner Herzog returns to the South American jungle with Juliane Koepcke, the German woman who was the sole survivor of a plane crash there in 1971. They find the remains of the plane and recreate her journey out of the jungle.

Cave Crocs of Gabon

January 2018 •English

A caving expedition recently discovered a community of dwarf crocodiles living in the Abanda Caves, Gabon. The crocs are living in pitch darkness, hunt bats and some have bright-orange skin. Part of the original team returns to find out more about this bizarre phenomenon. It's mission impossible to access the crocs world and there's no way of knowing what they might find.

Contrasts of Peru

April 2017 •Spanish

Peru is a country of many contrasts. From the cold waters of the Coast over the 6000 m high Andes to the unique biodiversity of the Amazon Jungle. Peru isn't only Machu Picchu. It's much more.

Come With Me to the Cinema – The Gregors

September 2022 •German

From the 1950s onwards, Erika and Ulrich Gregor brought countless film historical milestones to Berlin and shaped cinema discourse in post-war Germany. A look at the life and work of the couple without whom Arsenal and the Forum wouldn’t exist.

Das Geheimnis der Affen - Kulturforschung bei Schimpansen

February 2014 •German