USA, Europe, Asia, USSR–Russia and the rest of the world — from the kinetoscope to global streaming. Each of the 300 events opens on click with a title and two facts. Lanes run left to right by year. Drag the canvas or use the scroll wheel to move through time; + / − stretch the scale.
The Kinetoscope let only one viewer watch through a peephole at a time, rather than projecting onto a screen.
Edison's early cameras used perforated 35mm film — a format that later became the worldwide standard.
For the first time, audiences could pay to watch moving pictures individually.
Parlors lined with rows of Kinetoscopes were called 'Kinetoscope parlors' and stood on busy streets in major cities.
The Lumières' first screening lasted under an hour and included about a dozen short scenes.
The 'Arrival of a Train' screening spawned a legend that audiences panicked and fled from the oncoming train on screen.
The beginning of film exhibition history in the country.
The same screening also included some of the first Russian documentary footage of views of St. Petersburg.
Mexico's first screening came just months after the Lumière brothers' Paris premiere.
Mexico's earliest film screenings took place in hotels and private salons in the capital.
India's first screenings showed short Lumière documentaries of everyday European life.
Indian cinema quickly moved beyond imported films, producing its own mythological subjects as early as 1913.
Méliès was a professional illusionist before entering film and used stage tricks to create his effects.
Based on novels by Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, the film became cinema's first science-fiction narrative.
The film runs just 12 minutes but is considered the first to use editing to build a coherent story.
The film was shot in New Jersey even though it's set in the Wild West — typical practice for early cinema.
One of the oldest film studios in the world, still operating today.
Nordisk Film still exists today and remains one of the oldest continuously operating film studios in the world.
The film was made by an independent Australian filmmaker before any developed studio system existed anywhere in the world.
The film's original prints were later lost; only fragments and descriptions survive.
In the early 20th century, Pathé produced more films than the rest of the world combined.
Pathé's rooster symbol became one of the first recognizable film studio logos.
The film is based on a folk song about the outlaw Stenka Razin and was shot in a single day.
The film runs only about seven minutes, a typical length for narrative films of that era.
Hollywood was chosen partly for its reliable sunshine, ideal for shooting without electric lighting.
The first film studio opened in Hollywood in 1911, just a year after the mass relocation began.
Early color film experiments required projecting through two colored filters simultaneously.
The Kinemacolor system remained popular for about a decade before simpler technologies replaced it.
An early example of a large-scale, staged historical drama.
The film depicts the defense of the city during the Crimean War and featured real war veterans.
One of the first Hollywood studios and still in operation today.
The studio's first major hit was 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' starring Lon Chaney in 1923.
It will become one of the leading studios of Hollywood's golden age.
The studio's name comes from the idea of a 'paramount,' or supreme, peak, reflecting the founders' ambitions.
The film used thousands of extras, unprecedented for Italian cinema at the time.
'Cabiria' was one of the first films to make extensive use of camera movement (the 'carrello' tracking shot).
The director played all the main female roles himself, since women were forbidden from appearing in films.
Director Dadasaheb Phalke is considered the 'father of Indian cinema,' and India's highest film honor is named after him.
Starewicz animated insects frame by frame, attaching fine wires to their legs.
The self-referential film about its own cameraman is considered an early example of authorial irony in cinema.
The film set a box-office record that stood for decades despite the film's controversial reputation.
The film was based on a novel and play glorifying the Ku Klux Klan, which sparked NAACP protests from its premiere.
The film ran over three hours, an unprecedented length for the time.
Griffith made 'Intolerance' partly in response to criticism of his previous film, but its box-office failure nearly ruined him.
A decade later, it will release the first sound feature film.
The studio was founded by four Warner brothers, who started out running films in a traveling cinema.
The studio let stars and directors control their own films — rare under the studio system.
The name 'United Artists' arose from a rival's mocking remark that 'the lunatics have taken over the asylum.'
The film's sets were deliberately distorted and skewed to convey a sense of psychological madness.
The screenplay was originally conceived as direct criticism of military authority and blind obedience to orders.
Nationalization made the Soviet state the country's sole legal film producer and distributor.
The nationalization decree was signed personally by Vladimir Lenin in August 1919.
Early Latin American animation developed largely independent of Hollywood and European techniques of the time.
Early Latin American animation often used silhouette techniques rather than hand-drawn frames.
A classic of early Swedish cinema, notable for its innovative editing.
The film is based on a Swedish legend about a ghostly carriage that collects the souls of the dead on New Year's Eve.
It originally advertised a housing development and only later became a symbol of the film industry.
The sign originally read 'Hollywoodland' and even had illuminated light bulbs, switched off during the Great Depression.
The merger of three companies creates one of the most recognizable studios in film history.
The roaring lion in the MGM logo is one of the most recognizable studio logos in film history.
One of the earliest examples of cinematic avant-garde and surrealism.
Clair experimented with music synchronized to the rhythm of the editing, even before the era of sound film.
The editing experiment would become foundational to Soviet film theory.
The Kuleshov effect also underpins Western montage film theory and is still taught in film schools today.
Mingxing became one of the first genuinely major Chinese film companies.
The Mingxing studio was among the first to make films featuring social critique of Chinese society.
The famous Odessa Steps sequence became one of the most quoted scenes in world cinema.
The film was commissioned for the 20th anniversary of the 1905 revolution.
One of the key films of Soviet montage cinema of the 1920s.
The film is based on a work that had already been adapted in Germany a year earlier.
Though it has sound sequences, most of the film is still silent.
The film starred singer Al Jolson, whose line 'You ain't heard nothin' yet!' became legendary.
