影片由“冬”“早春”“春节”三个部分构成：内蒙古海拉尔的风雪中套马，大马车拉着皮、毛在风雪中奔驰，沙漠中驼队在运输，小羊羔在母羊身边吃奶，孩子们在打雪仗的，一家玻璃窗上一位小姑娘吹化的冰花；乍暖还寒的雾蒙蒙的太湖上，鸭子在嬉戏，飘浮着的船只，湖边春暖花开；春节前孩子们放风筝，耍龙舞、吹糖人、表演“双推磨”，大娘烧团圆饭等。影片构图追求一种中国画的效果。

Documentary about the building of blast furnaces by the communist youth workers organisation Komsomol, constructed as part of the first five year plan of Stalin's Soviet Union. The film is set Magnitogorsk in the de Ural, where an industrial city of over 200.000 people was built in just a few years, and in the Kubas basin in Siberia. The film is a tribute to the achievements of the volunteers, the Komsomol, but does not show the dark side of history: the thousands of imprisoned Kulach doing hard labour under terrible conditions. Influenced by the Russian filmmaker Vsevolod Pudovkin, Ivens tells the story by following one non-fiction character, a non-actor, who re-enacted the scenes. this form of 'personalised story', which we would call docudrama, reappears after this first attempt in Komsomol in many Ivens films.

One of Joris Ivens' most poetic films is his first attempt to film the wind. With a beautiful photography, a powerful editing and a poetic commentary the film tries to make the wind visible and tangible. It starts in black and white, continues in colour and ends in cinemascope to illustrate the force of the upcoming Mistral wind that blows in the south of France. The original scenario was much more elaborate and ambitious and fits Ivens' lifelong wish to film the impossible: the wind. It was difficult to find a producer for this film, for most people were rather sceptical to finance a film with an invisible main character. Finally Claude Nedjar was willing to produce the film, which despite many financial problems was finished in 1965.

1911年，13岁的伊文思在家人的协助下拍摄了一部长200米的影片《茅屋》，只是他的第一部电影习作。
On the age of 13 Joris Ivens was fond of Cowboys and Indians stories, so he decided to invent one himself. He made a script and used a camera from his father's shop. This became his first film Wigwam, with his own family as cast. Black Eagle, a bad indian, kidnaps the daughter of a farmer's family. Flaming Arrow, played by the young Joris Ivens, saves the child from the kidnapper and brings it back to her family. No better conclusion than smoking a piece pipe.

伊文思在《桥》和《雨》后拍了这部反映荷兰工人填海造田的杰出记录片，他运用和工人几乎一样的视角来拍摄，结果产生了一种几乎就是“摄影机”在劳动的效果，苏联工人笑称伊文思是工人阶级。
从这部影片开始，伊文思开始特别关注劳苦大众，虽然这部影片还没有他日后的左翼政治倾向，但是依然充满了理想主义。在1934年的《新的土地》中，建造提坝和开发新土地的荷兰工人发现他们突然失业了。。。这部片子理应被视为伊文思的一个转折点。

《塞纳河畔》（La Seine a rencontré Paris，尤里斯·伊文思，1958年|31分钟|35毫米|黑白|有声）以浓厚的诗情画意和温暖的人道情怀描绘了巴黎风情。影片开始，摄影机宛如轻盈的小船航行在塞纳河上，划过充满乡野气息的城郊，缓缓进入巴黎市区。接着，摄影机在塞纳河两岸驻足，展现岸边的生活场景：一个男人正在给自己补鞋，成群的市民漫无目的地闲逛，几个小痞子目不转睛地盯视在岸边拍照的女模特，恋人们旁若无人地沉溺在甜蜜的二人世界。一阵急雨袭来，人们迅速跑开。本片的创意源自法国电影史学家乔治·萨杜尔，试图在塞纳河与巴黎相逢的地方表现巴黎的风土人情（本片原名《塞纳河与巴黎相逢》。本片并非描写塞纳河和巴黎景色的风光片，而是一首充满温暖和煦的柔情、宽容慈悲的人道情怀以及洞察世事的幽默感的诗篇。本片拍摄完成不久就曾在中国放映，而且是导演亲自带来的拷贝。那时，他应中国政府文化部邀请访问中国，并应邀担任中央新闻纪录电影制片厂艺术顾问。本片导演尤里斯·伊文思（Joris Ivens，1898—1989）生于荷兰，年轻时代曾到许多国家拍片，后半生主要生活在法国巴黎。伊文思与中国的关系十分密切，从1938年拍摄《四万万人民》到文革时期拍摄《愚公移山》再到新时期拍摄《风的故事》，他多次来到中国并用摄影机记录下了中国不同时期的社会变迁。

The 400 million people of China are heirs to a great civilization, as their pagodas and stone lions can attest. But they are under attack from the Japanese. Civilian refugees walk, stumble, crawl to escape the destruction of their cities... While in the China of tradition, water buffalo still work the paddies and camels cross the desert, modern China is now a republic founded by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, with modern schools, heavy industry, large engineering projects... The government of Chiang Kai-shek resists the Japanese invasion from the coast. Madame Chiang receives a cheque from the U.S.A. for war relief. War production continues in distant villages safe from the grasp of the Japanese. With modern weapons the Chinese are pursuing their struggle behind enemy lines. And still their opponent persists in his reprisal bombings of civilian targets. "Will these people win?"

It is an autobiographical fiction starring Ivens as an old man who has spent his life trying to "tame the wind and harness the sea" by capturing them on film.

A lyrical portrait of Amsterdam and its changing appearance during a rain-shower.