Documentaries worth watching. Post 'em here

[harrybarracuda]

Years ago, I was about to switch off the television when the next programme started; a documentary study of occupied France during the Second World War, shot in black and white. Four and a half hours later, it finished, leaving me astonished, in awe and convinced that the film I had just seen, Marcel Ophüls' Le Chagrin et la Pitié (The Sorrow and the Pity), was a masterpiece. Having re-watched it half a dozen times since, I would argue that it is the greatest documentary ever made.

Ophuls was commissioned to make the film in 1967, for broadcast on TV around the 25th anniversary of the Liberation, in 1969. When, after two years of filming, he showed the material to network executives, they were horrified and refused to screen it.

France had been difficult to unite after the Germans were thrown out, because of the extent of collaboration; scores were settled in an often unjust and primitive fashion; the Fifties had been a time of political turbulence, calmed only by the establishment of a new republic under the authoritarian rule of Charles de Gaulle.

But his France was unified around a series of myths, namely: that the French had worked to liberate themselves; that collaboration had been kept to a minimum; that there had been scant participation in the genocide of the Jews; and that the Nazis’ puppet regime based in Vichy was little more than a bad dream. In exploding those myths, Le Chagrin et la Pitié caused outrage.

Shown in cinemas in Germany, Britain and America in the early Seventies, the film was nominated for an Oscar in 1972: French critics who saw it were dumbfounded. When it was eventually broadcast on French television in 1981, it still provoked anger.

Ophuls’s methods were simple. He focused on Clermont-Ferrand, near Vichy and in the zone administered by Pétain and his sidekick Laval, interviewing mainly local people. There are genuine résistants who describe the wicked acts of their occupiers; but there are too many others who did little more than turn the proverbial blind eye.

In perhaps the film’s most shocking scene, two teachers, 25 or 26 years after the event, become vague about their memories of the day in 1942 when they went to school and found all the Jewish boys had disappeared. As if the two events were not connected, one observes that several of those missing boys now had streets named after them.

There is an interview with a shopkeeper who regards his main achievement of the war as managing to convince his fellow French that although his name was Klein, he was not Jewish. There is a long conversation with Christian de la Mazière, an aristocrat who decided to join the Charlemagne division of the Waffen SS to fight for Hitler. And, perhaps most nauseating of all, is le comte de Chambrun, Laval’s son-in-law, who does his best to convince his interlocutors that France had been lucky to have this arch-collaborator as its prime minister.

It is not just the interviewing that is superb, the camerawork is brilliant, too. The director is sure to capture the shifty, sideways glances of Klein and Chambrun as they try to justify themselves, and the casualness of Mazière – looking louche in dark glasses as he puts his own disgrace down to the folly of youth.

Ophuls also lined up the greats to recall these events: notably Anthony Eden, speaking elegant, interestingly accented French, and Pierre Mendès France, the former French prime minister, a Jew whom Vichy sought to try on trumped-up charges of desertion.

By the end of his film, the myths are in ruins; and Ophuls’s last joke is to show a clip of Maurice Chevalier explaining, entirely dishonestly, to an anglophone audience how he had not collaborated. Chevalier, like too many others in this film, got away with it in the way that the résistants often did not. As he sings Sweepin’ the Clouds Away, one recalls the ease with which a whole nation went into denial only, eventually, to be forced out of it by a courageous film-maker.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/...ary-ever-made/

I found a two part torrent on TPB (here) with English subs (at least on part one, I didn't check the other, still downloading).

[Klondyke]

Suez: The Yellow Fleet trapped by the 1967 Arab-Israeli War
The story of ships stranded by war on the Suez Canal and covered in sand for 8 years, told by the crews themselves.

This is the story of fourteen cargo ships accidentally caught up in the June 1967 Arab-Israeli war, and stuck in the Suez Canal while it remained closed for eight years.

While their crews managed to maintain them, their decks became so covered in sand over time that they gradually merged with the landscape and were nicknamed "The Yellow Fleet". This film tells this unusual story through the eyes of the crews who manned the ships, on and off, for eight years.

