China: The Roots of Madness is a 1967 Cold War era, made-for-TV documentary film produced by David L. Wolper, written by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Theodore H. White with production cost funded by a donation from John and Paige Curran. The film has been released under Creative Commons license. It won an Emmy Award in the documentary category. The film… Read more →
Marihuana is a 1936 exploitation film directed by Dwain Esper, and written by Esper’s wife, Hildagarde Stadie. Plot: Burma is a confused girl who likes to party. One day she meets some strangers in a bar who invite her and her group to a party. She goes to the party with her friends, they all drink alcohol, only the girls… Read more →
The Birth of a Nation (originally called The Clansman) is a 1915 American silent epic drama film directed and co-produced by D. W. Griffith and starring Lillian Gish. The screenplay is adapted from the novel and play The Clansman, both by Thomas Dixon Jr. Griffith co-wrote the screenplay (with Frank E. Woods), and co-produced the film (with Harry Aitken). It… Read more →
The Man Without a Country is a 1917 American silent film adaptation of Edward Everett Hale’s short story The Man Without a Country. It was directed by Ernest C. Warde, and starred Florence La Badie, Holmes Herbert, and J. H. Gilmour, and released by Thanhouser Film Corporation. The film follows closely to the storyline of the book, and was a… Read more →
Resisting Enemy Interrogation is a 1944 United States Army docudrama training film, directed by Bernard Vorhaus and written by Harold Medford and Owen Crump. The cast includes Arthur Kennedy, Mel Tormé, Lloyd Nolan, Craig Stevens and Peter Van Eyck. Resisting Enemy Interrogation was intended to train United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) crews to resist interrogation by the Germans. Resisting… Read more →
Attack! The Battle of New Britain is a documentary/propaganda film produced by the US military in 1944. It details, as its name implies, the New Britain campaign, which was part of the New Guinea and Solomon Islands Campaigns during World War II. The film follows a rather standard format: it is a chronological narrative of the campaign from the arrival… Read more →
Reefer Madness (originally made as Tell Your Children and sometimes titled as The Burning Question, Dope Addict, Doped Youth, and Love Madness) is a 1936–1939 American propaganda film revolving around the melodramatic events that ensue when high school students are lured by pushers to try marijuana—from a hit and run accident, to manslaughter, suicide, attempted rape, hallucinations, and descent into… Read more →
My Japan is a 1945 American anti-Japanese propaganda short film produced to spur sale of American war bonds. The film takes the form of a mock travelogue of Japan, presented by an impersonated Japanese narrator. By U.S. War Finance Division, U.S. Department of the Treasury (http://www.archive.org/details/MyJapan1945) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Info.
Last Clear Chance is a 1959 American short film produced and directed by Robert Carlisle. Sponsored by Union Pacific Railroad, Last Clear Chance is a safety film intended to warn young drivers to be careful at railroad crossings. The film’s cast consists of William Boyett, Harold Agee, Mrs. Harold Agee, Tim Bosworth, William Agee, Christine Lynch, and Lou Spraker. Written… Read more →
The Fight for the Sky is a short propaganda film commissioned by the US government to highlight the victories of the Allied air forces over Europe prior to the Normandy invasion and narrated by Ronald Reagan. Opening with shots of aerial combat over Europe the film turns to footage of the airmen acting casually in their base in East Anglia,… Read more →
