Greece on the Brink

A visit to Athens, Greece and the island of Rhodes.

When Robert Lax was approached in the early 1980s about doing a video documentary on him, he had only one condition—that it be focused on his creative work and not a biography of his personal life. “Let’s keep it simple and about the work, with maybe some comments on it. No baby pictures PLEASE!” This documentary is an attempt at an introduction to the important works of poet Robert Lax.

32.Day, a news classic by Mehmet Ali Birand, is with you this time with the documentary 50 Years of Cyprus!

Nearly 100 years after its creation, the power of the U.S. Federal Reserve has never been greater. Markets and governments around the world hold their breath in anticipation of the Fed Chairman's every word. Yet the average person knows very little about the most powerful - and least understood - financial institution on earth. Narrated by Liev Schreiber, Money For Nothing is the first film to take viewers inside the Fed and reveal the impact of Fed policies - past, present, and future - on our lives. Join current and former Fed officials as they debate the critics, and each other, about the decisions that helped lead the global financial system to the brink of collapse in 2008. And why we might be headed there again.

How do 1.1 billion people around the world live on less than one dollar a day? Four young friends set out to research and live this reality. Armed with only a video camera and a desire to understand, they spend just 56 dollars each for 56 days in rural Pena Blanca, Guatemala. They battle E.Coli, financial stress, and the realization that there are no easy answers. Yet, the generosity and strength of their neighbors, Rosa, Anthony and Chino gives them resilient hope. They return home transformed and embark on a mission to share their new found understanding with other students, inspiring and challenging their generation to make a difference.

The film documents the conversion of young Greek Military Police (ESA) recruits into torturers and touches on the subject of the power of the institution to compel otherwise moral human beings to torture. The documentary examines the processes and methods of the military junta that ruled Greece from 1967 to 1974.

The sights of Athens and the Greek Isles are shown, including the Temple of Poseidon, city of Rhodes, the shores of Santorini, the Acropolis and the Parthenon.

With the Olympics returning to Greece, the opening ceremony of Athens 2004 sought to show the entire development of the Olympics over the centuries, until arriving at the modern Olympics.

Lost in the Bewilderness is a feature-length documentary about the filmmaker’s cousin Lucas, kidnapped at age five from his native Greece, and found on the eve of his 16th birthday in the US. This story of international parental abduction, filmed for over twenty years, chronicles Lucas’s journey of growth and self-discovery, and culminates with Lucas becoming a father himself. Lost in the Bewilderness is not only a detective story but also a lyrical meditation on childhood, lost and found, and an exploration of how the themes of ancient Greek myth and tragedy, with the family at their center, are still very much alive in the modern world.

This documentary looks at the factors that led to the 2008 financial crisis and the efforts made by then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Federal Reserve Bank of New York President Timothy Geithner, and Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke to save the United States from an economic collapse.