City Symphonies

This groundbreaking silent documentary captures the beauty and majesty of the New York City in its streets, skyscrapers, bridges, rail yards and harbors.

A black and white short film which documents a trip through Paris by train.

The life of a great city (Paris) from dawn until dusk, including the beautiful and the ragged, the rich and the poor, with little or no comment (intertitles) from the director, Cavalcanti (whose first film this was).

In 1626, Dutch traders bought Manhattan for $24 of beads and gift product. Within 30 years, there were 1,000 residents, and 300 years later, there were 8 million. This film celebrates the muscle, size, and majesty of Manhattan, starting at the river's edge where a huge-jawed steam shovel dredges. It's on to an ocean liner, then to a hole in the ground where men swing pickaxes, sledgehammers, and shovels. The camera then slowly examines a stately building by the shore. Behind and beside it is the city.

An experimental avant-garde film from director Henri Chomette in which the pure elements of form are emphasized.

This movie shows us one day in Berlin, the rhythm of that time, starting at the earliest morning and ends in the deepest night.

Documentary about Paris, beginning with views of Notre Dame, Arc de Triomphe, Les Invalides, Place de L'Opera, Louvre, the Paris Metro, traffic on the Seine, unloading coal and other forms of work, ending with shots of Pigalle-Montmartre at night.

Jean Fleury, a young engineer who has designed a revolutionary engine for the Revoil motor company, is engaged to Aimée Valois, a seamstress, his neighbor across the hall. But the charming young lady is hired one day by a nightclub and lets herself be lured by the easy life in Paris. So much so that, to Jean's great distress, she breaks up with him. But, along with time, Aimée gets tired of her vain and frivolous lifestyle and comes back to Jean.

An artist close to the avant-gardes, André Sauvage composed the first great filmed portrait of Paris. Its ambitious symphony of a big city marries, on the music composed by Jeff Mills, the changing rhythm of the Belle Époque.

Close shots of a railway train underway: track racing underneath, steam escaping, cars coupling, gears ratcheting, signals changing.

A tour of the nightlife in Prague during the Roaring Twenties. The city comes alive at night, from the cafes and nightclubs to the electrical generators which make it possible.

Against a backdrop of the night sky, Eugene Deslaw focuses the film on windows, streetlights and illuminated signs in Paris, Berlin, London and Prague.

A man travels around a city with a camera slung over his shoulder, documenting urban life with dazzling invention.

Two men and two women enjoy a pleasant Sunday at the beach amid the unending toil of the working week.

What starts off as a conventional travelogue turns into a satirical portrait of the town of Nice on the French Cote d'Azur, especially its wealthy inhabitants.

Regen is an experimental documentary film directed by Joris Ivens in 1929. It can be defined as a cinematic-poem. In 2021 Breve Storia Del Cinema restored the film with a new score composed by Nikolas Labrinakos.

A montage of the skyscrapers of Manhattan opens with a succession of stationary views of the upper portions of numerous buildings. This is followed by a wide variety of fluid shots, which also begin to show more and more of the surrounding city, in addition to the skyscrapers themselves.

A portrait of France's largest and most populous port cities, Marseille.

Documentary about the city of São Paulo, Brazil, having as model and inspiration the previous Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt (1927).

Belgian director Henri Storck presents a tribute to one of the most well-known spots in Belgium: the Ostende beach. Filming from everyone and everything, gathering a small collection of eight short films made in the 1920's, Storck invites the audience to feel the beach, the port, the surf, the wind and the dunes, giving us more than what the real images can really evoke, reaching a surreal level.

Leftist proletarian drama of a young woman who is assisted by a working class youth in finding justice and avenging her seduction by a rich man.