'Metropolis' became the first full-length science fiction film in cinema history.
The film took 310 days to shoot and used one of the largest urban miniature sets built up to that time.
For decades, Egyptian cinema became the dominant film industry across the Arabic-speaking world.
Egyptian cinema of the 1940s–50s was nicknamed 'Hollywood on the Nile' for its scale of production and star system.
The film experimented with the editing technique later named the 'Kuleshov effect.'
The film was commissioned for the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution, but authorities found the finished cut too complex for mass audiences.
Mickey Mouse became one of the first animated characters with synchronized sound.
Walt Disney himself voiced Mickey Mouse in the early cartoons.
The actress who played Joan of Arc appeared in almost no other films before or after this role.
The film's original score was considered lost for decades and was only restored in the 1980s.
The first ceremony lasted just 15 minutes, and the winners were announced in advance.
The Oscar statuette was reportedly nicknamed after an Academy staffer's uncle, whom she said it resembled.
The film runs just 17 minutes but remains one of the most influential surrealist works ever made.
The surrealist film was shot in just a week, with almost no script, following the filmmakers' free associations.
The film consists entirely of documentary footage of city life, with no actors or script.
The film uses over 1,700 individual edits, a record number for the silent film era.
The code formally remained in force until 1968, when the modern rating system replaced it.
The Code banned, among other things, depictions of interracial relationships and overly explicit on-screen kissing.
The film makes Marlene Dietrich a world star.
The film was shot in two versions simultaneously, in German and English — standard practice in early sound cinema.
Many later world-renowned directors and cinematographers are graduates of VGIK.
The institute is named after its founder, director and educator Vladimir Gardin.
A poetic drama about collectivization, later recognized as a film classic.
Dovzhenko faced criticism from Soviet authorities, who considered the film overly aestheticized.
The Golden Age coincided with reduced Hollywood competition during World War II.
Mexico's 'Golden Age' produced the region's first truly international film stars, including María Félix.
The start of Japan's film industry shift to sound.
The film was made by brothers Wan Laiming and Wan Guchan and became Asia's first animated feature film.
The film's effects were achieved with stop-motion animation rather than computer graphics.
The giant King Kong model used an articulated armature covered in rabbit fur.
The chanchada genre combined musical numbers with political and social satire.
The chanchada genre later gave way to more dramatic genres but laid the foundation for Brazil's mass musical culture.
Early Latin American sound cinema developed almost simultaneously with Hollywood's own transition to sound.
Early Argentine sound cinema developed with strong involvement from European émigrés who brought new technology.
The method required depicting life not as it was, but as it was meant to become under communism.
Socialist realism was formally adopted as doctrine at the Congress of Soviet Writers in 1934 and extended to all forms of art.
The film became one of the first Soviet films to spark a cult hero in popular culture.
The 'Vasilyev brothers' credited as directors were not actually related — it was a shared pseudonym for two filmmakers.
The start of the industry's mass shift to color.
Technicolor required a bulky three-strip camera, used later by only a handful of studios.
The adaptation was made with the direct involvement of Wells himself.
The film is known for its large-scale futuristic sets and some of the earliest special effects using city-of-the-future miniatures.
The comedy blended the musical genre with the ideological motifs typical of 1930s Soviet cinema.
Actress Lyubov Orlova, who played the lead, became the first officially recognized star of Soviet cinema.
The country's largest film studio gets the production base it still occupies today.
The studio was originally founded in the 1920s under a different name and changed locations several times.
The animation took three years to make and the budget far exceeded initial estimates.
Critics skeptically called the project 'Disney's Folly' before it became a box-office triumph.
One of the first major anti-war dramas in film history.
The film was banned by French censors until 1963 because of its pacifist message.
The film was made in response to the success of Disney's 'Snow White,' proving Chinese animation's capabilities.
The film screened even in Japanese-occupied China and inspired future generations of postwar Chinese animators.
The film was shot alongside the real war, and some scenes had to be finished only after it ended.
The role of the medieval prince was played by actor Nikolai Cherkasov, who later also played Ivan the Terrible in Eisenstein's next film.
Both films came out the same year and are still ranked among the greatest in film history.
Both films were nominated for the Best Picture Oscar, but 'Gone with the Wind' won.
An early experiment with surround sound in theaters.
The 'Fantasound' system required special equipment installed in only a few US theaters.
Welles was only 25 years old when he made the film.
The film flopped on release — legend holds that media magnate William Randolph Hearst, recognizing himself in the lead character, had it boycotted.
Early Indian cinema begins forming a national film language.
Prewar Indian cinema already had hundreds of studios and laid the groundwork for Bollywood's future star system.
One of the best-known Soviet films about the Second World War.
The film tells the story of a woman who becomes a sniper, an unusual subject for Soviet war cinema of the period.
The film was left unfinished — the second part was banned by Stalin personally, and the third was never made.
Eisenstein died shortly after completing the first part, never seeing the fate of the rest of his project.
The film was shot on the actual streets of postwar Rome rather than in studios — the hallmark of Neorealism.
The cast was partly recruited from non-professionals found on the streets of postwar Rome.
The film flopped at the box office on release and only became a classic decades later.
The film fell into the public domain for decades, which fueled its countless TV broadcasts and cult status.
Cannes was first held shortly after the end of World War II as a symbol of Europe's cultural revival.
The first festival was originally planned for 1939 but was cancelled with the outbreak of World War II.
Cairo cements its status as the center of the Arabic-language film industry.
Egyptian musicals of the 1940s were often built around Arab pop stars who acted and recorded music simultaneously.
