The Strength and Agility of Insects (1911)
A short, early documentary work showing insects exhibiting extreme strength and agility.
A short, early documentary work showing insects exhibiting extreme strength and agility.

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.

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.
A silent succession of black-and-white photographs of the city of Montreal.

The lives of Stan Laurel (1890-1965) and Oliver Hardy (1892-1957), on the screen and behind the curtain. The joy and the sadness, the success and the failure. The story of one of the best comic duos of all time: a lesson on how to make people laugh.
Film historians, and survivors from the nearly 30-year struggle to bring sound to motion pictures take the audience from the early failed attempts by scientists and inventors, to the triumph of the talkies.
Late 1800s cigarette advertisement produced by Thomas Edison Manufacturing.

An appreciative, uncritical look at silent film comedies and thrillers from early in the century through the 1920s.
Prix et Profits is a 20-minute short film originally made for educational purposes and released in 9.5mm format. As the title suggests, the film follows the supply chain of a potato, from farmers to consumers, and examines the mechanisms of capitalism.
"Danse serpentine" (Gaumont #588) is part of the "Miss Lina Esbrard. Danseuse cosmopolite et serpentine" series of 4 films, and should not be confused with "Danse excentrique" (Gaumont #587), "Danse fantaisiste" (Gaumont #589) or "La Gigue" (Gaumont #590).
A display of flower bouquets, rotating to show the Kinemacolour process.

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

An account of the journey that King Alfonso XIII of Spain made to the impoverished shire of Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in the region of Extremadura, in 1922.
Buster Brown creater R.F. Outcault sketches his creation. Part of the Buster Brown series for Edison film studio.

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

The first woman to appear in front of an Edison motion picture camera and possibly the first woman to appear in a motion picture within the United States. In the film, Carmencita is recorded going through a routine she had been performing at Koster & Bial's in New York since February 1890.
Fantastic Flowers is a compilation of short silent films produced between 1906 and 1920, displaying amazing colours that were applied to each frame using the Pathécolor process, or other similar stencilling techniques. Bonsoir – La Fée aux fleurs (1906) / [Bloemenvelden Haarlem] (1909) / Les Chrysanthèmes (1907) / Le Chrysanthème, roi de l’automne (1914) / [Les Tulipes] (1907) / Les Fleurs dans les jardins (1914) / L’Après-midi d’une japonaise (1920) / The Beauty Thief ([1920]) / La Fée printemps (1906) / [Het schoonste uit de natuur] (1912?) / La Culture du dahlia (1911) / [Hollandse Tulpen en Klompen] (1920?) / Fabrication des fleurs artificielles (1911) / [Bonsoir tableau] (1906)

Andy Warhol directs a single 35-minute shot of a man's face to capture his facial expressions as he receives the sexual act depicted in the title.
Finland’s first nature documentary. The filmmakers’ expedition leads them all the way to the Åland Islands and the Karelian Isthmus.

The Quays' interest in esoteric illusions finds its perfect realization in this fascinating animated lecture on the art of anamorphosis. This artistic technique, often used in the 16th- and 17th centuries, utilizes a method of visual distortion with which paintings, when viewed from different angles, mischievously revealed hidden symbols.
Short documentary on a central african tribe called 'The Chillouks'.