"I had an experience which I will never ever forget. I was 19 years old at the time. And it was quite a surprise to find myself right in the middle of a war, at the front seat, literally," Peter Richmond, who was on board the Agapenor in 1967, tells Al Jazeera.

When the guns fell silent at the end of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, Egypt closed the Suez Canal and while passenger ships were allowed to complete their journeys, cargo vessels were forced to remain, drop anchor and simply wait.

Geopolitics and war brought together cargo vessels from the United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Sweden, France, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and the United States into an accidental, international flotilla assembled in a wide section of the Suez Canal known as the Great Bitter Lake. The crews realised that their best option would be to create a spirit of international cooperation, in stark contrast to events in the wider world. So they established a club, the Great Bitter Lake Association, whose remit was to inject some much-needed humour into a difficult situation.

The crews began to devise ingenious ways to make life on board less uncomfortable and established their own unofficial, mini-country, with its own traditions, sporting competitions, and even postage stamps.

They developed a barter system between ships, trading cargos, meat for fruit and prawns for eggs. They even staged their own Olympic Games.

"The idea came mainly from everyone, driven by our desire to do something. We heard about the Olympics so decided we'd do the same on our ships. We had games like weightlifting, high jump, sailing and football. There were prizes and medals for the winners. I kept a silver medal I received for a sailing competition," Uwe Carstens, former sailor on the Nordwind, says.

In 1975, the Suez Canal was finally reopened but inertia had caused the engines to seize up and all but two ships had to be towed out of the waterway. Both German vessels started on first try, their turbines turning the propellers and setting them on course for Hamburg. In doing so, they set a record for the longest sea shipping voyage in history: Eight years, 3 months and 5 days.

https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes...110234435.html

[David48atTD]

Proud Country: A portrait of Australia’s worst drought in 50 years | Four Corners

[cyrille]

But his France was unified around a series of myths, namely: that the French had worked to liberate themselves; that collaboration had been kept to a minimum; that there had been scant participation in the genocide of the Jews; and that the Nazis’ puppet regime based in Vichy was little more than a bad dream. In exploding those myths, Le Chagrin et la Pitié caused outrage.

I guess dragonfly hasn't seen it.

dling now.

[harrybarracuda]

The incomparable Bruce Springsteen performs his critically acclaimed latest album and muses on life, rock, and the American dream, in this intimate and personal concert film co-directed by Thom Zimny and Springsteen himself.

https://1337x.to/torrent/4185580/Wes...x264-GalaxyRG/

[Dragonfly]

I guess dragonfly hasn't seen it.

dling now.

sorry cy to disappoint, but I didn't wait for a documentary to know what happened in France during WW2

you can blame history books in school, this was taboo, and that sad chapter was often downplayed or mystified

keep in mind also that France was split in 2 geographically, one side under complete control, the other where things were more flexible often referred to "La France Libre"

[jabir]

You are right, only half surrendered.

[PAG]

"Don't F**k With Cats". A 3 part Netflix production about the real events surrounding a group of internet users trying to track down the killer of kittens, who's posted videos of his actions on line. Really interesting, particularly as the events roll into an actual murder.

Trailer:



Download options:

Download dont fuck with cats Torrents | 1337x

[Luigi]

Really interesting, particularly as the events roll into an actual murder.

Made me think of 'Talhotblond', but with cats instead of people. Well worth a watch if you can find it.

[cyrille]

The incomparable Bruce Springsteen...

Documentaries not really your thing, then.

[Klondyke]

Film Review: ‘Cold Case Hammarskjöld’

Mads Brügger's investigation of the death of Dag Hammarskjöld is a documentary that opens into a looking glass: a conspiracy that chills you.

Director: Mads Brügger With: Mads Brügger, Göran Björkdahl, Alexander Jones, Jan Beuckels, René Goor, Tonie Groenewald, De Wet Potgieter. Release Date: Jan 26, 2019
Official Site: cold-case-hammarskjold | Sundance Institute

The vast majority of conspiracy theories have one key thing in common: Investigate them, and they turn out not to be true. But that doesn’t mean all of them aren’t true. “Cold Case Hammerskjöld” is a slow-building documentary mystery that sucks you in like a vortex. It offers several intertwined conspiracy theories, at least one of which, by the sternest reckoning, appears to be grounded in reality. Does that mean everything in the film is true? Maybe not. Yet “Cold Case Hammarskjöld” is a singular experience that counts as one of the most honestly disturbing and provocative nonfiction films in years.

