All Films - Short Movie Database

Springtime in an English Village

1944 • 7 min • United Kingdom

An extraordinary and unexpected snapshot of rural life in wartime in which a young black girl is crowned Queen of the May.

Montana Plains

1944 • 3 min

Emerson's Mountaineers perform in this January 1944 Soundie music video. Polly Shaffer sings, with the Hillbillies on fiddle, guitars, and upright bass.

Jordan Jive

1944 • 3 min • United States of America

Louis Jordan's Orchestra perform Jordan Jive. Setting is a canteen, with the orchestra and audience in US military uniform. The Swing Maniacs go through some extremely strenuous acrobatic dancing.

Ration Blues

1944 • 3 min

A Soundie with Louis Jordan and his Orchestra.

Too Many Sailors

1944 • 3 min

A Soundie with the Burch Mann Dancers.

Mutual Aid

1944 • 5 min • Canada

An animated short about the work of Canada's Mutual Aid Board and the necessity for this cooperation between the Allied countries.

Anu Parikka och de andra

1944 • 9 min

Pictures from the Finnish reconstruction work in Karelia.

Voodoo Devil Drums

1944 • 44 min • United States of America

A black zombie talks about his life.

Air Siege

1944 • 21 min • United States of America

A recount of the bombing campaign by the United States Army's Fifteenth Air Force against the oilfields and refineries in and around Ploesti, Romania during World War II.

Wandering Here and There

1944 • 9 min • United States of America

This Traveltalk series short visits various places around the United States. At the first stop, we admire the natural beauty of Crater Lake in Oregon. The next stop is the open pit copper mine at Bingham Canyon, Utah, the world's largest copper mine. We then spend time in Hannibal, Missouri, the hometown of author Mark Twain. After a short visit to a log-rolling contest in Washington State, we cross the country to get a view of Washington, DC from across the Potomac River. The final stop on this tour is Arlington National Cemetery, where we see the Tomb of the Unknown, Arlington House, and the mast of the USS Maine, which was sunk in 1898 in Havana Harbor.

La chanson du manioc

1944 • 7 min • France, Madagascar

Documentary about the cultivation of cassava, a plant used to make tapioca. The film begins with a presentation of Madagascar and its capital Tananarive, then shows us how cassava is grown.

47th Street Jive

1944 • 3 min

A Soundie featuring June Richmond with Roy Milton and His Band.

Providing Goods for You

1944 • 5 min • Canada

A short animated film that explains the necessity of curtailing the consumption of civilian goods in wartime.

Shadow of the Hunter

1944 • 8 min • Sweden

Gryning is a short Swedish film by Arne Sucksdorff, presented without narration or dialogue. It follows a hunter tracking animals through the forest at daybreak, but as the dawn light transforms the landscape, he lowers his rifle, overcome by the beauty of the morning, and walks away. The film is also known by the English titles The Shadow of the Hunter and Dawn.

Elementary and Pylon Eights

1944 • 10 min • United States of America

This government documentary short film demonstrates for Army Air Forces pilots in World War II the safe execution of a variety of aeronautical maneuvers. An instructor, using animation, shows the proper procedure for setting up and executing S-turns, elementary figure eights, and pylon figure eights. Illustrating the right and wrong ways to perform these maneuvers are the animated characters Wilbur Right and Wilbur Wrong.

La Ballerine

1944 • 1 min • France

When Agnès Varda was preparing the film Jacquot de Nantes in 1990, she was able to shoot in the small apartment where Jacques was raised. While emptying the attic, Agnès found pieces of 9.5 mm film, dry and folded, almost broken and two small cardboard figures. The film was impossible to project and the film had to be remade. Showing the pieces of film to Jacques he immediately identified La Ballerine. A student from the Fine Arts School of Nantes therefore redrew each shot, frame by frame, on blank 16 mm film.

Richard Mortensen's Motion Picture

1944 • 2 min • Denmark

Film reportage of a kinetic, abstract work by Richard Mortensen.

Klooga Death Camp

1944 • 7 min • Soviet Union

Im Lande der Basken

1944 • 12 min • Germany

"This documentary, filmed in the surroundings of Ainhoa and other border towns, covers the most romantic and bucolic landscapes and moments of the French Basque lands. Filmed by Herbert Brieger in 1944, it is an attempt to capture in images a mythical vision of the Basque people passed through the filter of Nazi propaganda. A tableware with Basque motifs shows the use of swastika in its decoration. The discoidal stelae of the cemeteries will also be the center of attention. It is part of the work of the filmmakers of the German regime to use peoples of Europe that served them to justify their songs of race during the years of World War II." Punto de Vista Film Festival