D. A. Pennebaker — Director (15)
The War Room (1993) [Movie] IMDb WikiData TMDB
The War Room
director: D. A. Pennebaker / Chris Hegedus actor: James Carville / George Stephanopoulos
A behind-the-scenes documentary about the Clinton for President campaign, focusing on the adventures of spin doctors James Carville and George Stephanopoulos.
Unlocking the Cage (2016) [Movie] WikiData IMDb TMDB
Unlocking the Cage
director: Chris Hegedus / D. A. Pennebaker
other title: Sagsøgt af en abe / L'Avocat Des Chimpanzés
Renowned filmmakers D A Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus follow determined animal rights activist Steven Wise into the courtroom for an unprecedented battle that seeks to utilize the writ of habeas corpus to expand legal “personhood” to include certain animals. Wise’s unusual plaintiffs—chimpanzees Tommy and Kiko, once famed showbiz stars—are now living in filth, struggling to survive. Wise and his impassioned legal team take us into the field, revealing gripping evidence of such abuse and plunging us into the intricacies of their case as they probe preconceived notions of what it means to be a non-human animal.
Alice Cooper (1970) [Movie] TMDB
Alice Cooper
director: D. A. Pennebaker / Chris Hegedus actor: Alice Cooper / Dennis Dunaway
Alice Cooper and band’s first performance, organized by his friend Frank Zappa, at the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival in 1969.
Jingle Bells: RFK - 1964 (1977) [Movie] TMDB
Jingle Bells: RFK - 1964
director: D. A. Pennebaker actor: Robert F. Kennedy / Ethel Kennedy
Surrounded by his children, his wife Ethel, and Sammy Davis, Jr., RFK visits schoolchildren around the city, and is every bit the good patriarch and dutiful public servant. But it’s the films’ fleeting, in-between, moments where Pennebaker most precisely hits the mark, offering reflection on the possibilities that Robert Kennedy’s all too brief life foreclosed. Set against the pageantry of a long ago Christmas, the film speaks to tragic contingencies of history lying far beyond the ken of politics that continue to circumscribe the tortured destiny of our country.
Lambert & Co. (1964) [Movie] TMDB IMDb WikiData
Lambert & Co.
director: D. A. Pennebaker / Richard Leacock actor: Dave Lambert / Mary Vonnie
other title: Audition at RCA
Jazz vocalist Dave Lambert auditions a new group of singers at RCA Studios in 1964.
Skyscraper (1959) [Movie] TMDB IMDb WikiData
Skyscraper
director: Shirley Clarke / Willard Van Dyke
Nominated for an Academy Award, this live-action short film playfully chronicles the construction of the Tishman Building at 666 Fifth Avenue in New York City.
Town Bloody Hall (1979) [Movie] TMDB IMDb WikiData
Town Bloody Hall
director: Chris Hegedus / D. A. Pennebaker actor: Norman Mailer / Jacqueline Ceballos
Norman Mailer and a panel of feminists — Jacqueline Ceballos, Germaine Greer, Jill Johnston, and Diana Trilling — debate the issue of Women's Liberation.
Kings of Pastry (2009) [Movie] IMDb WikiData TMDB
Kings of Pastry
director: D. A. Pennebaker / Chris Hegedus actor: Jacquy Pfeiffer / Sébastien Cannone
other title: Les rois de la pâtisserie / Crème de la crème
The collar awarded to the winners of the Meilleur Ouvrier de France (Best Craftsman in France) is more than the ultimate recognition for every pastry chef - it is a dream and an obsession. The 3-day competition includes everything from delicate chocolates to precarious six foot sugar sculptures and requires that the chefs have extraordinary skill, nerves of steel and luck. The film follows Jacquy Pfeiffer, founder of The French Pastry School in Chicago, as he returns to France to compete against 15 of France's leading pastry chefs. The filmmakers were given first time/exclusive access to this high-stakes drama of passion, sacrifice, disappointment and joy in the quest to have President Sarkozy declare them one of the best in France.