Directed by the Danish filmmaker Mads Brügger, it starts out as an offbeat journalistic inquiry into the 1961 plane-crash death of Dag Hammarskjöld, the secretary-general of the United Nations. Reviving old claims that have dogged the case but have never been proved, the film suggests that the crash was, in fact, engineered — that Hammarskjöld was murdered. Even if you’re young enough that his name strikes nothing but a distant chord, it’s a scary, bracing notion that gets its hooks in you. It makes you think: Could it possibly be true? And, if so, who could have been behind such an act, and why?

“Cold Case Hammarskjöld” sucks us in, but in a circling idiosyncratic way that only fuels its intrigue. Brügger — bald, twinkly, and a tad officious, like the young Donald Pleasance — first appears in a hotel room dressed in a white safari uniform. He tells us that the villain of his story is, yes, a man in a white safari uniform, and that there’s only one photograph of him in existence. (He shows us the photo.) Brügger, a filmmaker with a prankish reputation but, in this case, a deadly serious agenda, may be toying with the audience, but we go with him, because he seems to be in earnest, and he plants the seeds of a criminal enigma that turns out to have shockingly far-reaching implications.

Dag Hammarskjöld was a Swedish economist and diplomat who, in 1953, become the UN secretary-general, a post he held until his death. He had, as Brügger says, the look and aura of a dull Swedish bureaucrat, and many of the UN powers hoped he would be just that; they did not look favorably upon a secretary-general with pointed leanings. But Hammarskjöld turned out to be something of an activist, especially when it came to the African nations that were struggling to free themselves from the yoke of colonialism and forge independent identities.

When Hammarskjöld died, he was on his way to Congo to oversee cease-fire negotiations in the ongoing crisis there. Several background forces were vying for power in Congo, including the Soviet Union and Belgium, Congo’s former colonizer, whose largest mining company was intent on maintaining control of the country’s wealthy mineral resources.

Brügger takes us back to the night of Sept. 18, 1961, when Hammarskjöld’s small plane went down in a field in Zambia, eight miles from the Ndola airport. He tells us that investigators, at the time, dismissed statements by locals who were near the crash when it happened. So Brügger goes back and talks to them, and one after another, in a way that seems guilelessly casual and convincing, they all mention the same things: the sighting of a second plane, a red flash, a shot-like sound.

He also interviews a witness of significant authority: Charles Southall, a former top official in the U.S. National Security Agency, who in 1961 was working at an NSA listening station in Cyprus. Southall heard a recording of the pilot referencing a second plane, and also heard gunfire. Brügger then presents a photograph of consummate creepiness. It shows Dag Hammarskjöld’s bloodied corpse at the crash site, and wedged into his collar is a playing card: the ace of spades. What could this mean? It means something, and when we find out what it’s a true suck-in-your-breath “Whoa!” of an epiphany.

Brügger, lifting tricks from Nick Broomfield and Werner Herzog, knows just how to inhabit the role he’s playing: the cultivated European muckraker as teasing showman. He gathers equipment (a metal detector, two shovels) and heads for the spot where the wreckage from Hammarskjöld’s plane was buried. We think: Is he going to dig up a smoking gun? In a way, he’s still playing us, at once exploiting and tweaking our desire to see a puzzle in which every piece fits perfectly. “Cold Case Hammarskjöld” doesn’t provide that. Yet the film does convince you that the death of Dag Hammarskjöld was, in all likelihood, an assassination, a revelation that becomes the entry point into a larger looking glass.

