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Politics (2/4)
Politicians, political organisations and processes, in Australia and internationally, including biographical studies of prime ministers (Chifley and Whitlam) and other political figures such as Lionel Murphy; studies of parliamentary institutions; and stories of election campaigns and political change in various countries.
HIRED ASSASSINS
2003 (PG) 58 min
An incisive documentary about Australia's leading editorial cartoonists who grapple daily with the double-edged sword of humour and seriousness to reveal the heart of politics in Australia. more
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HISTORY BITES BACK
2021 (MA) 55 min
After the bold and brilliant Occupation: Native, Aboriginal filmmaker Trisha Morton-Thomas teams up again with Comedy Director-Writer, Craig Anderson to launch a rocket into 250 years of taboos, prejudice and ignorance. History Bites Back uses devastating satire to unpack the negative social bias of the history shared... more
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HOPE IN A SLINGSHOT
2010 (M) 61 min
HOPE IN A SLINGSHOT explores the day-to-day realities of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the effect on civilians on both sides. A journey through the underbelly of the occupation of Palestine by Israel. more
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HOW THE WEST WAS LOST
1987 (G) 72 min
NOW RESTORED FROM ORIGINAL FILM NEGATIVES! The story of the 1946 Aboriginal Pastoral Workers' Strike that has never officially ended. An event more important than the Eureka Stockade but never recorded in written histories - the passive resistance by 800 Aboriginal station workers against the appalling living and working... more
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IMAGINARY BORDER
2017 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 105 min
A challenging and compassionate reflection on race relations in Australia and the Torres Strait Islands. A film by Iranian-born Austrian filmmaker, Alireza Ghanie. more
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INHERITANCE, A FISHERMAN'S STORY
2003 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 52 min
Follows Balazs Meszaros' passionate struggle to gain compensation for his fellow fishermen for the loss of income and livelihood incurred by the cyanide spill that devastated the River Tisza in Hungary in January 2000. more
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INTERVENTION 2 years on [from the CAAMA Collection]
2010 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 22 min
An Aboriginal perspective on the effect of the Australian Government's Intervention in Aboriginal lives in the Northern Territory. more
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INTERVENTION, Katherine, N.T.
2008 (PG) 52 min
Intervention, Katherine, N.T. is a one-year record of the impact of The Emergency Intervention by the Federal Government in the Northern Territory region of Katherine and the surrounding communities of Beswick, Barunga, Eva Valley and Binjari. more
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INTERVENTION: Stories from the Inside
2009 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 46 min
An incisive inside look at the historic Intervention by the Federal Government in Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, made with the participation of Alice Springs town-campers. more
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I WANT TO MAKE A FILM ABOUT WOMEN
2020 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 12 min
A queer, speculative, documentary love letter to Russian constructivist women. It asks what the revolutionary women artists of the 1920s said, what they did, and what they might have created had it not been for Stalin's suppression. A film by Karen Pearlman ASE. more
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JABIRU 0886: TRESPASS [from the CAAMA Collection]
2002 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 26 min
The story of Yvonne Margarula and the resistance of the Mirarr people to the loss of their land and their heritage because of mining operations in the Kakadu area. more
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KULKA: The Life and Times of Gordon Briscoe
2010 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 52 min
The inspirational story of Dr. Gordon Briscoe's life - from his work with legendary eye doctor Fred Hollows, to his days as an activist travelling Australia and telling traditional land owners about their land rights, and everything in between. more
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LANGUAGE OF LIGHT, THE
2023 (M) 171 min
Intimate portraits of seven ground-breaking Australian photographers, each with a significant body of work and each with a different photographic style. more
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LAST STAND AT NYMBOIDA
2010 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 56 min
The remarkable story of a worker rebellion that made international history. Bonus 35 minute extra feature includes interviews with ANDREW VICKERS, General Secretary, CFMEU Mining & Energy Chairman, Mineworkers Trust, and ALAN MURRAY, mining historian and author. more
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LEGEND OF FRED PATERSON, THE
1996 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 58 min
The story of Fred Paterson, the only member of the Communist Party ever elected to an Australian Parliament. Idealist, divinity student, champion athlete, Rhodes scholar, war veteran and barrister, Paterson haunted the establishment until he was brought down by a police baton in 1948. more
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LIFE IS A VERY STRANGE THING (English language version)
2018 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 80 min
Frédéric, a former high school rebel, ethnomusicologist, and multinational executive, returns from decades abroad, to a France that is both familiar and on edge. A quirky and moving portrait by outsiders, exploring what it is to be French in the 21st century. A delightful film by Les McLaren and Annie Stiven. more
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LIFE IS A VERY STRANGE THING (French language version)
2018 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 80 min
Frédéric, a former high school rebel, ethnomusicologist, and multinational executive, returns from decades abroad, to a France that is both familiar and on edge. A quirky and moving portrait by outsiders, exploring what it is to be French in the 21st century. more
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LIVING COUNTRY [from the CAAMA Collection]
2005 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 22 min
Traditional owners of proposed nuclear waste dump sites in central Australia show us what's at stake if the unthinkable happens. A film by David Tranter. more
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LOCKOUT
2007 (PG) 56 min
In 1929, 10,000 miners found themselves locked out of their Hunter Valley coal mines in a bitter industrial dispute over pay rates. What began as an undeclared war on industrial labour ended up overpowering a government, crippling an industry and besieging a community. more
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LOUSY LITTLE SIXPENCE
1983 (G) 54 min
