Impactful Films

Seven years after the death of his wife, widower Shigeharu seeks advice on how to find a new wife from a colleague. Taking advantage of their position as a film company, they stage an audition. Interviewing a series of women, Shigeharu is enchanted by the quiet Asami. But soon things take a twisted turn as Asami isn’t what she seems to be.

When petty criminal Luke Jackson is sentenced to two years in a Florida prison farm, he doesn't play by the rules of either the sadistic warden or the yard's resident heavy, Dragline, who ends up admiring the new guy's unbreakable will. Luke's bravado, even in the face of repeated stints in the prison's dreaded solitary confinement cell, "the box," make him a rebel hero to his fellow convicts and a thorn in the side of the prison officers.

After high school slacker Ferris Bueller successfully fakes an illness in order to skip school for the day, he goes on a series of adventures throughout Chicago with his girlfriend Sloane and best friend Cameron, all the while trying to outwit his wily school principal and fed-up sister.

A drop-out from upper-class America picks up work along the way on oil-rigs when his life isn't spent in a squalid succession of bars, motels, and other points of interest.

Australian good girl Sandy and greaser Danny fell in love over the summer. But when they unexpectedly discover they're now in the same high school, will they be able to rekindle their romance despite their eccentric friends?

This film documents the coal miners' strike against the Brookside Mine of the Eastover Mining Company in Harlan County, Kentucky in June, 1973. Eastovers refusal to sign a contract (when the miners joined with the United Mine Workers of America) led to the strike, which lasted more than a year and included violent battles between gun-toting company thugs/scabs and the picketing miners and their supportive women-folk. Director Barbara Kopple puts the strike into perspective by giving us some background on the historical plight of the miners and some history of the UMWA. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with New York Women in Film & Television in 2004.

This film follows the hunting of a giraffe by four members of the Ju/'hoansi (a !Kung Bushmen tribe) over a 13-day period in the Kalahari desert. The film consists of footage shot in 1952-53 on a Smithsonian-Harvard Peabody expedition.

1943 silent short film

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.

A petty criminal fakes insanity to serve his sentence in a mental ward rather than prison. He soon finds himself as a leader to the other patients—and an enemy to the cruel, domineering nurse who runs the ward.

A commanding officer defends three scapegoats on trial for a failed offensive that occurred within the French Army in 1916.

A Jewish pawnbroker, a victim of Nazi persecution, loses all faith in his fellow man until he realizes too late the tragedy of his actions.

A burger-loving hit man, his philosophical partner, a drug-addled gangster's moll and a washed-up boxer converge in this sprawling, comedic crime caper. Their adventures unfurl in three stories that ingeniously trip back and forth in time.

When Dr. Indiana Jones – the tweed-suited professor who just happens to be a celebrated archaeologist – is hired by the government to locate the legendary Ark of the Covenant, he finds himself up against the entire Nazi regime.

1989 film by Michael Moore

1940 film directed by Ernst Lubitsch

Two musicians witness a mob hit and struggle to find a way out of the city before they are found by the gangsters. Their only opportunity is to join an all-girl band as they leave on a tour. To make their getaway they must first disguise themselves as women, then keep their identities secret and deal with the problems this brings - such as an attractive bandmate and a very determined suitor.

A concert film documenting Talking Heads at the height of their popularity, on tour for their 1983 album "Speaking in Tongues." The band takes the stage one by one and is joined by a cadre of guest musicians for a career-spanning and cinematic performance that features creative choreography and visuals.

A Hungarian immigrant, his friend, and his cousin go on an unpredictable adventure across America.

Errol Morris's unique documentary dramatically re-enacts the crime scene and investigation of a police officer's murder in Dallas.