1920s Documentary Movies

The first behind-the-scenes documentary in the film industry, from the making of a camera (Debrie) to studio shooting and directing, including animation techniques. Pierre Chenal meets André Rigal who executes, in his workshop, a series of freehand drawings. These sketches are then ground in a coffee grinder, from which a cartoon on film emerges. In Champigny, Alain Saint-Ogan and his host are working on Zig et Puce and developing Alfred the penguin's first steps. In Fontenay-sous-Bois, Ladislas Starewitch presents his future stars. Pierre Chenal described his film as follows: “I had designed to shoot a documentary in which I would show how a film is made in order, at the same time, to learn it myself. "

The building of Sevzapkino. Columns of demonstrators are moving along Bolshaya Dmitrovka, Dzerzhinsky square, Pushkinskaya (Strastnaya) square, Kamenny Most (The Big Stone Bridge) and Red Square. Decorated cars and trucks. This is a Military parade on Red Square. L.D. Trotsky, N.I. Muralov, S.S. Kamenev are among the commanders. The demonstrators are carrying the models of a boat, plane and globe. The theatrical march. The members of the government and guests including K. Tsetkin are watching from the tribunes. There are lots of planes on the airdrome and square. M.M. Litvinov, N.I. Rikov and others stand near the plane. The plane builds jp speed, soars in the air, leads for landing and lands. Hordes of people gathered at the aerodrome. Camera operator is shooting. The church on the corner of Ulitsa Myasnitskaya (Kirovskaya), the building of GUM (State Department Store) and Khamovnichesky (Frunzensky) Council. Illuminated building.

An ironic look at what it is like to be beautiful for a woman (and handsome for a few men) in the Paris of the late twenties.

A cameraman wanders around with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling inventiveness.

A trip through Norway, visiting the biggest cities, the fjords and mountains. Visiting farming communities as well as factories on the way, with great athletes, like Sonia Henie and meeting all from ordinary people to the King.

Impressions of Bandung, Dutch East Indies (modern-day Indonesia), with shots of the pasar (market), the Departments of War and Government Corporations, churches, parks, the residential office, a hospital, staff and service houses of the PTT, the Concordia society, the Chinese neighbourhood, the library and the observatory in Lembang.

A visual composition of the world.

Karel Plicka was also cinematographer of this short movie. Editor in charge was Alexander Hackenschmied. There is an extraordinary emotional charge, every shot is working on its own, such as photographs, paintings and poetic complement intertitles in this short. From the perspective of nature and the perspective is shifting to the people and their habits, work and clothes. Peculiar documentary shots underscore Ruthenians (men, women and children) who are interested in looking into the camera and the curious "eye" showing off their habits.

A Czechoslovakian avant-garde film. A visual symphony of Prague by night.

Grave robbing, torture, possessed nuns, and a satanic Sabbath: Benjamin Christensen's legendary film uses a series of dramatic vignettes to explore the scientific hypothesis that the witches of the Middle Ages suffered the same hysteria as turn-of-the-century psychiatric patients. But the film itself is far from serious-- instead it's a witches' brew of the scary, gross, and darkly humorous.

Documenting the trip of the airship "Norge" across the Pole ocean, called Roald Amundsen, Ellsworth and Nobiles flying expedition 1926.

Bold and exhilarating documentary account of the building of the Turkestan-Siberian railway, presented as a heroic triumph of Soviet progress over natural adversity.

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.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Connecting city and country, south and north, summer and winter, peasant women and worker women / Emancipation of women in the USSR

The documentary Their Kingdom, co-directed in 1928 by Nutsa Gogoberidze and Mikhail Kalatozishvili (Kalatozov) for Soviet Georgia’s Cinema Trust, was considered lost until 2008, when there appeared a possibility that this important film – Georgia’s first documentary feature and Kalatozov’s directorial debut – had not disappeared irretrievably.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: The opening of an electric generating station / Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries.

This documentary promoting the joys of life in a Soviet village centers on the activities of the Young Pioneers. These children are constantly busy, pasting propaganda posters on walls, distributing hand bills, exhorting all to "buy from the cooperative" as opposed to the Public Sector, promoting temperance, and helping poor widows. Experimental portions of the film, projected in reverse, feature the un-slaughtering of a bull and the un-baking of bread.

