Panoramas

The White Reindeer

April 2019 •Hungarian

Imagine one of the most remote wildernesses in the world. Granddaughter Masha and Vladimir, the protagonists of this story from Central Siberia try the impossible to keep their nomadic traditions alive.

Gimme Shelter

December 1970 •English

A detailed chronicle of the famous 1969 tour of the United States by the British rock band The Rolling Stones, which culminated with the disastrous and tragic concert held on December 6 at the Altamont Speedway Free Festival, an event of historical significance, as it marked the end of an era: the generation of peace and love suddenly became the generation of disillusionment.

Primary

November 1960 •English

Primary is a documentary film about the primary elections between John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey in 1960. Primary is the first documentary to use light equipment in order to follow their subjects in a more intimate filmmaking style. This unconventional way of filming created a new look for documentary films where the camera’s lens was right in the middle of what ever drama was occurring. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 1998.

Dont Look Back

May 1967 •English

In this wildly entertaining vision of one of the twentieth century’s greatest artists, Bob Dylan is surrounded by teen fans, gets into heated philosophical jousts with journalists, and kicks back with fellow musicians Joan Baez, Donovan, and Alan Price.

Koyaanisqatsi

April 1983 •English

Takes us to locations all around the US and shows us the heavy toll that modern technology is having on humans and the earth. The visual tone poem contains neither dialogue nor a vocalized narration: its tone is set by the juxtaposition of images and the exceptional music by Philip Glass.

D is for Division

April 2018 •Latvian

1940. On the border between Latvia and the USSR, a woman is killed in front of her house as she tried to protect her son from the liberating attack of the Soviets. Almost 80 years later, the archive photo bearing witness to this news item and representing a collateral victim of the European Union’s founding conflict forms the starting point for a journey undertaken by Davis Sīmanis. He navigates from one side to the other of this border, which today represents another separation, one that is geographical but also cultural: between Europe and Russia.

The Cooking Show

February 2021 •English

The cooking show is as old as television itself. But why do we like watching the making of a meal that most of us will never cook, let alone eat? Dirty Furniture’s jam-packed video essay is a rollercoaster ride through the history of the genre, at once a staple of television viewing and a hotpot of shifting perspectives and sociocultural values.

Visions of Europe

May 2004 •English

Twenty-five films from twenty-five European countries by twenty-five European directors.

Seafighters

October 2017 •Galician

Living among the percebeiros of the Coast of Death (Galicia), this documentary shows a unique relationship between man and his surroundings, man and the sea. At the end of Europe, years after the Prestige oil spill disaster, these fishermen face an uncertain future.

Four Shorts on Architecture

October 1975 •English

A visual essay on contemporary Kiwi architecture.

Um Documentário Brasileiro

May 2021 •Portuguese

O malém světě

February 1968 •Czech

Watching the Pain of Others

April 2019 •French

In this deeply personal video diary, a young researcher tries to make sense of her fascination for the film "The Pain of Others" by Penny Lane. A deep dive into the discomforting world of YouTube and online conspiracies, that challenges traditional notions of what documentary cinema is, or should be.

Elemental

June 2015 •English

40,000 years in the making: Kogonada's video essay created for The Connected Series.

Obit

January 2017 •English

How do you put a life into 500 words? Ask the staff obituary writers at the New York Times. OBIT is a first-ever glimpse into the daily rituals, joys and existential angst of the Times obit writers, as they chronicle life after death on the front lines of history.

Debra Paget, For Example

March 2016 •English

A video essay where the author presumes motivations and insights in a fictionalized biography regarding Debra Paget, a contract player for 20th-Century Fox whom they groomed and coached for stardom.

Letters from Wolf Street

October 2025 •Polish

A street in downtown Warsaw transforms into a kaleidoscopic portrait of Polish society. Behind the viewfinder is an Indian immigrant, who seeks to overcome the boundaries between himself and an anxiety-ridden country.

And the Dogs Were Silent

April 1976 •French

For 'Et les chiens se taisaient' Maldoror adapted a piece of theatre by the poet and politician Aimé Césaire (1913–2008), about a rebel who becomes profoundly aware of his otherness when condemned to death. His existential dialogue with his mother reverberates around the African sculptures on display at the Musée de l'Homme, a Parisian museum full of colonial plunder whose director was the Surrealist anthropologist Michel Leiris.

Grey Gardens

February 1976 •English

Edie Bouvier Beale and her mother, Edith, two aging, eccentric relatives of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, are the sole inhabitants of a Long Island estate. The women reveal themselves to be misfits with outsized, engaging personalities. Much of the conversation is centered on their pasts, as mother and daughter now rarely leave home.

Metropia

March 2025 •Spanish