Browsing: Biographies
Bad boy journalist Dr. Hunter S. Thompson - equally famous for his railings against the Nixon administration in the pages of Rolling Stone and his well-chronicled personal adventures with drugs, alcohol and the Hell's Angels -was an iconic counter-cultural hero of the 1960s and '70s.
After Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room and Taxi to the Dark Side, Hunter S. Thompson seems like an odd subject for Alex Gibney to take on. Unlike the Enron executives or Baghram guards, the gonzo journalist didn't bilk old...
Posted in: Biographies, News & Politics
Before there was Osama bin Laden there was Ayatollah Khomeini, a radical Muslim leader who challenged the world’s “infidels” in the name of Allah. After his father was killed by bandits, the young Khomeini was brought up by his mother and aunt. However, when he was only fifteen he suffered further loss as his aunt died and then shortly afterwards his mother also passed away. Under the guidance of his elder brother he learnt Islamic science, literature, and philosophy, eventually becoming a leading authority...
A Brilliant Madness is the story of a mathematical genius whose career was cut short by a descent into madness. At the age of 30, John Nash, a stunningly original and famously eccentric MIT mathematician, suddenly began claiming that aliens were communicating with him and that he was a special messenger.
Diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Nash spent the next three decades in and out of mental hospitals, all but forgotten. During that time, a proof he had written at the age of 20 became a foundation of modern...
Title aside, we'll never see the likes of Tupac Shakur again. The late rap superstar was a complex, contradictory figure and, throughout the course of this riveting documentary, it's as if he's back in our world again. Produced by his mother, former Black Panther Afeni Shakur, Tupac Resurrection isn't so much "biased" as it's subjective.
In the MTV film, accompanied by a book and soundtrack, director Lauren Lazin looks at Tupac's short, full life from beginning to end and doesn't avoid the dark times--the...
Posted in: Biographies, Sport & Adventure
Believe the hype. This much-praised documentary about one of the most famous boxing matches in history deserves every one of its accolades. Blending sports drama and biography with a touch of political analysis, When We Were Kings relates the who, when, where, and most importantly the why of the 1974 George Foreman/Muhammad Ali world championship fight in Zaire.
Splicing together old news footage, photos, and contemporary interview clips, director Leon Gast captures the excitement and chaos that led up to the...
Garry Kasparov is arguably the greatest chess player who has ever lived. In 1997 he played a chess match against IBM's computer Deep Blue. Kasparov lost the match. This film shows the match and the events surrounding it from Kasparov's perspective. It delves into the psychological aspects of the game, paranoia surrounding it and suspicions that have arisen around IBM's true tactics. It consists of interviews with Kasparov, his manager, chess experts, and members of the IBM Deep Blue team, as well as original...
Posted in: Biographies, News & Politics
North Vietnamese communist politician, prime minister 1954-55, and president 1954-69. Having trained in Moscow shortly after the Russian Revolution, he headed the communist Vietminh from 1941 and fought against the French during the Indochina War 1946-54, becoming president and prime minister of the republic at the armistice.
Aided by the communist bloc, he did much to develop industrial potential. He relinquished the premiership in 1955, but continued as president. In the years before his death, Ho successfully...
Posted in: Biographies, News & Politics
His Life follows Bill Clinton through his college days as a war protester, his years of purported womanizing as governor of Arkansas, his possible connections to drug trafficking and subsequent murders, ‘Filegate,' the Whitewater scandal and his questionable decisions, campaign financing and practices during his two terms as President of the United States - always in the shadow of wife Hillary.
Interspersed with interviews, His Life is a thought-provoking documentary in the narrative style which compels the...
Posted in: Biographies, War
From his famous motorcycle trips to his historic role in the Cuban Revolution, Argentinean revolutionary Che Guevara is profiled in a documentary produced to explore the life of the man whose visage has become an iconic symbol of hard left politics. This man, who ordered the execution of countless human beings while in charge of the notorious La Cabaña prison in Havana, who terrorized Cuban society and who denied freedom to thousands of citizens whom he considered "deviants" or "anti-revolutionaries" can never be...



