Myths die hard, and the history of the 20th century is no exception to this rule. Even today, we hold popular beliefs that we take for Evangelical truths. Thus, we believe that Hiroshima caused Japan to surrender, that the Marshall Plan saved Europe, that Adolf Hitler was a military genius, or that Mao Zedong was a necessary evil for China’s modernization. Of course, these judgements contain some truth; but, too broad-stroked to be accurate, they contradict the historical reality by denying its complexity. What if the truth was slightly different? Through an exploration of great national or international myths, this full archive documentary collection revisits the key moments of the 20th century with a new perspective in order to provide a new, smarter and more subtle interpretation, bringing elements to light that have been forgotten or sometimes overshadowed.
In 2004, shortly before Estonia's accession to NATO, the Russian intelligence service is approaching Alfred Vind, an official of the Estonian Ministry of Defense ...
Cheung Kei-sang and the orphan Chau Sai-kai, two young lovers from a village in Southern China, are forcibly separated on their marriage day due to the Japanese invasion. Filled with hatred and vengeance, Sai-kai joins a Kuomintang secret agency, becoming their spy, while Kei-sang ends up in a Communist guerrilla militia and receives training to be their government’s spy. It is through this militia group where Kei-sang meets Kong Sheung-hung, another Communist spy. Together, they go on a mission to search for a Japanese businessman, who looks eerily like Sheung-hung...
In 1988, renegade filmmaker Robert Altman and Pulitzer Prize–winning Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau created a presidential candidate, ran him alongside the other hopefuls during the primary season, and presented their media campaign as a cross between a soap opera and TV news. The result was the groundbreaking Tanner ’88, a piercing satire of media-age American politics.
During the Chinese Civil War, Du Xiumei leads a Red Army guerrilla group against Nationalist forces in the Silver River region. Amidst betrayal and mysterious deaths, local figure Pi Degui, with hidden loyalties, risks everything to aid the revolution and protect his comrades.
The classic BBC dramatisation of Tolstoy's epic story of love and loss set against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars. Anthony Hopkins heads the cast as Pierre Bezuhov (a role for which he won the 1972 Best Actor BAFTA); Morag Hood is the impulsive and beautiful Natasha Rostova; Alan Dobie is the dour but heroic Andrei Bolkonsky; and David Swift is Napoleon, whose decision to invade Russia in 1812 has far-reaching consequences for Pierre and the Rostov and Bolkonsky families. The twenty-part serial was the vision of producer David Conroy whose principle aim was to transfer the rich characterisation and incident from Tolstoy's greatest novel to a television drama. Scripted by Jack Pulman and directed by John Davies, Conroy's War And Peace boasts superb acting, award-winning design (1972 Best Design BAFTA) and breathtaking battle sequences which were filmed in former Yugoslavia.
During World War II, a Navy officer commands a pink sub with a crew of five rescued Army nurses and a combat-phobic supply officer in this series based on the 1959 movie starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis. Curtis's daughter Jamie Lee played one of the nurses (her first recurring role on network TV).
First aired in 1977
Set at the outbreak of WWII – mischievous playboy Ian Fleming is untroubled by the specter of impending war – chasing women, collecting rare books and living off his family fortune. Forever in the shadow of his brother Peter, and an eternal disappointment to his formidable mother Eve, Fleming dreams of becoming the ‘ultimate’ man – a hero, a lover, a brute and the one who always gets the girl. He is finally given some direction in his life when he’s recruited by the Director of Naval Intelligence to help in the effort against the Nazis. Suddenly, Fleming finds his chance to shine and prove his worth.