DIGITALLY RESTORED! In NSW, in 1909, the Aborigines Protection Board planned to break up Aboriginal communities by forcibly removing their children and hiring them out as servants to white employers. The title of this powerful documentary comes from the wages that were to be paid to the children. Many never saw that lousy... more
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MAKE IT RIGHT! [from the AIATSIS Collection]
1988 (G) 21 min
MAKE IT RIGHT! is a unique record of the landmark 1988 Barunga Festival of Aboriginal Sport and Culture at which Prime Minister Bob Hawke made commitments (unfulfilled) to negotiate a treaty with Aboriginal people. more
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MAN WITHOUT PIGS
1990 (G) 59 min
MAN WITHOUT PIGS offers a rare insight into the dynamics of village life in Papua New Guinea. The film explores the antagonism aroused when conflict between traditional custom and Western values occurs in an isolated community. more
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MESSAGE FROM MUNGO
2014 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 70 min
WINNER! UNITED NATIONS ASSOCIATION OF VICTORIA MEDIA AWARDS in the Category of "Promotion of Indigenous Recognition". The story of the interaction between Scientists and the Custodians of Indigenous Heritage at Lake Mungo, one of the world's richest archaeological sites. more
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MILLION ACRES A YEAR, A
2002 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 52 min
The devastating story of an ecological disaster: the epic history of post-war agricultural development in Western Australia and the personal journeys of a rural vanguard who came to acknowledge that current forms of agriculture were not sustainable. The re-release of a remarkable documentary from 2002, still powerfully... more
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MINISTER WITHOUT MONEY
2005 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 28 min
Minister Without Money portrays Dr John Waiko's political rise and fall fourteen years after the first film about Waiko, Man Without Pigs (1990) which focused on the significance of Dr Waiko's achievement as the first Indigenous scholar to gain the title of Professor in Papua New Guinea. more
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MORNING SUN
2004 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 117 min
A brilliant portrait of China's "Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution" of the 1960s and 70s. Another extraordinary film from the team that made the award-winning THE GATE OF HEAVENLY PEACE. more
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MURIEL MATTERS
2013 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 27 min
Adelaide-born actress and elocutionist Muriel Matters has been neglected by mainstream history, but in the early 1900s was a pivotal figure in the fight for women's rights in Britain and was renowned for her daring escapades to draw attention to the cause. more
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NORTH OF CAPRICORN
2014 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 54 min
"Northern Australia is a profoundly important part of Australia. It's a third of Australia that's in the tropics. It the part of Australia least developed, it's very rich in resources, and its the part of Australia closest to our neighbours," Professor Henry Reynolds. more
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OPHIR
2020 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 97 min
Voiced entirely by the Indigenous people of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville in Papua New Guinea, Ophir observes the colonisation of the land and its people, who at the end of the 1980s were left with no choice but to revolt for their right to exist. more
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PEACE PILGRIMS
2021 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 28 min
In September 2015, five peace activists penetrated the 'Joint Facility' Pine Gap, just outside Alice Springs to protest and lament victims of American drone strikes. They were arrested and faced 7 years jail. A documentary by John Hughes, based on Peace Crimes, Kieran Finnane (UQP 2020) more
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POLES APART: The Blue Poles Controversy
2001 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 52 min
POLES APART places the acquisition by the Whitlam government of Jackson Pollock's 'Blue Poles' in all the turbulence of its social and political context. more
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PUNISHED NOT PROTECTED
2004 (PG) 58 min
PUNISHED NOT PROTECTED is an educational documentary series in four parts (on one DVD) featuring the views of leading Australians and concerned citizens on the effects of government policy on asylum seekers and temporary protection visa holders. more
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ROAD TO HOME, THE
2015 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 55 min
A portrait of the West Papuan Benny Wenda, now in exile in England, and his on-going fight for the right to self-determination for his people. more
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ROCKING THE FOUNDATIONS
1985 (PG) 92 min
DIGITALLY RESTORED! A riveting documentary about the New South Wales Builders Labourers Federation (BLF). Filmmaker Pat Fiske, herself one of the first women members of the BLF, develops a portrait of this once-powerful union through interviews with former union members and officials, archival film, and television news... more
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SAFE HOUSE, THE [from HAND-DRAWN HISTORIES]
2006 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 26 min
Lee Whitmore's careful, loving recreation of a quiet suburban street in Sydney in the 1950s and the moment when larger issues intruded in the form of the Petrovs, ASIO and the newspapers. more
SCRIBE, THE
2018 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: G) 71 min
From deep within the engine room of politics comes this superb documentary on the "Donald Bradman" of speech-writers - Graham Freudenberg: a powerful journey into one of the great minds of politics who has written speeches for Labor leaders over many decades, including Gough Whitlam and Bob Hawke. more
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SERIOUS UNDERTAKINGS
1983 (G) 28 min
A fascinating film about Australian culture, politics, film and pleasure, and the context in which images of femininity and masculinity are produced. more
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SHADOW PANIC
1989/2020 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: PG) 25 min
The feminist classic from 1989, now restored from original 16mm film materials. An innovative film by Margot Nash (director of VACANT POSSESSION and THE SILENCES) based on "the idea of structuring a film via the female gaze". more
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SHADOW PLAY
2001 (Classification Exempt - Ronin Recommends: M) 79 min
In Indonesia, on 30 September 1965 a group of President Sukarno's guards murdered six generals who were anti-Communist. General Suharto blamed the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI). Suharto grabbed power and set up death squads to murder up to a million accused Communist sympathisers. The documentary traces the events... more
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