Inflation (1928) is an experimental silent film at eight minutes which is sometimes categorized as a documentary. By now Richter is well beyond playing with light & shadow. Inflation explores the subject of money through photographs & with with stop motion animation techniques, adding faces of people impoverished & enriched by the unpredictability of finance. It functions almost as a political cartoon in motion, building to a chaotic & catastrophic climax.

Documentary focusing on a cesarean section in a hospital in São Paulo.

Come take an avant-garde walk in the Montparnasse of the late 1920's. This district of Paris, filmed in a most unusual way, shows how dedicated it is to art. Visit its art galleries and exhibitions, take a glimpse of famous painter Fujita, of Luis Buñuel eyeing the legs of beautiful Parisian passing the terrace of the café where he sits, of Italian futurists Marinetti, Prampolini and Russolo.

The Dangers of the Fly is an educational film made by Ernesto Gunche and Eduardo Martínez de la Pera, also responsible for Gaucho Nobility (1915), the biggest blockbuster of Argentinean silent cinema. De la Pera was a talented photographer, always willing to try new gadgets and techniques. This film experiments with microphotography in the style of Jean Comandon's films for Pathé and it is part of a series which included a film about mosquitoes and paludism and another one about cancer, which are considered lost. Flies were a popular subject of silent films and there are more than a dozen titles featuring them in the teens and early twenties.

Inguti, an old African chief, recalls his life as a young hunter. He sets out to find food for the forthcoming feast. On reaching the shore of Fire Mountain lake he finds dead fish which he believes to be an ill omen. On his return, he warns the witch doctor that the land is cursed, but his warning is ignored and he is pronounced mad. While the tribe continue with the feast, Inguti leaves with his wife and small son.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries / Demonstrators carrying banners.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries / Motor race Moscow – Sevastopol' / Barges loaded with grain are sent to the starving in the provinces / The Caucasus and its resorts.

The epic story of the Russian Civil War (1918-21): the White Terror, the counterrevolutionary uprisings, the guerrilla war, the Kolchak front, the Wrangel front and the Kronstadt rebellion. Chaos and violence, devastation and death.

A total of 13 framed vignettes – 14 if we count the two shots of rainy streets edited together – comprise Tavlor från London, an enchanting picture gallery of London scenes in 1922. In that year the British Empire was at its territorial height, covering a quarter of the globe and thus making London truly the world’s capital. It’s something of a surprise to learn that the film was made by the great Swedish cinematographer Julius Jaenzon, shortly after he shot Victor Sjöström’s masterpiece Vem Dömer?

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Streetcar collision / Arms manufacturing plant resumes operation / Assembling an automobile / Bicycle and motorcycle races / A parade of Red Army armored units and an attack exercise.

A brief sound test made during production of Blackmail (1929), featuring Alfred Hitchcock playfully teasing lead actress Anny Ondra as she struggles to respond on camera. Photographed by Jack E. Cox, the clip was shot to test the new sound recording system for what would become Hitchcock’s first talkie.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Peasant People's Commissar for Agricultural Affairs, Vasilij Jakovenko / Health resort Soči / Sanatorium for children / Harness racing - The first Red Derby.

Documentary following Roald Amundsen's expedition from Seattle to Nome in Alaska and further to East Cape and up to the iced poles in C.S. Homes.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Against war / Against Gods / Education / Agitation / Sports and gymnastics / Danger of war.

This documentary depicts the creation of collective farms for Jews in Crimea. It shows them building their houses, digging a well, and farming the land.

Dziga Vertov documentary on flying.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: First anniversary of Lenin's death / Smycka of the city and the village: group of peasants visit Moscow / Lenin's effect on peasants and oppressed nations

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Starving children / Requisitioning of valuables possessed by the Russian Orthodox Church / Fundraising flights in support of the hungry / Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: Up the Eiffel Tower in Paris / Moscow / Auto race Petrograd – Moscow / Aspects of everyday Soviet life / Peasant from Jaroslavl' visiting Moscow / Ceremonial introduction of a newborn into a workers' collective

A propaganda film about the beautiful country Norway, meant for tourists abroad.

Dziga Vertov-directed Soviet newsreel covering: A bet is placed on the outcome of the Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries / The verdict / People in streetcars and on the street / A crashed aircraft / Reconstruction of streetcar line 13 / Peacetime use of tanks – airport construction work.

Commissioned by the Moscow Soviet as a documentary and information film for the citizens of Moscow prior to municipal elections, film is a tableau of Soviet life and achievements in the period of reconstruction following the Civil War of 1917-1921.

First National gala celebrity banquet with stars.