Hollywood faces a serious competitor for audience attention for the first time.
By the 1950s, most American households already owned a television, permanently changing family leisure habits.
The bicycle in the film serves as a metaphor for the life of a poor postwar Italian family.
The lead role was played by a non-professional actor, a factory worker discovered by the director on the street.
One of the most visually influential British films about ballet.
The film won two Oscars, for cinematography and music, a rarity for British films of its era.
Films from this period were made in huge numbers on minimal budgets and tight schedules.
Some Cantonese films of this era were shot in just a few days, from script to premiere.
The film is considered one of the earliest examples of British film noir.
The film's famous zither theme was performed by street musician Anton Karas, discovered by the director in a Viennese tavern.
Some blacklisted industry figures continued working under other names.
The 'Hollywood Ten' blacklist became a defining symbol of the McCarthy era in the film industry.
The film won the top prize at the Venice Film Festival and first opened the world's eyes to Japanese cinema.
The film centers on a single crime shown from four contradictory perspectives, a device now known as the 'Rashomon effect.'
The film was cast with amateurs and non-professional actors, including real street children of Mexico City.
The film was banned in Mexico itself for several years after release for its unflattering depiction of poverty.
The ruling forced studios to sell their theater chains, ending the industry's vertical integration.
The case is known as the 'Paramount Decree' and is still studied in antitrust law courses today.
Cairo was nicknamed 'Hollywood on the Nile' for the scale and influence of its film industry.
After the 1952 revolution, Egyptian cinema shifted toward socially realistic stories about ordinary city dwellers.
The industry responds to television competition with a bigger screen.
CinemaScope's screen width was more than double the standard format of the time.
One of the tensest thrillers in classic French cinema.
The film remains one of the tensest thrillers ever made about transporting nitroglycerin along Latin American mountain roads.
The film tells the story of a family's quiet disintegration almost without major dramatic turns.
The film consistently ranks among the greatest films ever made in polls of directors and critics.
The film is shot almost entirely within one apartment and its courtyard view.
The film starred James Stewart and Grace Kelly, who became one of Hitchcock's key muses.
The original Godzilla film was largely a metaphor for the atomic bombing of Japan.
The original monster suit weighed around 100 kilograms; the actor inside could only work for a few minutes at a time.
The film became the first Indian film nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
The trilogy was filmed on a minimal budget over several years, with breaks caused by lack of funds.
The continuation of one of the best-known Indian film trilogies.
The film continues the story of the boy Apu, following his coming of age in the city after his father's death.
The film was shot almost entirely on studio sets built to resemble medieval Sweden.
Filming was completed on a tight schedule — Bergman said he shot the film in 35 days to stay within budget.
The film transposes Shakespeare's 'Macbeth' into a medieval Japanese setting.
The film uses minimal sets, with the action unfolding almost entirely in fog on a mountainside.
It remains the only Soviet film ever awarded the top prize at Cannes.
The film tells the story of lovers separated by war and remains one of the most poignant Soviet war dramas.
It was later repeatedly named the greatest film of all time by critics.
The film was long considered a commercial failure and was only reassessed by critics decades later.
The film remains one of the highest-grossing Indian films in the country's box office history.
The film ran continuously in some Indian theaters for more than 50 years.
A small budget and location shooting without major stars became the hallmark of the whole New Wave movement.
Truffaut dedicated the film to the memory of his mentor, film critic André Bazin, who died shortly before its premiere.
The famous shower scene lasts only 45 seconds on screen but took a week to film.
The film's premiere marked the first time a Hollywood studio required theaters to bar latecomers from entering mid-screening.
Both films came out the same year and are seen as symbolic manifestos of the new European filmmaking.
Godard shot the film with almost no script, inventing dialogue on set on the day of filming.
The Bollywood formula traditionally blends drama, romance, comedy, and musical numbers within a single film.
India's first truly mass-market musical hit arrived as early as 1931, with the coming of sound.
One of the most expensive and celebrated films of classic Indian cinema.
The film consumed a then-record amount of money and years of preparation for Indian cinema.
The Iranian New Wave developed alongside the country's modernization under the Shah.
The Iranian New Wave drew on the Persian poetic tradition in shaping its visual language.
The 'luchador' film genre becomes part of mainstream Mexican popular culture.
The Santo film franchise includes more than 50 films, and the actor reportedly never removed his mask, even off screen.
The film was immediately banned by Franco-era censors in its own country.
Buñuel returned to Spain for the first time in many years specifically to make this film.
One of the highest-grossing Soviet films of its time.
Based on a novel by Alexander Belyaev, the film was one of the first Soviet films with extensive underwater filming.
The film was shot in the Jordanian desert in extreme heat.
The film won seven Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director for David Lean.
The farewell work of one of Japan's leading 20th-century directors.
Ozu died just a year after the film's release, on his 60th birthday.
The film was made as Tarkovsky's graduation project at VGIK.
The crew deliberately used a high-contrast visual style unusual for Soviet youth and family films of the time.
An epic drama about the fading era of the Italian aristocracy.
The novel the film is based on was rejected by Italian publishers during the author's lifetime and only published posthumously.
Lines from the film entered everyday speech and remained popular for decades.
The character of Shurik was played by actor Alexander Demyanenko, who became one of the most recognizable faces in Soviet comedy.
The name 'Cinema Novo' means 'new cinema' and was a direct manifesto against the Hollywood production model.
The term was coined by Glauber Rocha himself, positioning the movement against both commercial cinema and European arthouse.
The battle scenes required tens of thousands of Soviet army soldiers as extras.
The film took about six years to make, an unusually long production schedule by world cinema standards.
