Get curated editors’ picks, peeks behind the scenes, film recommendations and more.
In the experimental short documentary Regen (1929), the pioneering Dutch filmmaker Joris Ivens explores Amsterdam before, during and after a rainstorm, tracing an impressionistic arc through brief vignettes – rippling canals, seas of umbrellas, rising puddles, dripping windowsills. Shot over two years but giving the viewer an experience of a single event, the lyrical piece is an early film in Ivens’s influential and storied career, and a particularly poetic example of the ‘city symphony’, in which filmmakers aimed to distill the defining qualities of different urban environments. This restored version features a 1941 score from the Austrian composer Hanns Eisler titled Fourteen Ways to Describe Rain – a work he dedicated to his teacher Arnold Schoenberg.
Directors: Joris Ivens, Mannus Franken
Score: Hanns Eisler
video
Architecture
West Africa was once an architectural laboratory. Is it time for a revival?
12 minutes
video
Work
A Swedish expat in the Philippines wonders: what’s up with people sleeping at work?
14 minutes
video
Biography and memoir
The unique life philosophy of Abdi, born in Somalia, living in the Netherlands
29 minutes
video
Art
‘If you’re creative, why can’t you create a solution?’ One artist’s imaginative activism
17 minutes
video
The ancient world
An ancient Roman’s hilarious (and perhaps relatable) response to a social snub
2 minutes
video
Death
A hunter’s lyrical reflection on the humbling business of being mortal
6 minutes
video
Art
More than breathtaking, ‘The Birth of Venus’ signalled an aesthetic revolution
19 minutes
video
Childhood and adolescence
Striking shadow puppetry illuminates a skater kid’s memories of Boy Scout camp
12 minutes
video
Rituals and celebrations
Meet the entrepreneur whose business is crafting perfect peak experiences
12 minutes