All Films

In New Year Night

1958 • 10 min • Soviet Union

The film is based on a fire that broke out in the composer's house on New Year's Eve.

Huang Baomei

1958 • 49 min • China

The film introduces the famous national model worker, textile worker Huang Baomei, who is played by the real Huang Baomei herself.

Alone with the Monsters

1958 • 16 min • United Kingdom

An old woman apparently tormented by people in the street comforts herself in her room with memories of her youth.

The Frankenstein Story

1958 • 6 min

The story is set around Doctor Frankenstein, and his assistant Ygor, the hunchback are finishing the creation of and bring to life the monster. Ygor quickly makes friends with the monster. He instructs the monster to kill Doctor Frankenstein, leaving him for dead. Ygor and monster leave the castle to explore. They meet a teenager, who also becomes friends with the monster. When the teenager makes fun of the hunchback, Ygor has the monster kill him. The pair return to the castle to find Doctor Frankenstein still alive. In the meantime, the brother of the teenage victim enters the castle seeking revenge. He sets the castle on fir, trapping inside the Doctor, Ygor and the monster.

Charlotte and Her Boyfriend

1958 • 13 min • France

This short features a man who is visited by his ex-lover. The moment she arrives, the man starts his constant barrage of speech; the woman doesn't say much. She just mocks the man and pretends she isn't listening. She pulls faces at him and larks about; while the man is trying his best to get her back in his life, then in the next sentence he says he hates her.

Two Men and a Wardrobe

1958 • 15 min • Poland

The film features two men who emerge from the sea carrying a large wardrobe, which they proceed to carry into a town.

Las Callampas

1958 • 19 min • Chile

Documentary showing the formation of the population "Victory," a decision made by people affected by the fire in the ditch of Aguada, where they lived before.

På tokt med terna

1958 • 54 min • Norway

Boy scouts get hold of a sailboat that they travel down the coast with. They get on the trail of some smugglers, whom they catch after several dramatic episodes.

Now, Hare This

1958 • 7 min • United States of America

Big Bad Wolf and his little nephew try to trap Bugs Bunny by making like fairy tale characters.

Donald's Weekend

1958 • 46 min

Walt invites the audience to spend a weekend with Donald Duck.

The Revenge of Dracula

1958 • 6 min

Count Dracula is revived. He sets about to locate and revive the Frankenstein monster. Dracula is in need of nourishment, so leaves the safety of the castle and locates a victim to satisfy his blood lust. Two of the victim's friends, seek revenge and track Dracula to his lair, and are attacked by the monster. An electrical fuse causes a fire in the castle, while the morning dawn sun destroys Dracula, leaving just his skeletal remains.

A Lady Mislaid

1958 • 60 min

Esther and her sister Jennifer have just taken a remote country cottage. But there is strange gossip about the previous occupants.

Mole's Adventure

1958 • 9 min • Japan

The short film is the earliest surviving Japanese anime broadcast on television. Originally airing on July 14, 1958, on NTV and again on October 15, 1958, the nine-minute animation was the first televised Japanese animation and the first example of a full color broadcast.

Nusumareta Endan

1958 • 54 min • Japan

The Packet of "Kazbek"

1958 • 18 min • Soviet Union

Chief Mamishov is the head of the housing and utilities department. At first glance, he seems to be a businesslike and attentive person. He always responds to any complaints from residents, but he has one bad habit—smoking. As a result, he stashes packs of Kazbek cigarettes in his desk until an inspection from a higher authority comes along and several violations are discovered, one of which is his indifference to a complaint. Overall, the film is dedicated to the bureaucrats and officials of some housing and utilities companies, who are criticized by everyone for their heartless attitude towards the needs of workers.

Down North

1958 • 29 min • Canada

A report on sub-Arctic developments in the 1.3 million square km District of Mackenzie. In communities such as Hay River, Yellowknife and Port Radium modern technology and methods of winter transport opened up new possibilities in mining, lumbering, and other industries, and new opportunities for the Inuit and Indian populations.

Swiss Family Robinson: Lost in the Jungle

1958 • 26 min • Mexico, United States of America

After having been recently shipwrecked, a group of survivors begin dealing with both the reality of being stranded on a remote island as well as with feelings of alienation and isolation. Adapted from the novel by Johann Wyss, this was the pilot episode for a proposed television series co-produced by Edgar G. Ulmer and Louis Hayward. Filmed in Mexico in 1957 and bearing a 1958 copyright, Swiss Family Robinson: Lost in the Jungle was not "released" until 2000, when it was included as an extra feature on the DVD version of Ulmer's The Pirates of Capri.

Busho, the Brave Scout

1958 • 10 min • Yugoslavia

Short animated film.

The Wardrobe

1958 • 2 min • United Kingdom

Cartoon: a man takes off his shoes and climbs into a wardrobe, Another man appears, tries to communicate, and finally steps into a wardrobe; noises; the first man climbs out wearing another pair of shoes, leaving the second man with the old pair.

Warsaw Main Station

1958 • 10 min • Poland

Warsaw Central Station, 1958. A place of greetings and farewells, an intersection of people from different parts of Poland and Europe. A girl waits in vain, she goes away. Soon the station would belong to the past too.

Pictures for Percussion

1958 • 2 min

Len Lye made Pictures for Percussion as a sample for television stations while living in the United States.

Glass

1958 • 10 min • Netherlands

This short documentary, shot in the glass factories of Leerdam and Schiedam, demonstrates how glass blowers do their work. But thanks to the superbly edited ballet of working hands and the sequence of mechanical motions of the engines, is it especially a cinematic tour de force. That the industry can’t do without man’s involvement is shown in the scene where we hear the voice of Haanstra himself counting the bottles on the conveyor belt, until one bottle breaks…

The Very Eye of Night

1958 • 15 min • United States of America

Dancers, shown in photographic negative, perform a series of ballet moves, solos, pas de deux, larger groupings. The dancers glide and rotate untroubled by gravity against a slowly changing starfield background. Their movements are accompanied by music scored for a small ensemble of woodwind and percussion.

The Overworked

1958 • 24 min • France

A young woman wins a typing contest and sets off to work in Paris.