Depeche Mode 101 (1989) [Movie] TMDB IMDb WikiData
Depeche Mode 101
director: Chris Hegedus / D. A. Pennebaker actor: Alan Wilder / Martin Gore
other title: Depeche Mode: 101 / 101
A fascinating documentary focusing on backstage realities of art and business during the British synthesizer band's 1988 American tour.
Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1983) [Movie] WikiData IMDb TMDB
Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
director: D. A. Pennebaker actor: David Bowie / Mick Ronson
other title: Ziggy Stardust and the spiders
Hammersmith Odeon, London, July 3, 1973. British singer David Bowie performs his alter ego Ziggy Stardust for the very last time. A decadent show, a hallucinogenic collage of kitsch, pop irony and flamboyant excess: a musical symbiosis of feminine passion and masculine dominance that defines Bowie's art and the glam rock genre.
You’re Nobody Till Somebody Loves You (1964) [Movie] TMDB
You’re Nobody Till Somebody Loves You
director: D. A. Pennebaker actor: Timothy Leary / Monti Rock III
Description by D.A Pennebaker: "This movie is something of a mystery. Timothy Leary was getting married to a model named Nena Von Schlebrugge up in Millbrook, New York at the Hitchcock house, where Leary had been carrying on his hallucinogenic revelries for the past year or so after leaving Harvard. It was rumored that this was going to be the wedding of the season, the wedding of Mr. And Mrs. Swing as Cab Calloway put it. Blackwood took me downtown to meet Monte Rock III who was singing at Trudy Heller’s but who was also a very pricey and off-the-wall hairdresser and was in fact going to be doing the bride’s hair. Nena’s brother, Bjorn, known as the “Baron” was a friend of the Hitchcock’s, as was I, and the idea of going along and filming the wedding seemed not unwarranted. I’ve always wanted to film someone getting married."
Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (1963) [Movie] NeoDB Douban WikiData TMDB IMDb
Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment
other title: Crisis
During a two-day period before and after the University of Alabama integration crisis, the film uses five camera crews to follow President John F. Kennedy, attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, Alabama governor George Wallace, deputy attorney general Nicholas Katzenbach and the students Vivian Malone and James Hood. As Wallace has promised to personally block the two black students from enrolling in the university, the JFK administration discusses the best way to react to it, without rousing the crowd or making Wallace a martyr for the segregationist cause.

Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with The Film Foundation in 1999.
Monterey Pop (1968) [Movie] IMDb TMDB NeoDB Douban WikiData
Monterey Pop
other title: Monterey Pop Festival 1967
Featuring performances by popular artists of the 1960s, this concert film highlights the music of the 1967 California festival. Although not all musicians who performed at the Monterey Pop Festival are on film, some of the notable acts include the Mamas and the Papas, Simon & Garfunkel, Jefferson Airplane, the Who, Otis Redding, and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Hendrix's post-performance antics — lighting a guitar on fire, breaking it and tossing a part into the audience — are captured.
Original Cast Album: Company (1970) [Movie] NeoDB Douban IMDb WikiData TMDB
Original Cast Album: Company
director: D. A. Pennebaker actor: Stephen Sondheim / Hal Prince
In 1970, right after the triumphant premiere of Stephen Sondheim’s groundbreaking concept musical Company, the renowned composer and lyricist, his director Harold Prince, the show’s stars, and a large pit orchestra all went into a Manhattan recording studio as part of a time-honored Broadway tradition: the making of the original cast album. What ensued was a marathon session in which, with the pressures of posterity and the coolly exacting Sondheim’s perfectionism hanging over them, all involved pushed themselves to the limit.
Dont Look Back (1967) [Movie] Douban TMDB NeoDB WikiData IMDb
Dont Look Back
director: D. A. Pennebaker actor: Bob Dylan / Albert Grossman
other title: Don't Look Back / Se dig ikke tilbage - Bob Dylan
In this wildly entertaining vision of one of the twentieth century’s greatest artists, Bob Dylan is surrounded by teen fans, gets into heated philosophical jousts with journalists, and kicks back with fellow musicians Joan Baez, Donovan, and Alan Price.