The film's title became a byword for the effect of distortion when a photograph is enlarged.
The film became one of the first major British international hits directed by an Italian filmmaker.
A semi-documentary drama about the Algerian war of independence.
The film deliberately used grainy black-and-white film stock to create a newsreel-like sense of authenticity.
The studio released dozens of films a year, launching a whole generation of future martial arts stars.
Many of the studio's martial arts stars, including Jackie Chan, began their careers as stuntmen.
The film underwent heavy censorship cuts and only reached theaters years after it was completed.
The finished film sat shelved under censorship for years before its wide release.
Sembène's film is considered one of the first feature films made by an African director about Africans.
Sembène had worked as a dockworker and novelist before turning to filmmaking later in life.
Both films came out the same year and are seen as the symbolic start of the New Hollywood era.
Both films drew heavy criticism under the censorship code for their explicit content and violence, hastening its eventual repeal.
One of the most influential science fiction films in cinema history.
The film's effects, including the famous 'star gate' sequence, were created by artist Douglas Trumbull.
New Wave films in Czechoslovakia were banned as soon as the Prague Spring was suppressed by Soviet-led forces.
Some directors of the Czechoslovak New Wave, including Miloš Forman, emigrated and continued their careers abroad.
The manifesto compared colonial exploitation to the work of blast furnaces, giving the documentary its name.
The documentary manifesto was made by the collective Cine Liberación and became a model of Latin American political cinema.
One of the most recognizable Soviet comedies, endlessly quoted since its release.
The film remains one of the most frequently rebroadcast comedies on Soviet and Russian television.
The concept set commercial Hollywood cinema and European arthouse film against a third, revolutionary path.
The 'Third Cinema' concept was laid out in a manifesto by directors Octavio Getino and Fernando Solanas.
One of the key films of the Cinema Novo movement.
The film blends documentary and staged techniques characteristic of the whole Cinema Novo movement.
The film faced heavy censorship in Britain and was formally withdrawn from release for almost 30 years.
Kubrick himself had the film withdrawn from UK release after reports of copycat acts of violence.
The chief rival to Shaw Brothers, later home to Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan.
Golden Harvest offered Bruce Lee a contract after Hollywood studios had refused to give him a leading role.
One of the largest Soviet war films by the sheer scale of personnel and equipment involved.
The film was made as three separate epic installments unified by the story of the war's turning-point battles.
The film is based on a novel, but the studio had the screenplay substantially reworked.
The role of Don Corleone won Marlon Brando a second Oscar, which he famously declined to accept.
The title alludes to the surrealist tradition of unfinished formal dinners derailed by outside circumstances.
The film won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, a rarity for a surrealist film.
Based on Stanislav Lem's novel, though the author himself was unhappy with Tarkovsky's interpretation.
Some filming took place in Japan, including scenes depicting futuristic elevated highways.
One of the highest-grossing horror films in history.
The film sparked a wave of horror imitators and spawned several sequels and remakes.
The film made Bruce Lee a global star just years before his early death.
Bruce Lee died under mysterious circumstances just a month before the film's premiere.
The series ran for decades and remains a beloved classic to this day.
The Wolf and Hare characters became among the most recognizable icons of Soviet animation.
The film draws heavily on Fellini's own childhood memories of his hometown, Rimini.
The film won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1975.
The giant mechanical shark constantly broke down during filming, doubling the shoot's schedule.
The film's success prompted studios to start releasing blockbusters in wide nationwide release for the first time.
The film was banned in many countries for its graphic content and remains disputed to this day.
The film was seized by Italian police just before its premiere.
One of the most frequently rewatched and quoted films in Indian cinema history.
The film flopped in its first week but went on to become one of the highest-grossing Indian films of the decade.
The film is traditionally broadcast on television every New Year's Eve, almost every year since its release.
The film is set on New Year's Eve and hinges on confusion caused by identical standardized Soviet apartment blocks in different cities.
Filming took place at the real Hanging Rock in Australia, fueling legends about its mystical influence.
The fate of the missing girls in the film is deliberately left unexplained, an unusual device for mainstream cinema of the time.
The film about the war of independence wins the Palme d'Or.
The film was supported by Algeria's new government as part of its cultural policy after independence.
The low-budget boxing drama wins the Academy Award for Best Picture.
Actor Sylvester Stallone wrote the screenplay himself and insisted on starring in the lead role.
Many Argentine filmmakers left the country during the period of military rule from 1976 to 1983.
Many exiled Argentine filmmakers went on to build careers in Spain, France, and Mexico.
Made on a budget the studio considered risky, it became one of the most profitable films in history.
George Lucas largely self-financed the film with minimal studio backing, retaining the merchandising rights for himself.
One of the most popular Soviet comedies, set amid the daily life of a research institute.
The film remains one of the most widely quoted Soviet comedies about daily office life.
The first class enrolled at China's main film school after the end of the Cultural Revolution.
Graduates of this class included future directors Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige.
Filming in the jungle was plagued by typhoons, a lead actor's heart attack, and massive budget overruns.
The Philippines shoot inspired its own documentary, 'Hearts of Darkness,' about the film's chaotic production.
Herzog made the film as a tribute to the 1922 silent film on the same subject.
Unlike the 1922 original, Herzog's remake was shot in color and with sound, but preserved the earlier film's expressionist visual style.
An adaptation of Hardy's novel, made by the director while living in exile in Europe.
Polanski could not enter the US to accept awards due to a pending criminal case, which didn't stop the film's acclaim in Europe.
Filming stretched over years amid ongoing conflicts between the director and Soviet censors.
