The World's Greatest Fair

A City Decides chronicles the events that led to the integration of the St. Louis public schools in 1954. An Oscar-nominated short documentary from 1956.

Based on the Depression-era bildungsroman memoir of writer A. E. Hotchner, the film follows the story of a boy struggling to survive on his own in a hotel in St. Louis after his mother is committed to a sanatorium with tuberculosis. His father, a German immigrant and traveling salesman working for the Hamilton Watch Company, is off on long trips from which the boy cannot be certain he will return.

Made for screening at the U.S. Pavilion at the 1974 World's Fair in Spokane Washington, USA, which had a Native-American environmental theme, MAN BELONGS TO THE EARTH depicts the history of air, water, and earth pollution, and how environmentalists are trying to solve these problems using various technologies.

Uses first-person accounts from Missourians who went to the Fair in 1904, interviews with historians, archival motion pictures, and photographs to situate the St. Louis Fair in the social, political, and cultural context of American society in 1904. Covers American civilization at the turn of the century; the representation of history; authenticity; modernity; dress and body language; oral history and childhood memories; world fairs as experiences; and receiving information through visual symbols, words, and exhibits.

The Gateway Arch: A Reflection of America chronicles for the first time the complete story of this great American symbol… from Thomas Jefferson, Lewis & Clark, and St. Louis’ role in westward expansion; to the eventual construction of the largest stainless steel structure in history.

This documentary let us to relive the challenge of the men behind the 1967 Universal Exposition in Montréal, Canada. By searching trough 80,000 archival documents at the national Archives, they managed to bring light on one of the biggest logistical and political challenges that were faced by organizers during the "Révolution Tranquille" in the Québec sixties. Includes the accounts of the Chief of Advertising Yves Jasmin, and businessman Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien.

A collection of twenty short films, averaging 2-3 minutes, by various filmmakers depicting American life, intended to be shown in a continuous loop at the American Pavilion of the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair. Some releases of the film include ten extra minutes of rough cuts.

Documentary featuring original materials from the 1939 New York World's Fair. Includes film images of Jason Robards Jr. as a child at the World's Fair and clips from the promotional film "The Middleton Family at the New York World's Fair" (1939).

Make No Little Plans: Daniel Burnham and the American City reveals the fascinating life and complex legacy of architect and city planner Daniel Hudson Burnham. In the midst of the late nineteenth century urban disorder, Burnham offered a powerful vision of what a civilized American city could look like, one that provided a compelling framework for Americans to make sense of the world around them. A timely, intriguing story in the American experience, Make No Little Plans explores Burnham's impact on the development of the American city as debate continues today about what urban planning means in a democratic society.

In 1909, looking to shed its rough frontier past, the young city of Seattle decided to host a World’s Fair in the same grand spirit as those that preceded it in Chicago and St. Louis. Seattle welcomed the world to the University of Washington campus where visitors walked among palaces, saw new inventions that would change the world, and mined for mirth on the Paystreak - AYP’s Midway. Featuring thousands of historical images, rare archival footage, and contemporary interviews, the film explores the fair’s historical reverberations.

Behind the iconic Eiffel Tower lies the story of an incredible challenge to erect a thousand-foot tower that went far beyond a design competition, and marked a major turning point in engineering history. It was the beginning of radical transformation where iron was pitted against stone, engineering against architecture, and modern design against ancients. Press campaigns, lobbying, public conferences, denigration of opposing projects, bragging about big names - all participants engaged in a fierce battle without concession. Using 3D recreations, official sources (reports, letters, drawings...) and intimate archives obtained from their descendants, this film will bring to life this vertical race through a fresh and visual way to mark the centenary of Eiffel death.