Vagabunden Karawane: A musical trip through Iran, Afghanistan and India in 1979

The filmmaker Werner Penzel accompanied the group Embryo at the end of the 70s on their eight-month-long trip from Munich to the province of Calcutta, India. Back then, Embryo was one of the most innovative German rock bands. On their country adventure trip, the group encounters foreign cultures and their music. The film contains expressive pictures, cultural exchange, but also the strain of the trip as well as the social and political situations of the featured countries.

Trances

 

The groundbreaking Moroccan band Nass El Ghiwane is the dynamic subject of this captivating, one-of-a-kind documentary by Ahmed El Maanouni, who filmed the four musicians during a series of electrifying live performances in Tunisia, Morocco, and France; on the streets of Casablanca; and in intimate conversations. Storytellers through song and traditional instruments, and with connections to political theater, the band became a local phenomenon and an international sensation, thanks to its rebellious lyrics and sublime, fully acoustic sound, which draws on Berber rhythms, Malhun sung poetry, and Gnawa dances. Both a concert movie and a free-form audiovisual experiment, bolstered by images of the band’s rapt audience, Trances is pure cinematic poetry.

Complicated Women: Sex and Power in Pre-Code Hollywood

In the pre-Code Hollywood era, between 1929 and 1934, women in American cinema took lovers, had babies out of wedlock, got rid of cheating husbands, enjoyed their sexuality, led unapologetic careers, and, in general, acted the way many think women only acted after 1968.

Before then, women on screen had come in two varieties-sweet ingenue or vamp. Then two stars came along: Greta Garbo, who turned the femme fatale into a woman whose capacity for love and sacrifice made all other human emotions seem pale; and Norma Shearer, who succeeded in taking the ingenue to a place she'd never been: the bedroom. In their wake came a deluge of other complicated women-Marlene Dietrich, Jean Harlow, and Mae West, to name a few. Then, in July 1934, the draconian Production Code became the law in Hollywood and these modern women of the screen were banished, not to be seen again until the code was repealed three decades later.

Black Axe: Nigeria’s Mafia Cult

Black Axe is a confraternity in Nigeria that now operates as an international criminal organization, which originated around 1980. Among many crimes it was responsible for the Obafemi Awolowo University massacre.

According to BBC Africa over the 2010s they became one of the most far-reaching and dangerous organised crime groups in the world.

Two documents state that in Benin City, 35 million naira was funnelled to the Black Axe to "protect votes" and secure victory in a governorship election in 2012. In exchange for the support, the files suggest that "80 slots [were] allocated to NBM Benin Zone for immediate employment by the state government".

Over 2021 they attempted to steal €1m in welfare fraud during the COVID-19 pandemic in the Republic of Ireland.

Interpol arrested six alleged Black Axe leaders in Johannesburg in 2021, and they may be extradited to the United States. Members of the group are known as "Axemen". Its South African wing allegedly has security known as "butchers" to maintain discipline.

In November 2021 a massacre led by the group claimed six lives in the Okitipupa community, headquarters of Okitipupa Local Government Area of Ondo State, Nigeria.

There are many reports of the ill-effects of cultism on Nigerian society. One such report from 1999 states: "[Cults] have brutally ravaged Nigeria's 37 state-run institutions. The Obafemi Awolowo University massacre is only the most recent tragedy. Observers estimate that 150 students have been slain in the last five years, with scores more victimized by rape, assault, extortion, kidnapping, blackmail, torture and arson attack. Cultists—who often emulate the music and attitudes of American street-gang culture—dominate several campuses with intimidation tactics. Sometimes they employ threats of murder or extortion for seemingly petty ransoms, like an 'A' grade or a fraudulently written term paper. Unprotected students, professors and administrators are often forced to surrender whatever grades, goods and privileges the cultists demand."