The film is based on the Strugatsky brothers' novella 'Roadside Picnic,' substantially reworked for the screen.
The series became one of the most rewatched Soviet TV dramas about postwar Moscow crime.
The five-part TV film follows Moscow police detectives working in the immediate postwar years.
A subtle tragicomedy about indecision and conscience.
The lead role was played by Oleg Basilashvili, portraying an indecisive professor.
State funding let Australia build a competitive domestic film industry for the first time in decades.
Australia's government film-funding body still exists today under a different name.
VHS beat rival Betamax largely thanks to longer recording time.
By the mid-1980s, home video rental revenue in the US exceeded theatrical box office receipts.
One of the most ambitious television adaptations of its time.
The series aired late at night on German television because of its explicit content.
The genre was defined by virtuoso gunfights choreographed almost like ballet.
John Woo later brought the 'heroic bloodshed' style to Hollywood, directing 'Face/Off' and 'Mission: Impossible II.'
The film became the first Soviet film to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Actress Vera Alentova, who played the lead, was praised by critics for her realistic portrayal of a Soviet woman's life story.
Filming took place almost simultaneously with the imposition of martial law in Poland.
The film was briefly banned in Poland itself immediately after martial law was declared.
The film is known for its many quotable lines that entered everyday Russian speech.
The film draws on tales of Baron Munchausen, blending fantasy with philosophical parable.
The film's post-apocalyptic aesthetic shaped the visual language of dozens of imitators worldwide.
The film, starring Mel Gibson, launched his path to a major Hollywood career.
An elderly woman who smoked cigarettes voiced E.T., chosen for her distinctive tone.
The film became the highest-grossing film in history at the time of release, surpassing 'Star Wars.'
The director's first film made outside the USSR.
Tarkovsky never returned to the USSR after making this film, remaining in exile for the rest of his life.
A modestly budgeted sci-fi action film launches one of cinema's iconic franchises.
The role of the killer cyborg made Arnold Schwarzenegger a global action star.
An early work by the future leading figure of Chinese arthouse cinema.
The film faced heavy censorship in China itself and was only shown domestically years later.
An adaptation of Ostrovsky's play 'Without a Dowry.'
The lead role was played by Larisa Guzeeva, marking her film debut.
Made late in Kurosawa's life, the film is regarded as one of the pinnacles of his career.
Kurosawa had partly lost his eyesight by the time of filming and worked from storyboards drawn in advance for every scene.
The film was made during the movement toward Georgian independence and addressed Stalin-era repression.
The film was banned from release for a time and only reached theaters during perestroika.
The film addressed themes of AIDS and political repression in Latin America at the time.
One of the lead roles was played by William Hurt, who won the Best Actor Oscar for it.
A drama about children adopted during Argentina's 1976–1983 period of military rule wins an Academy Award.
The film is based on the real practice of children being taken from political prisoners during Argentina's military rule.
Reduced censorship allowed Soviet directors to freely address sensitive social topics for the first time in decades.
The term 'glasnost' became one of the defining symbols of Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms, alongside 'perestroika.'
The title evokes the fall of the Berlin Wall — a metaphor of angels watching over a divided city.
The film is shot with almost no traditional dialogue — most of the narrative unfolds through voice-over monologue.
The film brings international recognition to Chinese arthouse cinema.
The success of 'Red Sorghum' at the Berlin Film Festival opened the door for Chinese cinema to major international venues.
One of the defining films about Soviet youth during the perestroika era.
The lead role was played by actor Fyodor Dunayevsky, who became a symbol of a whole generation of Soviet youth.
Considered one of Almodóvar's best-known works outside the Spanish-speaking world.
The film was Pedro Almodóvar's international breakthrough and one of the first hits of post-Franco Spanish cinema.
Both Ghibli films premiered together as a double feature on the same release date.
Both films originally screened together in theaters as a double feature, despite their contrasting tones.
Based on the director's own manga, it became one of the first Japanese animated hits in the West.
The manga that 'Akira' is based on runs over 2,000 pages and was completed only after the film's release.
The film caused a public sensation for content considered explicit by Soviet standards.
The film drew over 55 million theatrical viewers, a rare box-office success for late-Soviet arthouse cinema.
The film is seen as one of the symbols of musical and cultural freedom during perestroika.
Musician Viktor Tsoi, frontman of the rock band Kino, starred in one of the lead roles.
The film wins an Academy Award — a rare case of a joint Danish-Swedish production reaching this international scale.
The film is based on a novel by Swedish Nobel laureate Martin Andersen Nexø.
Burton turned a superhero film into a dark gothic drama, breaking prior genre expectations.
Casting Michael Keaton as Batman sparked protests from comic fans who thought the actor too comedic for the role.
The film wins the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival.
The film addresses the historical memory of political repression in Taiwan, making it a politically significant release.
One of the highest-grossing family comedies in history.
The film became one of Fox studio's biggest surprise hits of the early 1990s.
One of the most successful French-language classic adaptations released abroad.
Dozens of actors had played Cyrano before, but Depardieu's version is considered the definitive film adaptation.
The film wins the Best Director award at Cannes.
The lead role was played by actor Pyotr Mamonov, previously known as the frontman of rock band Zvuki Mu.
The Soviet collapse led to a sharp drop in state funding and the breakdown of the old production system.
The number of films produced in the country fell several-fold in the early post-Soviet years.
One of the most commercially successful Mexican films internationally at the time.
The novel the film is based on became one of the best-selling Spanish-language books of its decade.
The dinosaurs were brought to life with digital graphics almost at the last minute — animatronics alone had originally been planned.
