Movies Similar to Polar Bears: A Summer Odyssey

Fields of Sacrifice(1964)

This 1964 documentary returns to the battlefields where over 100,000 Canadian soldiers lost their lives in the First and Second World Wars. The film also visits cemeteries where servicemen are buried. Filmed from Hong Kong to Sicily, this documentary is designed to show Canadians places they have reason to know but may not be able to visit. Produced for the Canadian Department of Veteran Affairs by the renowned documentary filmmaker Donald Brittain. (NFB)

Ein Ehrenmann geht…(1971)

The film follows the career of Karl-Theodor Molinari from major in the Wehrmacht to general in the Bundeswehr. Authentic archive material and eyewitness testimonies are used to gather evidence of Molinari's guilt in the deaths of over a hundred French resistance fighters.

The Alps - Climb of Your Life(2007)

In 1966, John Harlin II died while attempting Europe's most difficult climb, the North Face of the Eiger in Switzerland. 40 years later, his son John Harlin III, an expert mountaineer and the editor of the American Alpine Journal, returns to attempt the same climb.

Torino 20venti - Storie da un altro mondo(2020)

Shots of Turin, deserted because of the pandemic, interweave with images of the movies that have been shot in the city ever since the dawn of cinematography.

Land Without Bread(1933)

An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.

Railway Station(1980)

Kieslowski’s later film Dworzec (Station, 1980) portrays the atmosphere at Central Station in Warsaw after the rush hour.

Eine Stadt und ihre Soldaten(1979)

East German short film

Because the World Never Stops(2016)

Shot live in the studio during the evening broadcast on Swedish public television, the film shows the news like you've never seen them before.

Afrocentricity(2000)

On the surface, this collection of shorts by up-and-coming African American filmmakers arrived at a perfect time. The cutting-edge products of the New Black Cinema of the early '90s had disappeared, giving way to embarrassingly stereotypical, scatological fare such as Booty Call and Next Friday. This feature-packed compilation (which includes production notes, interviews with all of the filmmakers, and audio commentary by four) attempts to prove that African American cinema is intent on moving past the lowbrow humor, as six of the seven shorts steer clear of any comedy.

Quest for the Ring(2001)

Solar Do-Nothing Machine(1990)

In 1957, Charles and Ray designed the Solar Do-Nothing Machine for Alcoa, the Aluminum Company of America. True to the Eameses’ belief that toys are not as innocent as they appear, the machine was one of the first uses of solar power to produce electricity. In the 1990s, Eames Demetrios discovered unedited footage of the wonderful machine. He cut it together to produce a new film that shares a bit of its flavor for future generations to enjoy.

The Grizzlies of Siberia(1999)

Naturalists Charlie Russell and Maureen Enns film recently discovered grizzlies on Siberia's Kamchatka peninsula.

Donner, Blitz und Regen(1930)

Short film about light and weather phenomena

Περιπτώσεις του ΟΧΙ(1965)

Twenty Years After(1944)

This short celebrates the 20th anniversary of MGM. Segments are shown from several early hits, then from a number of 1944 releases.

Film for Blind Poet(2012)

Glauco Mattoso, a blind sadomasochistic poet, agrees to participate in a documentary about his own life, but the conditions he imposes raise difficulties to the work of the young director.

The Water Map(2024)

The Water Map is an essayistic journey through the ethnography and landscapes of the Region of Murcia. These places are in the process of disappearing due to the increasing and abundant agricultural exploitation. Water has marked the territory and the culture of the area, and with its disappearance, the memories of four characters fade away.

The Himalayas(2011)

The highest mountain range in the world, the Himalayan range is far reaching, spanning thousands of miles, and holds within it an exceptionally diverse ecology. Coniferous and subtropical forests, wetlands, and montane grasslands are as much a part of this world as the inhospitable, frozen mountaintops that tower above. The word Himalaya is Sanskrit for abode of snow, fitting for a stretch of land that houses the world’s largest non polar ice masses. Extensive glacial networks feed Asia's major rivers including the Ganges, Indus, and Brahmaputra. More than a billion people rely on these glacier-fed water sources for drinking water and agriculture. The Himalayas are not only a remarkable expanse of natural beauty. They're also crucial for our survival.

Kekaiulu Hula Studio(2022)

Kekaiulu Hula Studio follows the Proclaimed Hula Halau of the same name, showcasing their twist on what the real reason for hula is and what life as a dancer in the halau is really like. Something previously unseen in the public eye.

Siberian Apocalypse(2006)

This astounding documentary delves into the mysteries of the Tunguska event – one of the largest cosmic disasters in the history of civilisation. At 7.15 am, on 30th June 1908, a giant fireball, as bright the sun, exploded in the sky over Tunguska in central Siberia. Its force was equivalent to twenty million tonnes of TNT, and a thousand times greater than that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945. An estimated sixty million trees were felled over an area of over two thousand square kilometres - an area over half the size of Rhode Island. If the explosion had occurred over London or Paris, hundreds of thousands of people would have been killed.