Movies and TvShows featuring "cultural-studies" theme.

An examination of the evolution of commercials as an artistic medium, featuring interviews with media luminaries who relate how the in-your-face stylistic conventions of commercials have influenced feature films and the visual arts. A documentary film talking about art and advertising divided in three parts: 1. Crossing Over - from cinema to ads from ads to cinema 2. Humour - How humour affects us in advertising 3. Shock - The way shock is used to sell

From Caligari to Hitler is a documentary that examines the sociological and cultural impact of German Expressionist cinema during the Weimar Republic. It delves into the influence of films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari on the people's psyche and how it paved the way for the rise of fascism and National Socialism in Germany. The film also discusses the role of sociological factors and analyzes the political and historical context of the time.

The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu (2010) is a biographical documentary film that explores the life and political career of Nicolae Ceausescu, the former dictator of Romania. The film delves into Ceausescu's rise to power, his implementation of an oppressive communist regime, and his eventual downfall during the Romanian Revolution. It examines various aspects of Ceausescu's rule, including media manipulation, cultural studies, and the cult of personality that surrounded him. The film also touches on broader themes such as the Cold War, international relations, and the impact of totalitarian states on society.

Videograms of a Revolution is a documentary film that chronicles the events of the Romanian Revolution of 1989, which led to the fall of Nicolae Ceaușescu's totalitarian regime. Through a compilation of amateur video footage shot by citizens during the revolution, the film provides a unique perspective on the historical events and captures the atmosphere of fear, hope, and change that permeated the country. It also explores the role of media and representation in shaping public opinion during times of social and political upheaval.

Cultural theorist Stuart Hall offers an extended meditation on representation. Moving beyond the accuracy or inaccuracy of specific representations, Hall argues that the process of representation itself constitutes the very world it aims to represent, and explores how the shared language of a culture, its signs and images, provides a conceptual roadmap that gives meaning to the world rather than simply reflecting it. Hall's concern throughout is the centrality of culture to the shaping of our collective perceptions, and how the dynamics of media representation reproduce forms of symbolic power.

A person’s culture is something that is often described as fixed or defined and rooted in a particular region, nation, or state. Stuart Hall, one of the most preeminent intellectuals on the Left in Britain, updates this definition as he eloquently theorizes that cultural identity is fluid—always morphing and stretching toward possibility but also constantly experiencing nostalgia for a past that can never be revisited.

In both his private and public life, Foucault often contradicted himself, especially when his ideas collided with the institutions where he worked. Contemporary critics and philosophers reframe their legacy in an effort to build new ways of thinking about his struggle against the mechanisms of domination within society, demonstrating how the conflict lies at the heart of his life and work.

Cinema has long fed our fascination with other cultures, and appears to be just one facet of what is a fundamentally visual fascination. One of the most elaborate manifestations of this was the 1931 Exposition Coloniale Internationale, held in Paris to celebrate ‘la France des 5 continents’. This exhibition sought to represent to the people of France their colonial world by reordering and reconstructing it into scenes or tableaux of everyday indigenous life. This entailed shipping over scores of indigènes and forcing them to act out the gestures of their ‘everyday lives’ under the eyes of 1930’s Parisian society. A slightly less elaborate, although equally controversial at the time, visual representation of The Other was one of the first film documentaries to be made which sought to represent the lives of a colonised people, Marc Allégret’s Voyage au Congo.

The Happy Island looks at the work of the London Missionary Society on Gemo (now Hanudamua) Island in Port Moresby harbour, Papua New Guinea, which from 1937-1974 treated people who suffered from infectious diseases, mainly leprosy and tuberculosis. The film offers insight into the attitudes and practices of Christian missionaries of that time. Despite the colonial paternalism that underpins the Missionary Society’s model of care, the film tells the story of a happy, active community, as it follows the lives of the patients, their families and the dedicated staff, all of whom live, work and socialise on the island together.

An educational short about families from around the world, what they eat and how they cook.