Steven Spielberg was simultaneously making 'Schindler's List,' shuttling between two tonally opposite projects.
The film shares the top prize at Cannes.
The novel the film is based on was temporarily banned in mainland China.
The script's nonlinear timeline was unusual for mainstream cinema of the time.
The film restored John Travolta's star status after several years of career decline.
All three films are shot in the colors of the French flag, each one embodying a different revolutionary ideal.
Kieślowski died shortly after completing the trilogy, which became his final work as a director.
Known for its nonlinear structure, the film became a signature work of the director.
The film was shot in just a few weeks while Wong Kar-wai was awaiting clearance to edit another of his projects.
The film became the second Russian film to win the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Director Nikita Mikhalkov starred in the film himself, alongside his own daughter Nadezhda.
Campion became the first woman director to win the Palme d'Or at Cannes.
The film starred a young Anna Paquin, who became one of the youngest actors ever to win an acting Oscar.
The film brought international recognition to the then-young New Zealand director Peter Jackson.
The screenplay is partly based on a real 1950s New Zealand murder case.
The studio behind it was later acquired by Disney and became one of its key animation brands.
The rendering technology required weeks of continuous computer processing to produce the film's finished frames.
One of the most visually distinctive films of Hong Kong arthouse cinema.
The film is considered less commercially successful than 'Chungking Express' but is a cult favorite among cinephiles.
The Dogme 95 manifesto called for no artificial lighting, special effects, or non-diegetic music during filming.
The Dogme 95 rules were formally numbered as a 'vow of chastity' consisting of ten strict points.
A biopic about pianist David Helfgott earns international acclaim, and its lead actor wins an Academy Award.
Pianist David Helfgott, the film's real-life inspiration, went on a concert tour immediately after the film's success.
It remained the highest-grossing film in history for over a decade, until another film by the same director surpassed it.
Production was plagued by massive budget overruns, leading the studio to seriously consider shutting the film down.
Home video shifts from analog tapes to a digital format.
The DVD format offered noticeably higher picture quality compared to VHS.
The film blends a tragic Holocaust story with elements of comedy — a rare and debated genre combination.
Roberto Benigni famously climbed over the seats to reach the stage when accepting his Oscar — a moment now part of ceremony history.
The handover was accompanied by concerns about the future of the local film industry under new jurisdiction.
Hong Kong's film industry retained a separate ratings and censorship system even after the handover to Chinese jurisdiction.
The film became one of the highest-grossing films in Japanese box office history at the time of release.
The film briefly became the highest-grossing film in Japanese box office history, surpassing even Hollywood blockbusters.
The film is regarded as one of the defining statements of post-Soviet Russian cinema about the 1990s.
The film spawned a sequel, 'Brother 2,' which became even more culturally iconic and commercially successful.
The title alludes to a Persian tradition — the protagonist seeks someone to bury him after his planned suicide.
The title alludes to a Persian saying that life is worth living for the taste of even a single cherry.
The film's experimental structure, replaying one day in several versions, became iconic.
The film shows the same twenty-minute stretch of time three times, each with a different outcome.
One of the most expensive Russian films of its time.
Filming took place in Portugal and France with an international cast.
The film was among the first to openly address the legacy of apartheid in South African cinema.
The film was made by a director who had left South Africa in protest of apartheid and returned after its end.
The film wins the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.
The film is based on the director's own travel notes about his childhood in Brazil.
The bullet-time rotating-room effect required building a giant mechanical rig.
The film introduced the term 'bullet time' into popular culture for its slow-motion camera-rotation effect.
The film was made in strict accordance with the Dogme 95 rules, including a total ban on staged lighting.
The film is dedicated to Dreyer and deliberately shot to evoke the austerity of early Danish cinema.
The musical drama wins the Palme d'Or at Cannes.
Icelandic singer Björk played the lead role and wrote the film's music, though she later said she would never act in a film again.
The film's fight choreography was staged by one of cinema's most celebrated martial arts choreographers.
The film won four Academy Awards, including Best Foreign Language Film.
A measure to support the local film industry against Hollywood competition.
Similar quota systems exist in other countries to protect domestic film production.
The film brought international fame to Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu.
The film consists of three interweaving stories connected by a single car accident.
The first film in the franchise came out just three years after the book was published.
The lead cast was chosen after a massive casting search among thousands of children across Britain.
The film became one of the most commercially successful French-language films worldwide.
The film grossed more than 20 times its budget and became a cultural phenomenon in France.
The Oscar win was a rarity for non-Hollywood animation at the time.
The film's protagonist is a ten-year-old girl, unusual for the lead role of an animated blockbuster.
The shoot took 274 days and turned New Zealand into a tourist destination thanks to its landscapes.
The production built dozens of sets across New Zealand specifically for the trilogy.
The festival becomes one of the largest showcases of Arab and African cinema.
The festival annually honors distinguished figures from world cinema, not just regional filmmaking.
The film wins the Grand Prix at Cannes for its brutal, twisting detective plot.
The film is structured as a detective puzzle with one of the most famous plot twists in Korean film history.
The film combined urban fantasy with special effects on a scale rarely seen in Russian cinema.
Based on novels by Sergei Lukyanenko, the film spawned a direct sequel, 'Day Watch.'
The film depicts life in Brazil's favelas with near-documentary rawness and without embellishment.
The cast was made up mostly of non-professionals recruited directly from the favelas where filming took place.
One of the best internationally known works of South Korean arthouse cinema.
The film is almost entirely without dialogue yet achieved wide international acclaim.
Computer animation is now firmly established as a mainstream format.
