UCL now has access to the World Cinema Collection from film streaming platform Films on Demand
By Sarah Gilmore, on 7 July 2022
UCL staff and students now have access to the World Cinema Collection from film streaming platform Films on Demand.
World Cinema Collection includes the best of the silent era, groundbreaking international directors, masterpieces from the mid-20th century, and contemporary films from around the world, including Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean, the Middle East, and North America
Highlights include:
- German film – Fritz Lang’s Metropolis and M, Josef Von Sternberg’s The Blue Angel, Walter Ruttmann’s Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis, multiple films by F. W. Murnau and G. W. Pabst (including Pandora’s Box and Diary of a Lost Girl), as well as films by Paul Leni, Robert Siodmak, and Robert Wiene.
- French film – Georges Méliès’s seminal work A Trip to the Moon, as well as films by Jean Renoir (Rules of the Game and Diary of a Chambermaid), Luis Buñuel’s France-based work (including An Andalusian Dog, Tristana, and The Golden Age), and René Clair (The Million).
- Japanese film – 16 films by Akira Kurosawa (including Rashomon, Drunken Angel, and Stray Dog), 21 films by Kenji Mizoguchi (including The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums, Sansho the Bailiff, and Ugetsu), 16 films by Yasujirō Ozu (including Tokyo Story; I Was Born, But…; and Late Spring), and films by contemporary directors such as Juzo Itami and Kazuyoshi Okuyama.
- Soviet, Eastern European and Central Asian film – 10 films by Sergei Eisenstein (including Battleship Potemkin, October, Strike, and Ivan the Terrible), and award-winning contemporary films from Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Yugoslavia, Bosnia, Croatia, Albania, Serbia, Macedonia, and Georgia (including When Father Was Away on Business, Fine Dead Girls, and A Wonderful Night in Split).
- American film – multiple titles from Buster Keaton (including The General and Steamboat Bill Jr.), D.W. Griffith (including The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance), Charlie Chaplin, and others representing the best of early American cinema, plus films by Douglas Sirk, Alfred Hitchcock, Frank Capra, Ida Lupino, Orson Welles, Busby Berkeley, and others covering the golden age of Hollywood.
- African film – Cairo Station by Youssef Chahine, six films by Ousmane Sembène (including Black Girl aka La Noire de…, and The Curse aka Xala), two films by Flora Gomes (Those Whom Death Refused and Tree of Blood) and acclaimed contemporary films such as The Night of Truth, Daughter of Keltoum, and Max and Mona.
- Italian film – classics from Vittorio De Sica (including The Bicycle Thief and Two Women), Federico Fellini (including La Dolce Vita and Variety Lights), and Roberto Rossellini (including Paisan; Rome, Open City; and Journey to Italy), as well as films by Luchino Visconti, Michelangelo Antonioni, and Giuseppe De Santis.
- Chinese-language film – the 1993 Cannes Palme d’Or winner Farewell My Concubine (Chen Kaige), Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu), four films by King Hu (Dragon Gate Inn, Touch of Zen, The Fate of Lee Khan, and Raining in the Mountain), four of Zhang Yimou’s most famous films (The Story of Qiu Ju, Red Sorghum, and Ju Dou), as well as two films by Tsai Ming-Liang (The River and Vive L’Amour).
- Latin American film – classics from Glauber Rocha (including Black God, White Devil; Antonio Das Mortes; and Entranced Earth), 12 of Luis Buñuel’s Mexico-based productions (including Cannes Palme d’Or winner Viridiana, The Exterminating Angel, and Simon of the Desert), and award-winning contemporary films by directors from Mexico, Brazil, Columbia, Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, Cuba, Chile, and Ecuador.
- Turkish and Middle Eastern film – seven films by Turkish director Yılmaz Güney (including Cannes Palme d’Or winner The Way aka Yol, and Hope aka Umut) as well as award-winning contemporary films from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Israel, and Palestine (including The Kite, The White Meadows, and Toll Booth).
- British film – the pre-Hollywood work of major British directors like Alfred Hitchcock (including The 39 Steps, The Lady Vanishes, and The Man Who Knew Too Much) and Michael Anderson (1984 and The Naked Edge).
- Indian film – 14 films by Satyajit Ray (including Pather Panchali, The World of Apu, Aparajito, and The Big City), as well as films by contemporary directors such as Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Partho Sen-Gupta, and Rajesh Shera.
- Caribbean film – contemporary films from Curaçao, Cuba, Haiti, and Trinidad and Tobago distributed by ArtMattan Productions, a leading distributor of films from the African diaspora.
All foreign language films are accompanied by English subtitles
Please send feedback on this resource to your subject librarian.