A key clue emerges from an unexpected place: South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which unveiled, but did not investigate, a tell-tale document from an organization called the South African Institute for Maritime Research (SAIMR). It’s a mercenary group that worked hand in glove with the Apartheid regime, and the document contains what one witness describes as “the manuscript for killing Dag Hammarskjöld.” Brügger, who effectively communicates that he’s discovering this evidence right along with us, then pursues the hidden agenda of SAIMR. Its founder and leader? Keith Maxwell, the man in the safari uniform. He was a trainer of mercenaries and a devout white supremacist; he was also a little nuts. (He liked to dress in 19th-century naval regalia and wrote screw-loose diaries.) And what he was up to, according to the movie, was big. Nothing less than a way to reshape the world on racist grounds.

In the three days since “Cold Case Hammarskjöld” premiered at Sundance, its key claim — which has to do with the spread of AIDS in Africa — has been investigated by several journalistic organizations, notably The New York Times. The Times story that appeared on Jan. 27 debunks a number of the implications of Brügger’s film. I saw the movie several weeks ago (it was pre-screened for critics before Sundance), but have waited to write about it until some of this follow-up information could get out there. My initial experience of watching “Cold Case” was of falling into the seductive quicksand that a conspiracy theory can create. When I saw the movie, I bought the claims Brügger was making. I now believe The New York Times more.

That said, Brügger presents an extensive interview with Alexander Jones, a former SAIMR militia member who makes the shocking claims that “Cold Case” leaves us with. And what was haunting when I first saw the film, and remains haunting, is the intent that Brügger captures. This is what a contingent of people in South Africa, allied with the government, at least wanted to do. And that’s eminently believable. And it chills us. “Cold Case Hammarskjöld” doesn’t offer the last word about the issues it raises. But it’s a movie that should be seen, grappled with, argued with, and experienced, because the questions it plants in us are dark enough to reverberate as powerfully as answers.


Film Review: 'Cold Case Hammarskjöld'

Reviewed a Sundance Film Festival (World Cinema Documentary Competition), January 26, 2019. Running time: 128 MIN.

PRODUCTION: A Wingman Media, Piraya Film, Laika Film & Television production. Producers: Peter Engel, Andreas Rocksen, Bjarte M. Tveit.

CREW: Director: Mads Brügger. Camera (color, widescreen): Tore Vollan. Editor: Nicolás Norgaard Staffolani.

WITH: Mads Brügger, Göran Björkdahl, Alexander Jones, Jan Beuckels, René Goor, Tonie Groenewald, De Wet Potgieter.

‘Cold Case Hammarskjold’ Review: A Conspiracy That Chills You – Variety

[Klondyke]

Just airing on TV5 (up to 14:00) Eng
(good for the ones who do not know what had to be cleaned up after the Froggies left)

Aux Armes, Citoyens!

Episode 2: 1945-1996 By mixing different social classes and origins, military service was the final step in fashioning the French citizen. From immediately after World War II until 1996, from the rise of antimilitarism to the professionalization of the armed forces, this second episode recounts the fracture between the French and the military. Directed by: Jérôme Lambert, Philippe Picard (France, 2019)

TV5MONDE - TV5Monde

[harrybarracuda]

Documentaries not really your thing, then.

Sorry, should have been in quotes, he does nothing for me personally but I know we have some fans.

[harrybarracuda]

"\"This Is Korea!\" was commissioned by the Navy to explain an unpopular war to the American public, but Ford, always a poet first and a propagandist second, chooses to depict, not a heroic battle against godless Communism, but the toll war takes on its participants.
The 16-millimeter color footage, shot by Ford and his two favorite newsreel cameramen from his World War II tour of duty, consists largely of melancholic portraits of troops in retreat or interned in military hospitals, as Ford hands off the narration between Irving Pichel, speaking in the voice of the dead, and John Ireland, who speaks for the young soldiers entering combat.
Small, subtle and extremely moving \"This Is Korea!\" was released as a theatrical feature by Republic but sank at the boxoffice and has largely been forgotten."

https://rarbgway.org/torrent/lrydu9g

[Luigi]

Been looking for a fantastically done 2003 Channel 4 doco called 'Brinks Mat: The Greatest Heist'.

Any other of the movies or docos about the heist aren't worth watching.

