During World War II, a hand-picked group of American GI’s undertook a bizarre mission: create a traveling road show of deception on the battlefields of Europe, with the German Army as their audience. The 23rd Headquarters Special Troops used inflatable rubber tanks, sound trucks, and dazzling performance art to bluff the enemy again and again, often right along the front lines. Many of the men picked to carry out these dangerous deception missions were artists. Some went on to become famous, including fashion designer Bill Blass. In their spare time, they painted and sketched their way across Europe, creating a unique and moving visual record of their war. Their secret mission was kept hushed up for nearly 50 years after the war’s end.
You May Also Like
“Radioactive Veteran” is a documentary short about Marine Corps veteran Donald Guy and his widow Mary. When Donald was serving in the early 1950s, the military ordered him to the Nevada Test Site, where they had begun conducting nuclear testing. Along with thousands of other Marines and soldiers, Donald was assured he was safe as he gazed at the billowing mushroom cloud and marched through the desert toward the atomic blast. Within only a few years, however, Donald began experiencing serious medical issues resulting from radiation exposure and soon became disabled. For the rest of his life, he fought for disability benefits with Veterans Affairs, but in 2009 he died before receiving his due compensation. Over the next seven years, his widow Mary continued his fight for justice, as documented in “Radioactive Veteran.”
In Egypt, 1888 Flinders Petrie finally broke in to the burial chamber of King Amenemhat III one of the wealthiest monarchs from the middle kingdom. After a year of digging, he finally peered into the resting place of the old king, only to find that the space had been stripped of everything. Four experts have been brought together to reopen the case to solve the mystery.
Actor Stephen Tobolowsky has acted in over 200 TV shows and films over the past 40 years, possessing one of the most dazzlingly diverse filmographies on the planet. But even more compelling than the stories he’s been apart of onscreen are those he tells offscreen. In ‘The Primary Instinct,’ Stephen plays himself and uses the art of storytelling to take the audience through a riveting and moving journey about life, love, and Hollywood. Along the way, he just may answer one of the questions that’s dogged humanity since the beginning of time: Why do we tell stories in the first place?
Renowned documentary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker captures Otis Redding in his ascendancy, singing at the historic Monterey International Pop Festival in June 1967. Comedian Tom Smothers introduces Redding to a crowd that is leaving — until Redding grabs them with his charged rendition of “Shake.” Redding’s performance also includes “Respect” (which he wrote), “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long,” “Satisfaction,” and “Try a Little Tenderness.” Tragically, Redding died in a plane crash six months later. An innovative filmmaker who started in the 1950s making experimental films, Pennebaker garnered an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary Feature in 1993 for The War Room, his behind-the-scenes look at Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign. His other subjects have included Norman Mailer, Bob Dylan, and David Bowie.
Finding Sally tells the incredible story of a 23-year-old woman from an upper-class family who became a communist rebel with the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party.
September 18, 1980, 6:25 p.m., Titan II base in Damascus, Arkansas. On this fateful night an explosion kills an Air Force member and transforms the lives of everyone on the base. Honing in on a single case of so-called “human error”, Command and Control juxtaposes precision on a minute scale against the gargantuan risks inherent in the United States’ aggressive nuclear proliferation policy during the Cold War.
David Spade riffs on the humiliations of doctor visits, lemur season in paradise, falling for clickbait and the one selfie he can never get right.
As 2015 marks a half a century since the Moors murderer was sentenced to life imprisonment, this documentary examines Ian Brady’s 50 years in jail. Among the contributors are prison officers, detectives, relatives of victims, pen pals and inmates who served time with him. They reveal how Brady has shown a psychopathic lack of connection with his crimes. Arrested and charged in 1965, he’s never been considered for parole, nor has he asked to be freed.
A young evangelical filmmaker is granted unprecedented access inside a controversial Christian behavior modification program for teens, where she discovers shocking secrets and young students that change her life.
An unprecedented UHD film on Karnataka’s rich Biodiversity narrated by David Attenborough. Portraying the state with highest number of Tigers and Elephants using the latest technology – a masterpiece showcasing the state, its flora, fauna.
Poetic journey through the shards and shadows of one boy’s war-ravaged youth.