The film became the first Pixar film ever nominated for the Best Original Screenplay Oscar.
One of the director's most personal films.
The film references Almodóvar's own early work, made during the Franco era in Spain.
The wave coincided with growing global audience interest in Asian cinema generally.
Directors of this movement came to be called the 'Korean New Wave,' echoing the French movement of the 1960s.
The film's box office take far exceeded previous domestic records several times over.
The film's success prompted other Russian studios to invest heavily in genre blockbusters with computer effects.
The film is based on the real journey of a young Che Guevara across South America.
The film was produced by Robert Redford through his independent Sundance production company.
One of the most notable television adaptations of Bulgakov's novel.
The series was filmed over several years with breaks and became one of the most ambitious Russian TV adaptations of the novel.
The film becomes one of the first major post-apartheid South African films to win an Oscar.
The film's title is Zulu slang for the main character's nickname, meaning 'thug.'
The film is based on a true story of a Stasi surveillance officer in East Germany.
The actor who played the lead role died shortly after the premiere, without seeing the film's worldwide success.
The film set a South Korean box-office record for a domestic film at the time.
The monster's computer-generated effects were created jointly by Korean and Hollywood visual effects studios.
The film is known for its extended unbroken takes — one battle sequence was shot in a single nearly four-minute continuous shot.
The film starred Clive Owen and is loosely based on a novel by P.D. James.
The sequel to the New Year's comedy arrived more than 30 years after the original.
The sequel was released around New Year's and also became one of the highest-grossing Russian releases of its season.
The film's success launched one of the largest commercial film projects in history — an interconnected universe of dozens of movies.
Robert Downey Jr. played Tony Stark, and his own real-life 'comeback' story echoed the character's arc.
The film won BAFTA and eight Oscars, despite a mixed reaction in India to its portrayal of poverty.
The film is based on the Indian novel 'Q & A' and ends with a now-iconic mass dance sequence.
It was the most expensive film in history at the time of its release.
The film developed its own motion-capture system for animating its three-dimensional alien characters.
The black-and-white drama wins the Palme d'Or.
The film was deliberately shot in muted black and white to underscore the harshness of pre-war rural Germany.
One of the highest-grossing Bollywood films of all time.
The film remains one of the most rewatched Indian films online more than a decade after release.
A musical about the Soviet youth subculture of the 1950s.
The film depicts Soviet underground music fans of the 1950s and their clashes with Komsomol activists.
According to UNESCO, Nollywood becomes the world's second-largest film market by output, after Bollywood.
The term 'Nollywood' was coined by journalists by analogy with Hollywood and Bollywood.
Netflix started as a DVD-by-mail rental service before moving into streaming and production.
Netflix's first original series, 'House of Cards,' didn't premiere until 2013, after years of searching for the right format.
The film became one of the first big-budget science fiction blockbusters shot in and about Africa.
The film was deliberately shot in a 'documentary' style mimicking news footage.
The film is based on a real murder case in contemporary Iran.
The film also won the Independent Spirit Award and became one of the first Iranian films to achieve this level of US recognition.
The film takes place almost entirely in a single scene of conversation between a couple in their apartment.
Both lead roles were played by actors in their eighties, a rarity for a major international production.
Second only to North America in box office revenue.
China's market growth was driven largely by a massive wave of new multiplex construction in smaller cities.
A drama about the 1988 referendum that determined Augusto Pinochet's future rule is nominated for an Academy Award.
The film is shot in a near-documentary style, recreating the actual anti-Pinochet advertising campaign.
The film wins the Academy Award for Best Picture.
The film is based on the memoir of Solomon Northup, a free man kidnapped and sold into slavery.
The film wins the Palme d'Or at Cannes for its frank depiction of a relationship.
The film runs over three hours, making it one of the longest films ever to win the Palme d'Or.
India's film industry releases more films annually than Hollywood, though its revenues remain lower.
India's film industry actually comprises several regional-language film industries, not just Hindi-language Bollywood.
The film received an Oscar nomination and sparked a mixed reaction within Russia itself.
Part of the film's post-production budget was funded by Russia's Ministry of Culture.
The film won seven Oscars, including a Best Director nomination for Cuarón.
The film consists almost entirely of long unbroken takes simulating the real-time feeling of weightlessness.
The film receives an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film.
The film was shot in Palestinian territory with local non-professional actors.
The Holocaust drama wins the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
The film is shot almost entirely in long static takes with minimal camera trickery, heightening its documentary feel.
Based on a real-life disaster, it became one of the highest-grossing Russian films of its year.
The film is based on a real 2010 An-24 plane crash near Izhma, Russia.
The film is based on the true story of an American frontiersman who survived a bear attack.
Actor Leonardo DiCaprio won his first Oscar for the role after several previous nominations.
The first Colombian film ever nominated for an Academy Award.
The film follows a scientist traveling through the Amazon in search of a rare plant.
The musical becomes one of the most talked-about films of the decade.
The film received a record-tying 14 Oscar nominations, matching 'Titanic' and 'All About Eve.'
The film unexpectedly became one of the most profitable Korean hits on international streaming.
The film became one of the first Korean hits to gain wide recognition on Netflix outside the country.
The film explores a family drama set against the backdrop of immigration in contemporary Iran.
Iranian authorities later temporarily barred Farhadi from leaving the country over the content of his subsequent films.
Nollywood releases thousands of films a year on budgets relatively modest compared to Hollywood.
Nollywood produces films mostly on video format with minimal shooting schedules, sometimes just a few days.
The move sparked controversy and a boycott by some theaters at the Cannes Film Festival.
