All Films

O Vigilante Rodoviário

1978 • 57 min • Brazil

The Police are investigating a money counterfeiting ring. When an undercover agent suffers a disaster caused by criminals, a team joins the Highway Police to dismantle the gang.

Bird

1978 • 3 min • United States of America

This portrait of a guinea fowl is the first clear vision I've had of the hot-blooded dinosaurs still living among us. (SB)

Step by Step

1978 • 23 min • Syrian Arab Republic

In a rolling area of Syria, the villagers live their everyday life, in toil and poverty. Trapped between the hardships of farming, religious and political ideologies, they barely survive. Their children are the only ones that are still full of hope. They imagine their future lives and picture themselves as doctors or engineers. But these are pipe dreams. All they can actually look forward to is farming the land with primitive tools like their parents, getting a menial job in the city or becoming brainwashed soldiers..

Campos Elíseos

1978 • 12 min • Brazil

The history of São Paulo's first residential district..

Klaabu

1978 • 9 min • Soviet Union

Klaabu's birth and adventure begins.

The Institution

1978 • 54 min • United Kingdom

A critique of the institution of mental health care that questions ‘normal’ viewing habits.

Camilo Pessanha: Entre os Dois Abismos

1978 • 27 min

Biographical program on Camilo Pessanha, a poet associated with the movement of symbolism in the Portuguese language, led by Danilo Barreiros, writer and researcher, highlighting his stay in Macao and the influence that Chinese culture and art had on his work.

Sevilla Rota

1978 • 10 min • Spain

Fake documentary about Sevilla.

Zero Hour

1978 • 25 min

Presents a story about a girl and her friends who play a strange game called invasion. The girl's mother becomes alarmed when she discovers that the invasion is to come from outer space, and she begins to wonder what will happen at zero hour.

Women's Things

1978 • 45 min • Mexico

A young sociology student has an unintended pregnancy and is subjected to the terrible humiliation of an incompetent doctor. The girl falls ill from the poorly performed abortion and is taken by a friend to the General Hospital. Film that reports clandestine abortion in Mexico, with interviews with women who have had abortions in that hospital and shocking maternal death statistics from procedures carried out under unsafe conditions.

Future Perfect

1978 • 11 min

Future Perfect is an early algorithmic film, based on a collection of decreasing mathematical series that produce visual and auditory rhythms beyond the control of the filmmakers. (Grahame Weinbren) Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2007.

Phantom Conception

1978 • 4 min • Sweden

A crushed fly. An outline of organic forms, an illusory trip. (Filmform)

Mis en pièces

1978 • 11 min • France

Mis en pièces means in French taking into pieces, but it could mean to set up a play, or to deconstruct a play. The film is about a theater play which is shot against the medium theater. This film is an attempt to destroy the representation of the perspectivist point of view. Disorganizing a process to see…

We Stop Here

1978 • 30 min • Australia

Describes life on the Aboriginal reserve of Palm Island in Queensland. Old men from Dyirbal language group tell stories of the massacres and poisoning of their people when they first came in contact with the white settlers.

Guestworker's Road

1978 • 60 min • Sweden, Turkey

The trans-European motorway, also known as the "Guest Worker's Road", is full of dangers for the migrants who drive to Turkey for their summer break. This portrait of this highway is a powerful documentation of the history of labor migration to Europe.

Do You Get It No. 4

1978 • 15 min • Netherlands

Footage of a sunny village square in Sardinia leads to humorous, philosophical reflections on reality and the role of the ‘objectively recording’ documentary maker. Van Gasteren sees the square as a backdrop in his film, and the chance passers-by as extras. Then, as a ‘director of reality’, he gives an ironic commentary on what he sees. “For a moment I thought, from what source of information am I thinking up what I see. Or, did I just see exactly what I thought.”

Think Bike - Jimmy Hill

1978 • 1 min • United Kingdom

Featuring well known sports presenter Jimmy Hill, ‘Think Bike’ encourages motorists to take extra care to look out for motorcyclists when pulling out from junctions. Using the slogan ‘think once, think twice, think bike’, the film features a graphic depiction of an accident to shock the audience. A very similar tactic is still in use today in the recently launched ‘Think – take longer to look for bikes’ campaign which also shows a motorcyclist crashing into the side of a car. A Department for Transport report from 2006 concluded that the most common cause of motorcycle crashes is a ‘right of way’ violation…the majority of these incidents occur at T-junctions and it is usually the motorist – rather than the biker – who is at fault.’ ‘In around 65% of these ‘right of way’ incidents, a driver somehow fails to see a motorcyclist who should be in clear view.’

Arba

1978 • 9 min • Soviet Union

The old man was riding a cart to the bazaar. The road ran through a mountain and the horse began to resist and refused to pull the watermelon. The old man tried his best to get the horse to climb the mountain, but he couldn't do anything. It was only through kindness and mutual help that the old man managed to cross the mountain.

Canon

1978 • 12 min • Yugoslavia

Short documentary by Aleksandar Ilić.

Is It Worth Rushing?

1978 • 5 min • Soviet Union

A propaganda film in the form of a fictional narrative urges pedestrians to be alert and cautious on city streets.

Pendulum

1978 • 2 min

Peter Bundy & Jan Millsapps film

Water Motor

1978 • 8 min

A filmed record of a solo performance by American postmodern dancer and choreographer Trisha Brown. In order to better understand the dance, Mangolte learned to perform it herself. Mangolte shot Brown as she performed the solo twice, and then on the third take she decided to film in slow motion: "I shot slow motion, knowing that it would reveal the dance and the movement in a totally different context... the slow motion version permits a second look at the choreography, and the spectators can marvel at what they remember and also what they missed the first time around."

The Enchanted Prince

1978 • 9 min

A mouthy frog gets his wish when a princess’s kiss turns him into a human. But just because he’s got a voice doesn’t mean he has much to say.

The Beach

1978 • 3 min • Canada

An experimental animation about four people at a beach, three men and one woman.