The Secret of Trees

13-year-old inventor Aidan has discovered that trees use a mathematical formula to gather sunlight in crowded forests. Now he wonders why we don't collect solar energy the same way.

Safari Ya Gari

This early travelogue film, made in a Kenyan train station, captures an impromptu musical performance. Some passengers eagerly join in while others sleep—blissfully unaware of the performance taking place around them.

Meet Marlon Brando

Journalists from all over America meet Marlon Brando in a New York hotel room to interview him about his new film, Morituri. Seeing this as an opportunity to let the legendary actor promote the film, they find Brando unwilling to talk about it, instead he is more interested in larking about and turning on the charm when being interviewed by a former winner of the Miss USA competition.

Iris

IRIS pairs legendary 87-year-old documentarian Albert Maysles with Iris Apfel, the quick-witted, flamboyantly dressed 93-year-old style maven who has had an outsized presence on the New York fashion scene for decades. More than a fashion film, the documentary is a story about creativity and how, even in Iris’ dotage, a soaring free spirit continues to inspire. IRIS portrays a singular woman whose enthusiasm for fashion, art and people are life’s sustenance and reminds us that dressing, and indeed life, is nothing but an experiment.

Psychiatry in Russia

In 1955, Albert Maysles traveled by motorcycle throughout Russia. During this trip, he shot what was to become his first film, 'Psychiatry in Russia', an unprecedented view into Soviet mental healthcare. Originally televised by the David Garroway Show on NBC-TV in 1956.

LaLee's Kin: The Legacy of Cotton

This heartbreaking documentary depicts the extreme poverty of an African-American family and their Mississippi Delta school district. LaLee's Kin takes us deep into the Mississippi Delta and the intertwined lives of LaLee Wallace, a great-grandmother struggling to hold her world together in the face of dire poverty, and Reggie Barnes, superintendent of the embattled West Tallahatchie School System. The film explores the painful legacy of slavery and sharecropping in the Delta.

Russian Close-Up

Albert Maysles' visual diary of the faces and places encountered along a cross country motorscooter ride through the Soviet Union in the late 1950s.

Jessye Norman Sings Carmen

Jessye Norman Sings Carmen is a gripping vérité study of the famous dramatic soprano’s approach to mastering Bizet’s heroine in recording sessions with Seiji Ozawa and the Orchestre National de France. Musical segments include performances of three arias and the great duets between Carmen and Don José

Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!

Orson Welles in Spain

Orson Welles pitches to potential investors his vision of a largely improvised bullfighter movie about an existential, James Dean type troubadour who sets himself apart from other matadors. In front of an audience of wealthy arts patrons, Welles pontificates on the state of cinema, the filmmaking process, and the art of bullfighting.

Anastasia

The life of Anastasia Stevens, an American dancer at the Bolshoi Ballet, at the height of the Cold War. An early work by the Maysles brothers for the NBC television network, produced by acclaimed screenwriter Bo Goldman.

Experiment on 114th Street

A 1968 documentary made under the aegis of the United States Office of Economic Opportunity, chronicling the early stages of the 114th Street Rehabilitation Project in Harlem.