Topic

Socialism

Common ownership, and two centuries of disagreement about how much.

2: in film
13:00: average
26 min: in total
9: across the network

Socialism across the network →

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13:00

Born in Flames

Lizzie Borden · 1983

Born in Flames (1983), directed and produced by Lizzie Borden, is a low-budget science fiction drama set in an alternate socialist-democratic United States ten years after revolution. It follows intersecting feminist groups — pirate radio collectives, a radical newspaper, and a militant Women’s Army — as they confront state-backed sexism, racism and classism. Shot on location in New York with non-professional performers and fragmented, urgent editing, it rejects narrative polish in favour of political precision. Its themes remain starkly relevant: media control, reproductive labour, surveillance, and the necessity of coalition across difference.

13:00

Redes

Fred Zinnemann, Emilio Gómez Muriel · 1936

A 1936 Mexican fiction film shot on location in Alvarado, Redes depicts fishermen resisting exploitation through collective action. Directed by Fred Zinnemann and Emilio Gómez Muriel, written by John Dos Passos, and scored by Silvestre Revueltas, it uses non-professional actors, Paul Strand’s stark cinematography, and a politically grounded script to render poverty as material condition rather than moral allegory. Though its narrative scaffolding is thin, its formal coherence — in image, sound, and rhythm — makes it a singular work of interwar cinematic socialism.

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13:00

20th Century Women

Mike Mills · 2016

Set in 1979 Santa Barbara, Mike Mills’ 20th Century Women follows 15-year-old Jamie as his single mother Dorothea enlists two younger women — photographer Abbie and teenage friend Julie — to help raise him. Anchored by Annette Bening’s restrained performance, the film observes their overlapping lives with warmth and precision, treating feminism, illness, ageing and adolescence as lived conditions rather than themes. Shot by Sean Porter and edited by Leslie Jones, it moves at the pace of real conversation, building meaning through accumulation rather than climax.

13:00

24 Frames

Abbas Kiarostami · 2017

Abbas Kiarostami’s final film, 24 Frames, comprises twenty-four uncut, static shots — each ninety seconds long — observing nature, animals, and thresholds between interior and exterior. Beginning with animated movement superimposed on Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow, it proceeds into real-world stillness, testing how much meaning resides in time, attention, and unmediated presence. Released posthumously at Cannes 2017, it is a rigorous, unsentimental essay on perception and impermanence.

13:00

3:10 to Yuma

Delmer Daves · 1957

Delmer Daves’ 1957 Western 3:10 to Yuma adapts Elmore Leonard’s taut short story into a study of obligation under pressure. Rancher Dan Evans agrees to escort outlaw Ben Wade to the 3:10 train for Yuma, facing ambush, betrayal, and his own wavering resolve. Shot by Charles Lawton Jr. with sun-bleached realism and scored sparingly by George Duning, the film builds suspense through pacing, performance, and moral granularity — not spectacle. It was preserved by the Library of Congress in 2012 for its cultural and aesthetic significance.

13:00

3 Women

Robert Altman · 1977

Robert Altman’s 1977 film 3 Women follows the uncanny merging of identities among a timid young woman, her garrulous roommate and a silent, pregnant artist in a sun-scorched California town. Built from a dream and shot with deliberate, unhurried precision, it uses repetition, reflection and improvisation to explore how selves are borrowed, performed and abandoned.