Here at the Water's Edge
1961 · 60 min · Documentary
Leo Hurwitz’s film, Here At The Water’s Edge, features the 1960 New York City’s waterfront. Made with photographer Charles Pratt, the film is a cinematic poem to the people who work on the water. Pratt, who largely financed the film, made it possible for Leo to use his vision as an artist and filmmaker while the blacklist still over-shadowed his life and ability to work in other areas. Here At The Water’s Edge, a film without narration, draws our attention to the often-neglected life in, on and around water – as well as bringing into view what workers on the water give us. Leo, in his own work, was always concerned with seeing what is happening in spaces in the world where others fail to look.
Directed by Leo Hurwitz
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Dialogue with a Woman Departed · 1980Dialogue with a Woman Departed
★ 7.91980
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★ 7.51943
MovieDocumentary
1943 Oscar nominated film in the category Best Documentary, Short Subject.
Heart of Spain · 1937Heart of Spain
★ 7.51937
MovieDocumentary
The first production from Frontier Films, the film production collective that was the successor to NYKino and the Workers Film and Photo League, Heart of Spain focuses on the Spanish Civil War, a conflict that became a touchstone of its era and was the most forceful opposition to the rising threat of fascism in Europe. Heart of Spain was begun by Geza Karpathi and Herbert Kline, who ultimately turned their footage over to Paul Strand, Leo Hurwitz, and Ben Maddow to make the film. It is compelling both for its shrewd formal aesthetics and as a sympathetic human document of the war.
This Island · 1970This Island
★ 7.01970
MovieDocumentary
How the art in the Detroit Institute of Art connects to life's experiences and the neighborhood.
Strange Victory · 1948Strange Victory
★ 6.81948
MovieDocumentary
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The National Hunger March 1931 · 1932The National Hunger March 1931
★ 6.51932
MovieDocumentary
The film shows the National Unemployment Council Hunger March of Nov. and Dec. 1931, which set out from disparate parts of the U.S. to represent twelve million unemployed.
The Sun and Richard Lippold · 1966The Sun and Richard Lippold
★ 6.41966
MovieDocumentary
Documentary examining the work of sculptor Richard Lippold, particular his sculpture of the sun at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Native Land · 1942Native Land
★ 6.31942
MovieDramaHistory
By the start of World War II, Paul Robeson had given up his lucrative mainstream work to participate in more socially progressive film and stage productions. Robeson committed his support to Paul Strand and Leo Hurwitz’s political semidocumentary Native Land. With Robeson’s narration and songs, this beautifully shot and edited film exposes violations of Americans’ civil liberties and is a call to action for exploited workers around the country. Scarcely shown since its debut, Native Land represents Robeson’s shift from narrative cinema to the leftist documentaries that would define the final chapter of his controversial film career.
For Life, Against the War · 1967For Life, Against the War
★ 6.01967
MovieAnimation
First shown on January 30, 1967, FOR LIFE AGAINST THE WAR was an open-call, collective statement from American independent filmmakers disparate in style and sensibility but united by their opposition to the Vietnam War. Part of the protest festival Week of the Angry Arts, the epic compilation film incorporated minute-long segments which were sent from many corners of the country, spliced together and projected. The original presentation of the works was more of an open forum with no curation or selection, and in 2000 Anthology Film Archives preserved a print featuring around 40 films from over 60 submissions.
The Plow That Broke the Plains · 1936The Plow That Broke the Plains
★ 5.91936
MovieDocumentary
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Detroit Workers News Special 1932: Ford Massacre · 1932Detroit Workers News Special 1932: Ford Massacre
1932
MovieDocumentary
The only known film record of the mass march and meeting held in Detroit on Feb. 4, 1932, against hunger and unemployment. Also shows the dramatic demonstration by workers at the Ford auto plant in River Rouge, Michigan in March of 1932, which ended with a violent attack by Dearborn police and Ford Company guards on the crowd with clubs, tear gas and guns which killed four young men. These deaths set off a wave of protest across the country.
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1964
MovieDramaDocumentary
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1951
MovieMusicTV Movie
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Emergency Ward · 1952Emergency Ward
1952
MovieDocumentary
Shot in Manhattan’s St. Vincent Hospital, creating what would be the antecedent of the direct cinema (or cinema verité) movement of the late 1950s and early 1960s.
In Search of Hart Crane · 1966In Search of Hart Crane
1966
MovieDocumentary
Produced and directed by Hurwitz for National Educational Television (precursor of PBS), Hurwitz uses biographer and Columbia professor, John Unterecker, to help him look for the poet, Hart Crane, in his work and in the memories of many of his contemporaries. In Search of Hart Crane, 1966, is one of the very first interview-driven documentaries and is still a masterpiece of the literary documentary film.
The Museum and the Fury · 1956The Museum and the Fury
1956
MovieDocumentary
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