Screen Snapshots Series 18, No. 8

Documentary on the master composer, from a GDR point of view.

The fifth film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight propaganda film series, revealing the nature and process of the fight between the Soviet Union and Germany in the Second World War.

A featureless land fit only for war, as the narrator, J. L. Hodson stated in the early scenes: "If war was to be fought then let it begin here". In endless miles of rock-strewn scrub desert, where civilians hardly existed. Desert Victory tells the story of the Allied campaign to drive Germany and Italy from North Africa is analysed, with the major portion of the film examining the battles at El Alamein, including some re-enactment. Won "Best Documentary Feature" at the 16th Academy Awards in 1944.

In 1938 Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler sponsored an expedition to Tibet lead by several Nazi SS scientists to study the regions flora and fauna, and to take scientific measurements of the Earths magnetic fields. The expedition was also sent to find traces of the orgins of the "Aryan" race in Tibet which was where Himmler thought evidence of could be found. This film is a Nazi era documentary of that expedition.

Documentary by Torgny Anderberg

The Rolling Stones' record-breaking 1981 North American arena tour documented by director Hal Ashby. Featuring the biggest Rolling Stones songs from the first 20 years - in the words of Mick Jagger, "a feel of what it's like to be there", as 20 cameras take you onstage with the band in this groundbreaking, dynamic tour.

The second part of the film begins with a journey in the equatorial region, where the travelers managed to capture the most typical images of the original Africa. The journey continues to the forests of the Belgian Congo, where they filmed the smallest people in the world, black dwarfs. From Central Africa, they head south through Victoria Falls and the mysterious ruins of a medieval settlement in Zimbabwe. In Johannesburg, they witness a celebration of black gold diggers. Their journey ends at the southernmost tip of Africa under Table Mountain in Cape Town. The end of the film depicts the birth of a volcano shot from close range.

The feature-length film by engineers J. Hanzelka and M. Zikmund captures how the two travelers prepared for their first trip around the world and in documentary footage describes their experiences from the first half of the trip through Africa. You will see for yourself what obstacles they had to overcome on the ravaged roads of Abyssinia and in what danger the fate of the expedition was during the daring passage through the Nubian desert. The film culminates with an ascent to the highest mountain in Africa, the extinct volcano Kilimanjaro, whose peak is covered in ice all year round.

Travelers Hansel and Zikmund sail from Africa to South America. On their journey to film, they capture clouds of locusts on the plains of Argentina's Chaco, a snake farm in Butantane, skyscrapers in Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro, a visit to lepers in Paraguay, waterfalls in Iguazu, a daring expedition to the jungles of the Marañon river basin to hunt skull hunters. an Indian settlement in Panama and the journey ends prematurely in Mexico amidst the ruins of ancient Indian temples and pyramid.

This 95-minute, full-color documentary was released in the U.S. as Sixth Continent. That continent is Africa - or, more specifically, the coast of Ethiopia. Director Folco Quillici takes his cameras deep, deep into the waters near the coastal islands of Dalach, observing the passing parade of sea life on an up-close-and-personal basis. Particularly thrilling is a shark attack and its aftermath, with the cinematographers obviously in the thick of things. Gian Caspare Napolitano provides the narration, while the lush, evocative musical score is the handiwork of Roberto Nicolosi.