1. Albania (Shqipëria)
Made by the highly influential Russian cameraman Roman Karmen, this documentary vividly features Albanian life immediately after the communists came to power in 1944. The film is especially memorable since it’s missing much of the heavy socialist realism that marked Albanian doc making. Shortly after he completed the film, Karmen set off for Berlin to shoot the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.
2. Vendetta - Obliged to kill (Vendetta - Albańska zemsta krwi)
A dramatic depiction of honor, family feuds and thousand-year-old traditions. In Albania, the tradition of avenging an injustice according to the motto "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" still lives on. This has led to people being trapped in their homes for fear of being murdered due to a family feud.
3. The Brainwashing of My Dad
A filmmaker examines the rise of right-wing media through the lens of her father, whose immersion in it radicalized him and rocked the foundation of their family. She discovers this political phenomenon recurring in living rooms everywhere, and reveals the consequences conservative media has had on families and a nation.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
4. Anniversary of the Revolution (Годовщина революции)
A chronicle of the Russian Revolution of 1917, from the bourgeois democratic February Revolution to the great socialist October Revolution and the final triumph.
It has an average vote of 6.8 on TMDB.
5. Goskinokalendar (Госкинокалендарь)
Traditional-style newsreel series
It has an average vote of 7.8 on TMDB.
6. Here Be Dragons
Filmmaker Mark Cousins goes to Albania for five days, and films what he sees. He discovers that the movie prints in the country's film archive are decaying. In investigating this, Cousins begins to encounter bigger questions about the history and memory of a place. Perhaps a country whose 20th Century, dominated by its authoritarian ruler Enver Hoxha, was so traumatic, should allow its film heritage to fade away? Perhaps a national forgetting should be welcomed? Influenced by the films of Chris Marker, Cousins' film broadens to consider the architecture of dictators and the great icon paintings of Onufri. In the past, when cartographers knew little about a country, they wrote on it Here be Dragons. Albania was, for decades, one of the least well know countries in the world. Cousins' road movie meditation takes the advice of Goethe: "If you would understand the poet, you must go to the poet's land."
It has an average vote of 5.7 on TMDB.
7. Triedny nepriateľ (Triedny nepriateľ)
(Triedny nepriateľ)
8. Le Parti du cinéma (Le Parti du cinéma)
(Le Parti du cinéma)
It has an average vote of 7.5 on TMDB.
9. Land Without Bread (Las Hurdes)
An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.
It has an average vote of 7.081 on TMDB.
10. Railway Station (Dworzec)
Kieslowski’s later film Dworzec portrays the atmosphere at Central Station in Warsaw after the rush hour.
It has an average vote of 4.8 on TMDB.
11. The Truth About Communism
Ronald Reagan hosts and narrates this documentary about the Communist threat to the free world. Alexander Kerensky, the first premier of the provisional Russian Government in 1917, formally introduces the film. This documentary traces the development of the Communist movement from birth, the Lenin years, its struggle for direction, the Stalin years and the ascendancy of Nikita Krushchev.
12. Life Goes On
The absurd and often surrealistic story of the last propaganda film of the Third Reich.
It has an average vote of 5 on TMDB.
13. Victory Through Air Power
This is a unique film in Disney Production's history. This film is essentially a propaganda film selling Major Alexander de Seversky's theories about the practical uses of long range strategic bombing. Using a combination of animation humorously telling about the development of air warfare, the film switches to the Major illustrating his ideas could win the war for the allies.
It has an average vote of 5.6 on TMDB.
14. Tragedy or Hope
Contrasting radical mobs, anarchy, and 1960s counterculture with footage of American manufacturing and innovation, this film celebrates the concept of American exceptionalism and argues that anti-Vietnam War protesters were influenced by communism, atheism, and immorality. Set mostly in a university library, this political debate between a medical student, his 1770s ancestor, and a history professor is a sequel to the 1972 National Education Program film, Brink of Disaster! Two additional characters appear in this drama: a 19th-century steamboat captain, and the student’s grandfather - an early 20th-century automobile worker. The National Education Program at Harding College in Searcy, Arkansas created a variety of widely-distributed anti-communism films from the mid-1940s to the early 1970s.
15. Brink of Disaster!
A student is held up in the library while a riot rages outside. As SDS protesters head to burn the library down, he has to fend them off with his baseball bat. This film opens with actual footage of civil disturbances in the 1960s, and moves on to images of historical American figures.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
16. Gestern und heute
Nazi propaganda film contrasting Germany in the days before Adolf Hitler became Chancellor with the Germany of "today" and how much better it is.
It has an average vote of 4.2 on TMDB.
17. Un Pic pour Lénine (Un Pic pour Lénine)
(Un Pic pour Lénine)
It has an average vote of 10 on TMDB.
18. The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl (Die Macht der Bilder: Leni Riefenstahl)
This documentary recounts the life and work of one of most famous, and yet reviled, German film directors in history, Leni Riefenstahl. The film recounts the rise of her career from a dancer, to a movie actor to the most important film director in Nazi Germany who directed such famous propaganda films as Triumph of the Will and Olympiad. The film also explores her later activities after Nazi Germany's defeat in 1945 and her disgrace for being so associated with it which includes her amazingly active life over the age of 90.
It has an average vote of 7.1 on TMDB.
19. Left Behind
Leading biblical scholars and religious experts discuss the implications of the Rapture, when prophecies predict that Jesus Christ will return to Earth and his true believers will be transported to meet him.
It has an average vote of 5.5 on TMDB.
20. The Truth Will Out
Anti-Congress propaganda film made by a District Officer in India.
