With the help of more than 10,000 dedicated Zappa fans, this is the long-awaited definitive documentary project of Alex Winter documenting the life and career of enigmatic groundbreaking rock star Frank Zappa. Alex also utilizes in this picture thousands of hours of painstakingly digitized videos, photos, audio, writing, and everything in between from Zappa's private archives. These chronicles have never been brought to a public audience before, until now.

Film noir, which enjoyed particular success in the 1930s and 1940s, is probably the most profound genre of classic Hollywood cinema. Eckhart Schmidt tries to show the background and developments and speaks, among others, with directors such as Richard Fleischer and Robert Wise as well as with "femme fatale" actresses. Filmmakers of the following generations explain how the style and themes of noir continue to shape cinema today.

Documentary about Hollywood.

A documentary on American composer George Antheil (1900-1959) featuring excerpts from Leger's Ballet Mecanique (1924) for which Antheil wrote the music.

A nostalgic and compelling look into the legendary three camera, three projector process that revolutionized motion pictures and led the industry into the widescreen era.

A biographical documentary about the great British actor and director Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977), from rags to riches, from the slums of London to glory.

The story of how the classic epic "Ben-Hur" was made.

Music For The Movies: Bernard Herrmann explores the work of a composer who created music for over 50 films, collaborating with such diverse directors as Orson Welles, Nicholas Ray, and Martin Scorsese. Best remembered for his twelve-year collaboration with Alfred Hitchcock in such classics as Vertigo, North By Northwest ,and the unforgettable Psycho, Herrmann pioneered many fundamental techniques of film scoring in the course of his 35-year career.

In the silent film era, movies were never really silent. In the background of films that made figures like Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton into cultural icons, were the musical giants whose compositions defined the very films that captivated a generation of movie-goers. Arthur Kleiner converses with the still-living legends from that bygone golden age of cinema.

The best in the performing arts from across America and around the world including a diverse programming portfolio of classical music, opera, popular song, musical theater, dance, drama, and performance documentaries.