Checkpoint Zoo

Birds of America

2022

In the first half of the 19th century, the French ornithologist Jean-Jacques Audubon travelled to America to depict birdlife along the Mississippi River. Audubon was also a gifted painter. His life’s work in the form of the classic book ‘Birds of America’ is an invaluable documentation of both extinct species and an entire world of imagination. During the same period, early industrialisation and the expulsion of indigenous peoples was in full swing. The gorgeous film traces Audubon’s path around the South today. The displaced people’s descendants welcome us and retell history, while the deserted vistas of heavy industry stretch across the horizon. The magnificent, broad images in Jacques Loeuille’s atmospheric, modern adventure reminds us at the same time how little - and yet how much - is left of the nature that Audubon travelled around in. His paintings of the colourful birdlife of the South still belong to the most beautiful things you can imagine.

Call Me Kate

2023

A feature documentary which captures Katharine Hepburn's spirit and determination, exploring her story using her own words, through a combination of hours of previously hidden and intimate audio tapes, video and photographic archive.

Les Derniers Secrets de l'humanité

2023

Préhistoire en Asie : L'Aventure humaine

2024

Vielfalt statt Artensterben: Die Menschheit am Scheideweg

2022

The loss of biodiversity is highly alarming: our planet is currently experiencing the greatest extinction since the age of the dinosaurs. This film documents the extinction of species currently happening around the world. But it also highlights hopeful initiatives as committed men and women on every continent fight to save endangered species and work towards improving biodiversity.

Mann vor wilder Landschaft

2019

War and Peace of Mind

2016

War and Peace of Mind explores what war does to the human mind and how both, the individuals and the nation as a whole, survive it psychologically. Finland and WWII, locally known as continuation war, is the backdrop of this documentary.

Pele's Appeal

1989

In the swirling volcanic steam and misty rain forest of Kilauea volcano’s east rift zone on the island of Hawai’i, two forces meet head on. Geothermal development interests, seeking to clear the rain forest for drilling operations, are opposed by native Hawaiians seeking to stop the desecration of the fire goddess, Pele. Pele is a living deity fundamental to Hawaiian spiritual belief. She is the eruption, with its heat, lava and steam. Her family takes the form of forest plants, animals and other natural forces. But geothermal development interests see Pele as simply a source of electricity. When Hawaiians take the issue to court, they find that nature-based religions are not respected by U.S. law.

An Obese World

2020

As obesity progresses inexorably, Sylvie Gilman and Thierry de Lestrade investigate the causes of this planetary plague and reveal the fight waged in certain countries to stem it.

Hunan: The Other World of Avatar

2015

How China's magical Zhangjiajie National Park attracted director James Cameron, who came seeking inspiration for a mysterious fictional planet.

Severo

2023

Big Brother: A World Under Surveillance

2020

Under the pretext of fighting terrorism or crime, the major powers have embarked on a dangerous race for surveillance technologies. Facial recognition cameras, emotion detectors, citizen rating systems, autonomous drones… A security obsession that in some countries is giving rise to a new form of political regime: numerical totalitarianism. Orwell's nightmare.

Justice Redefined: Ukraine's Frontline Journalists

2024

How do you cover a war in your own country? We spent two years with journalists from Ukraine's public broadcaster and saw how Russia's invasion transformed their profession and changed their beliefs. Broadcast on 5/4/2024

Earth

1931

A main agenda of the prewar farmer's movement was struggle against landowners. Prokino also considered this as their prime concern. The main title sequence and the latter part of the film have unfortunately been lost. While we cannot see its entire structure, we can still get a glimpse of it from this surviving short.

Into the Woods: The Making of "Interchange"

Invalid Date

A making-of documentary of the analogue horror short film "Interchange" made by James Seed.