The decision sparked debate over the future of theatrical releases versus streaming well before the COVID-19 pandemic.
The film explores a family's breakdown amid social indifference and won an award at Cannes.
The film's title became a byword for emotional estrangement within contemporary Russian families.
One of the highest-grossing films in Russian box office history.
The film tells the story of the Soviet basketball team's win over the US at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
One of the lead roles in the Oscar-winning film is played by transgender actress Daniela Vega.
Actress Daniela Vega became the first openly transgender person to present at the Academy Awards the following year.
The film's cast sparked wide discussion about representation in Hollywood.
The film is based on the novel of the same name by Kevin Kwan and spawned two sequels.
The film was shot in black and white and is based on Cuarón's own childhood memories.
The film is dedicated to a family's housekeeper, based on Cuarón's own childhood nanny.
The reopening of cinemas came with major investment in new multiplexes across the country.
The reopening of cinemas came alongside the easing of several other social restrictions in the country.
The film follows a child who sues his own parents.
The film was directed by Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki, who also appears in it.
The film capped a decade-long series of interconnected films in a single cinematic universe.
The film's final battle is considered one of the largest-scale sequences by character count in film history.
The film is largely autobiographical, drawing on the director's own personal experience.
Filming took place in Almodóvar's own hometown, which the director openly acknowledged as an autobiographical element.
The production was noted for its precise recreation of the contrast between Seoul's wealthy and poor neighborhoods.
The film won the Palme d'Or at Cannes before its Oscar triumph.
A symbolic milestone in the shifting center of gravity of the global film market.
China's market growth was partly driven by limits placed on the number of foreign films allowed release each year.
Latin American content became one of the fastest-growing segments of global streaming catalogs.
Mexico and Brazil became the main regional production hubs for international streaming services.
One of the first major international co-productions of Saudi cinema.
Haifaa al-Mansour had earlier directed the first feature film ever made by a woman filmmaker in Saudi Arabia.
The film wins the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.
The film follows a young Senegalese woman and her fiancé, who leaves for Europe by boat.
Major Hollywood releases were delayed anywhere from several months to over a year.
'Mulan' and other major releases premiered directly on streaming platforms, bypassing theaters entirely.
The film became the first non-English-language winner of Best Picture in Academy Award history.
Director Bong Joon-ho also won Best Director and Best Original Screenplay the same night.
Russian films and series found new international audiences through local and regional streaming services.
Russian animated content, including the 'Masha and the Bear' franchise, gained especially wide popularity abroad.
An example of a new generation of elaborately staged Russian New Year's films.
The film draws on Scandinavian folklore, blending fantasy with a historical setting.
African streaming platforms faced the challenge of limited, stable internet access for viewers.
Several African countries launched their own national streaming platforms in response to growing demand.
Major streaming services began competing for the rights to local European content.
Major streaming services began opening dedicated European production hubs around this period.
The film's hero is based on a comic book character with a history spanning more than forty years.
Actor Simu Liu previously worked as a stuntman and taxi driver before landing the lead role.
The cinema ban in Saudi Arabia had been in place for more than 35 years before it was lifted.
The first official commercial screening after the ban was lifted took place in April 2018.
The first narrative feature in history with scenes shot in space.
Some scenes were filmed aboard the actual International Space Station with a professional cosmonaut acting in a supporting role.
Streaming services sharply expand their presence in the region.
Latin American telenovelas were exported to more than 100 countries even before the streaming era.
The independent film sets a record for the most Academy Awards won by such a production.
The film was released by independent studio A24, which became a symbol of successful arthouse cinema in the 2020s.
It's the first German-language adaptation of the novel.
The film is based on Remarque's novel of the same name, which had already been adapted twice before in Hollywood.
The film's success brought music from Indian cinema to the attention of Hollywood's award shows for the first time in years.
The song's composer said he drew inspiration from both Indian folk dance traditions and Western musicals.
The film's dance number gains worldwide fame on social media.
The song's dance number went viral as a challenge on social media worldwide.
The shift in distribution accelerated the growth of domestic releases and local streaming content.
Several streaming services and film studios announced they were suspending operations in Russia in 2022.
The film became one of the first major Hollywood productions devoted entirely to African culture and heritage.
The film is dedicated to the memory of actor Chadwick Boseman, who died before filming began.
Turkish series gained particular popularity in the Middle East, the Balkans, and Latin America.
Turkish historical dramas became especially popular in countries of the former Ottoman Empire.
The film depicts the trial of Argentina's 1976–1983 military rulers, known as the 'Trial of the Juntas.'
Director Santiago Mitre had previously made documentary and narrative films about Argentine political life.
The writers' strike lasted nearly five months, one of the longest in Hollywood history.
The strike also affected TV showrunners, halting production on dozens of television projects.
The film centers on domestic violence and sparked wide public debate in France.
The verdict in the real French court case that inspired the plot was handed down only after the film's release.
Shot in Germany and Poland, the drama is praised for its unusual narrative approach.
The film's title references a Nazi German bureaucratic euphemism for the area surrounding the death camps.
Both markets show record growth in animated film revenue outside their home audiences.
India's animation industry remains significantly smaller than Japan's in terms of international sales.
Anime films increasingly top global box office charts.
Some anime franchises, including 'Demon Slayer,' have set box-office records outperforming Hollywood releases in Japan.
The investment was partly driven by the region's large and youthful population.
The investment came alongside the opening of new studio facilities in Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Cinema from the Maghreb region experiences a new wave of international interest.
The Carthage Film Festival remains one of the oldest and most prestigious showcases of African and Arab cinema.