Around China with a Movie Camera

Jul 18, 2016

1h 8m

★ 4.2

Take a trip back to China in the first half of the twentieth Century with this presentation of extraordinary, rare and beautiful travelogues, newsreels and home movies.

Overview

A new film compiled from the BFI National Archive's unparalleled holdings of early films of China, features films from 1900-48 filmed across China. The cinematic journey of Around China with a Movie Camera contains many films which may never have been seen in China, or at the very least not for over 70 years. These travelogues, newsreels and home movies were made by a diverse group of British and French filmmakers, some professionals, but mainly enthusiastic amateurs, including intrepid tourists, colonial-era expatriates and Christian missionaries.

Genres

Documentary

Production Companies

BFI

Around China with a Movie Camera Trailers

No Trailers found.

Cast

No Cast found.

October 1st, 1957. Dusk descends on Tiananmen Square, Peking. Fireworks crackle light across the night sky, above a city alive with National Day festivities and celebrations. Two intrepid New Zealand film-makers - Rudall and Ramai Te Miha Hayward - are there, documenting the life and times of communist China. The distinction of being the first English speaking foreigners to film unfettered in communist China was significant. The invitation to visit China was facilitated through the New Zealand China Friendship Society. They filmed in Canton, Shanghai, Peking (Beijing) and Wuhan. It was a small window of opportunity for Westerners to gaze on a country that was largely a mystery to the outside world since 1949. The unfortunate irony was that two of the documentaries; “Wonders of China”, and “Inside Red China”, were considered to be communist propaganda, and were not distributed outside of New Zealand.

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0.0

Maos China, Protokolle einer Revolution

Jan 1, 1974

Short film directed by Walter Knoop

7.5

Berlin: Symphony of a Great City

Sep 23, 1927

A day in the city of Berlin, which experienced an industrial boom in the 1920s, and still provides an insight into the living and working conditions at that time. Germany had just recovered a little from the worst consequences of the First World War, the great economic crisis was still a few years away and Hitler was not yet an issue at the time.

7.1

Nanook of the North

Jun 11, 1922

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.

0.0

La remise des décorations

Apr 15, 1903

No overview available.

5.3

Famous T & A

Jan 1, 1982

A collection of nude and/or topless scenes from various films featuring actresses who were either famous at the time or who became famous later on.

7.4

I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story

May 6, 2015

A documentary about Caroll Spinney who has been Sesame Street's Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch since 1969. At 78-years-old, he has no intention of stopping.

10.0

Trip to Asia: The Quest for Harmony

Feb 28, 2008

Journey with the musicians of the Berlin Philharmonic and their conductor Sir Simon Rattle on a breakneck concert tour of six metropolises across Asia: Beijing, Seoul, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taipei and Tokyo. Their artistic triumph onstage belies a dynamic and dramatic life backstage. The orchestra is a closed society that observes its own laws and traditions, and in the words of one of its musicians is, “an island, a democratic microcosm – almost without precedent in the music world - whose social structure and cohesion is not only founded on a common love for music but also informed by competition, compulsion and the pressure to perform to a high pitch of excellence... .” Never before has the Berlin Philharmonic allowed such intimate and exclusive access into its private world.

4.9

Visions of Europe

May 1, 2004

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

6.2

Waiting for the Sun

Mar 19, 2017

In China more people are on death row than the rest of the world combined. The children of the convicts are often left alone, stigmatized and living in the streets. Grandma Zhang, as the kids call her, is a former prison guard who has founded an orphanage in Nanzhao.

3.8

Tossing a Nigger in a Blanket

Apr 6, 1898

A method soldier boys have for amusing themselves in their leisure moments. New comrades are frequently initiated by the old-fashioned sport of tossing in a blanket. The newly arrived recruit, who is the victim of their sport, enjoys himself, perhaps, less than the other participants.

5.5

Days of Thrills and Laughter

Mar 21, 1961

An appreciative, uncritical look at silent film comedies and thrillers from early in the century through the 1920s.

6.0

Hollywood Singing and Dancing: A Musical History - The 1940s: Stars, Stripes and Singing

Dec 31, 2009

This is a two-hour in-depth exploration into the Hollywood musicals of the 1940s.

6.5

42nd Street Forever, Volume 5: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema

Oct 27, 2009

WELCOME TO THE ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE CINEMA, the most awesome post-modern hot spot for exploitation movie revival, deep in the heart of Texas! Home to world-famous events such as The Quentin Tarantino Film Fest, Fantastic Fest and Butt-Numb-A-Thon, the Alamo is one of the last places on earth where you can still see grindhouse classics such as THE DEVIL WITHIN HER and MAD MONKEY KUNG FU. Now, the Alamo has opened their vaults for a peek at some of the most outrageous cinematic gems from several golden ages of sleaze cinema. Digitally re-mastered in high-definition from the actual reels that show every week at the Alamo, this exciting edition of the 42ND STREET FOREVER series is the most bizarre, the most terrifying and the most hilarious one yet!

6.0

Traffic Crossing Leeds Bridge

Oct 15, 1888

A film by Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince, shot in late October 1888, showing pedestrians and carriages crossing Leeds Bridge.

10.0

Crocodile in the Yangtze

Apr 12, 2012

Crocodile in the Yangtze follows China's first Internet entrepreneur and former English teacher, Jack Ma, as he battles US giant eBay on the way to building China's first global Internet company, Alibaba Group. An independent memoir written, directed and produced by an American who worked in Ma's company for eight years, Crocodile in the Yangtze captures the emotional ups and downs of life in a Chinese Internet startup at a time when the Internet brought China face-to-face with the West. Crocodile in the Yangtze draws on 200 hours of archival footage filmed by over 35 sources between 1995 and 2009. The film presents a strikingly candid portrait of Ma and his company, told from the point of view of an “American fly on a Chinese wall” who witnessed the successes and the mistakes Alibaba encountered as it grew from a small apartment into a global company employing 16,000 staff.

8.0

A Day on the Grand Canal with the Emperor of China or: Surface Is Illusion But So Is Depth

Mar 18, 1988

Director Philip Haas and artist David Hockney invite you to join them on a magical journey through China via a marvelous 72-foot long 17th-century Chinese scroll entitled The Kangxi Emperor's Southern Inspection Tour (1691-1698), scroll seven . As Hockney unrolls the beautiful and minutely detailed work of art, he traces the Emperor Kangxi’s second tour of his southern empire in 1689.

0.0

Redefining China's Family: Women

Jul 19, 2008

10 May 2007 - China's staggering economic growth has overshadowed a more subtle shift in Chinese society. In domestic life, many women are now ignore the advice of their mothers and grandmothers, turning instead to counselling hotlines and, increasingly, divorce.

10.0

Playboy Wet and Wild: The Complete Collection

Aug 15, 2004

For the first time in Playboy's history, the entire Wet & Wild series is available in one unbelievable soaking set! From irresistible icons Pamela Anderson and Jenny McCarthy to Playmate favorites Shae Marks, Stacey Sanches, Julie Lynn Cialini, Summer Altice, Shannon Stewart and Nicole Lenz, these are the hottest bods yet -- naughtier than ever on a non-stop mission to get clean! From sweltering sandy beaches to sudsy car washes you'll soak in every satisfying moment from more than nine hours of the wettest, sexiest scenarios. Whether you're a long-time fan or a relative newcomer to this ultra-popular 10-part collection, this sizzling series will leave you drenched with desire and begging for more.

Around China with a Movie Camera

Overview

Genres

Production Companies

Around China with a Movie Camera Trailers

Cast

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