Being Ch4, it's excellent.

Can't now locate it anywhere. Any links to a source greatly appreciated.



Brinks Mat: The Greatest Heist | EastEnders | Media | The Guardian

[harrybarracuda]

Been looking for a fantastically done 2003 Channel 4 doco called 'Brinks Mat: The Greatest Heist'.

Any other of the movies or docos about the heist aren't worth watching.

Being Ch4, it's excellent.

Can't now locate it anywhere. Any links to a source greatly appreciated.



Brinks Mat: The Greatest Heist | EastEnders | Media | The Guardian

It appears to be on Youtube in four parts.

[Luigi]

^ Indeed it is.



Unfortunately the 240p resolution is on par with yer Screeners.

[Mendip]

After a couple of small bottles of Strongbow last night I watched 'Drinkers Like Me', a BBC documentary made by Adrian Chiles. I would highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys a drink. I watched it on the BBC iPlayer using a VPN but I'm sure there are many other ways of accessing it. I find Adrian Chiles a really personable guy and he is very honest in this documentary.

I've long suspected that my relationship with alcohol is a lot closer than it should be, yet since I hold down a pretty challenging (at times) job, I've never lost a day's work through drink, am up before 6am every single day, virtually never have a drink before 5pm and can easily go six weeks offshore without even thinking about a drink, I've never really thought it a problem.

Anyway, at the moment I'm weekend only drinking, with no booze on school nights. After watching this documentary I totalled up the units I've consumed this week since Sunday night... and it was 17! That's 3 units above the UK recommended weekly safe limit, and I still have the weekend to go!

I was absolutely amazed... I had managed this just with the occasional small bottle of cider and a couple of Leos while sitting with the dogs. There's been no Hong Thong at all. It was a very sobering (excuse the pun) thought that I can exceed 'safe' limits even when I don't consider that I'm drinking.

Apparently in the UK the biggest health problems through drinking is with the middle aged (am I really middle aged now!!!), with late teens /early 20s now reducing alcohol intake. A lot in this documentary struck very close to home. I did a bit of Googling afterwards and found out that Adrian Chiles has the exact same birth date as me. That made me think as well.

[Luigi]

^ cheers.

Presume it is this:




Been meaning to get a full-health check-up lately, with extra focus on me liver.

[Mendip]

Yep, that's the one!

I'd be interested to hear what you think of it.

[Luigi]

Will let ya know in a week or two when I'm brave enough to put it on.

[cyrille]

I was absolutely amazed...

This is probably why you found the programme more worthwhile than me.

I've been well aware of the limits, of how I didn't stay within them for many years, and how our generation is particularly problematic.

It's a pretty thorough look at the problem though, and at least Chiles can blame his social life.

[Mendip]

^ Are you saying sitting with my dogs isn't sociable??!

Friday night is my social life... I sit with my Welsh mate in his garden and we guzzle Leo while our kids play.

I would expect an easy 12 to 16 units will go down tonight... the weekly limit.

I've downloaded the app he used now... will have a 'normal' weekend to set up the base case i units, and then I'm gonna address this.

[Luigi]

I would expect an easy 12 to 16 units will go down tonight... the weekly limit.

Blimey, just took a look at the whole units thing and that's a bit scary.

2.8 units for a pint (568ml) of 5% beer.

Will have 6 x 620ml Singha tonight as hte restaurant we go to is buy 2 get 1 free. 6 x 620 = 3720. 3720/568 = 6.5. 6.5 x 2.8 = 18.2 units.


Probably same Sat night with the football.

Bit less Sunday if out or movie with MM.

Probably 46 units over a weekend.


Probably 25 units or so as the sun goes down Mon-Thus.



What do the UK government knobbers say about 70 units per week?


Might have to leave MM (pretty much a teetotaler) and move in with Miss Teetotaler (who has somehow been led to believe that I am also just about one) if I'm to see 41.

[Mendip]

^ Snap.

I was working on 2 units a pint... not 2.8 for a 620ml 5% bottle of Leo. Usually 6 to 8 bottles on a Friday... I'll doubtless be over 20 units tonight.