By 2015 the Black Axe had become a persistent problem. Responsible for the involvement in the murders of at least 200 people in 2014 and carrying out other criminal activities around the world including Internet fraud (romance scams, inheritance scams, real estate scams and business email scams), murder, international smuggling of drugs, human trafficking, prostitution, use by politicians as 'hired thugs', extortion, counterfeiting of identity documents, cloning of credit cards, cheque fraud, advance-fee scams, robbery, and rape.

Members pledge allegiance to a deity called Korofo, the unseen God, according to their ideology they are fighting against colonial oppression. Their name comes from the Neo Black movement symbol featuring a black axe cutting chains of oppression. They have spies known as "eyes" all across Nigerian society.

Dust and Ashes - Maha Kumbh Mela

 

A 50 minute look at the profound faith of Hinduism that led 15 million people to the world’s largest human gathering - the great Kumbh Mela pilgrimage In Alahabad, India in 1989, for BBC 2’s “Under the Sun” series.

T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land" documentary

Read by noted actors Michael Gough, Edward Fox, and Eileen Atkins, T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land powerfully expresses the disillusionment and disgust of the post–World War I era in Europe. In this program, Professor Frank Kermode, of Cambridge University; Eliot biographer Peter Ackroyd; and poets Sir Stephen Spender and Craig Raine examine the complex nature of Eliot’s influential poem, analyze its appeal, and trace the reasons why it became one of the best-known emblems of the 20th century.

The Valley of the Sacred Fire

Presentation of the Kathmandu Valley, in Nepal, and of the restoration work carried out by UNESCO with the Nepalese government to preserve the Buddhist and Hindu temples of this sacred valley where faith plays an important role. Explanation of the architectural achievements and the artistic and artisanal work on images of the various sites with a commentary on the images of Bakthapur, Patan and the temple of Nyatapola. 

The visit continues with comments on images of Bodnath, the Hindu temple of Pashupatinath populated by monkeys, the sacred rituals of the people in the Bagmati River, the Hanuman Dhoka temple and the immense work of the craftsmen who contribute to its restoration to using ancient techniques.

The Sadhu who came to Varanasi from Italy

In 1974, a 22 year old Italian named Alessandro traveled to India. He never went back. The moment he entered Benares, he was captivated. He adopted the life of a Sadhu and was given the name Shiva Das. The gentle soul departed his mortal body in May 2020. 

I believe I met Baba Shiva Das at Assi Ghat in Varanasi in January or Feburary 1997. This is what he said to me (I wrote it down): 

 “Just make silence, the idea of turning off the ego machine and listening with your whole being. Become the harmony that is chanting the mantra, the names of God. Surrender to cosmic Bhakti, Live with balance in nature. Avoid the conflicts and chaos of desire. Realise what you need and travel through what is called days and nights. The moon is soma juice for all plants and from thoughts and actions you create us. Switch off and make the flow go the other way. Then tune consciousness through levels of perception to new states of ecstasy. What is really you is eternal and has been. We are all ascending into energy but there has been a breakdown. There has been a blockage along the way, a disturbance in the flow. Thoughts are self-fulfilling, so what happens if you stop thinking? Reality makes itself. Do not be distracted by your mind. Silence is penance.”

Anarchy in the UK: The New Underground Cinema (2016)

The definitive documentary that chronicles the UK's 'Misrule Cinema Movement' boom from (2010-2016) This period of social revolution and unrest gave birth to a new wave of pent-up creative energy and determined filmmakers who started shaking the chains of the mainstream film industries rigid cage, by making movies on mobile phones and using Youtube and Facebook to promote their films. Building their own cinemas and staging guerrilla-style movie screenings throughout the country.

Intrépidos Punks (1980 Eng Subs)

 

Hard to describe this surreal Mexican movie about a outlaw gang of 'punks' who ride motorcycles, rob and party. The music, the costumes and the hairstyles are on another level. It is difficult to imagine this film was intended to be a serious work with shock value. Today it comes across as funny and over the top. Brilliant.