Underplayed Gems

When the World was Wide (1978)

When the World was Wide poster
Directed by
Perry Miller Adato
Genre
documentary film
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

This documentary shows early travel films from the early 1900s. It includes some of the very first footage captured in places like Japan, Tibet, and China.

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What happens

When the World was Wide is a 1978 American documentary film that presents pioneering travelogue footage of exotic and far-flung locales taken between 1905 and 1927. It samples archival footage reaching back to "the last days of the Manchu Dynasty" in China and includes the first footage taken in Japan (1909) and Tibet (1919) and the first ever of a Dalai Lama. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? You can browse by genre, country and year, or take this one into the 3D catalogue and ask the Catbot for something closer.