Pirates of the Airwaves (2014)
In 1966 a group of determined young men defied the New Zealand government and launched a pirate radio station aboard a ship in the Hauraki Gulf.
In 1966 a group of determined young men defied the New Zealand government and launched a pirate radio station aboard a ship in the Hauraki Gulf.
For more than 50 years, we’ve been unsuccessfully searching for any evidence of intelligent extraterrestrial life. But, the discovery of thousands of exoplanets has meant the hope of finding them is higher than ever. If any messages could eventually be decoded and answered in any far, far away star, it could radically transform our consciousness as species and our place in the universe. A message from the stars changes life on Earth… forever.
J.P. McCarthy was an icon of Detroit broadcasting who ruled the radio waves in the Motor City for thirty years. His story is the ultimate local-kid-done-good tale. Working extensively with the McCarthy family and conducting over twenty interviews with J.P.’s friends, family, co-workers and contemporaries, Detroit Public Television memorializes someone who was considered more of a family member than a voice on the radio to anyone who tuned in to hear his morning show or the Focus program over the years.
On August 7th 1974, French tightrope walker Philippe Petit stepped out on a high wire, illegally rigged between New York's World Trade Center twin towers, then the world's tallest buildings. After nearly an hour of performing on the wire, 1,350 feet above the sidewalks of Manhattan, he was arrested. This fun and spellbinding documentary chronicles Philippe Petit's "highest" achievement.
A successful TV star during the 1960s, former "Hogan's Heroes" actor Bob Crane projects a wholesome family-man image, but this front masks his persona as a sex addict who records and photographs his many encounters with women, often with the help of his seedy friend, John Henry Carpenter. This biographical drama reveals how Crane's double life takes its toll on him and his family, and ultimately contributes to his death.
Lake Tahoe, 1969. Seven strangers, each one with a secret to bury, meet at El Royale, a decadent motel with a dark past. In the course of a fateful night, everyone will have one last shot at redemption.
In 1916, the New Zealand Government secretly shipped 14 of the country's most outspoken conscientious objectors to the Western Front in an attempt to convert, silence, or quite possibly kill them. This is their story.
Taking over Leeds United, Brian Clough's abrasive approach and his clear dislike of the players' dirty style of play make it certain there is going to be friction. Glimpses of his earlier career help explain both his hostility to previous manager Don Revie and how much he is missing right-hand man Peter Taylor.
Aristos, a ship worker and singer at a popular tavern in the evening, is preparing to marry a poor girl, Maryio. One night at the shop comes the rich Elena, which hides the truth about her financial situation, he falls in love with her and separates him from Maryio. However, after an accident, the real identity of Elena is revealed, as is the fact that she is betrothed. Elena, seeing the misfortune she has scattered around her, pretends that Aristos was just an adventure for her and lets him return to Maryio.
For Ted, music and creation are the most important things in life. And around him he has a small group of friends who never hesitate to do everything they can to help him. My Brother Ted is a touching declaration of love from a big brother to his little brother.
As he approaches manhood, Ben Meechum struggles to win the approval of his demanding alpha male father, an aggressively competitive, but frustrated marine pilot.
Two freethinking teenagers - a boy and a girl - confront with authoritarian teachers in their boarding schools. The other students treat this differently.
Israel, 1961. Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann, responsible for organizing the extermination of European Jews, is sentenced to death.
Someone Else’s Country looks critically at the radical economic changes implemented by the 1984 Labour Government - where privatisation of state assets was part of a wider agenda that sought to remake New Zealand as a model free market state. The trickle-down ‘Rogernomics’ rhetoric warned of no gain without pain, and here the theory is counterpointed by the social effects (redundant workers, Post Office closures). Made by Alister Barry in 1996 when the effects were raw, the film draws extensively on archive footage and interviews with key “witnesses to history”.
The story of unemployment in New Zealand and In A Land of Plenty is an exploration of just that; it takes as its starting point the consensus from The Depression onwards that Godzone economic policy should focus on achieving full employment, and explores how this was radically shifted by the 1984 Labour government. Director Alister Barry's perspective is clear, as he trains a humanist lens on ‘Rogernomics' to argue for the policy's negative effects on society, as a new poverty-stricken underclass developed.
No musical group has had as profound an impact on pop music as The Beatles. Tony Palmer's groundbreaking documentary gives us an intimate look at one of the most influential groups in musical history.
A young man roams the streets of Caracas.
An usherette in a theatre, where a distinguished and popular actor performs, gets her big break when the leading actress has an accident. The director decides to take advantage of the heretofore unexploited talent of the girl and asks her to replace the leading actress. This unexpected opportunity transforms her from a humble usherette into a shining star. Later on, she wins the heart of the leading actor with whom she was secretly in love. However, her sudden rise to theatrical-musical stardom creates complications in their love affair, as her companion sinks into disappointment and drowns himself in drink, abandoning his career. Nevertheless, the usherette/leading actress doesn't give up; She looks for him, finds him and supports him, psychologically and morally, until he makes a comeback to the stage and their love nest.
The vampire myth is given a stylish 1960s treatment, where a human cop partners with a vampire cop to stop a vamp bent on creating a war between the two "separate but equal" races.
It’s This American Life’s wildest, most ambitious live show ever! Nearly 50 actors, singers, dancers, musicians and comedians joined Ira Glass onstage at the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Opera House on June 7th, 2014 to try some things they'd never tried before. The result? Journalism turned into opera, into plays, into a Broadway musical. Comedy from Mike Birbiglia, and SNL’s Sasheer Zamata. Songs from Stephin Merritt of the Magnetic Fields. Dance from Monica Bill Barnes & Company.