S5.E4 ∙ Getting the Bird

George Orwell wrote that in a repressive political system every joke is a "tiny revolution." Jokes were an essential part of the communist experience because the monopoly of state power meant that any act of non-conformity, down to a simple turn of phrase, could be construed as a form of dissent. By the same token, a joke about any facet of life became a joke about communism. Hammer and Tickle recounts a humorous history of the Soviet Union and its satellite states through the jokes that flourished under the oppressive regimes in Russia and parts of Central and Eastern Europe. Jokes, the film contends, were a language of truth under Communism; a language that allowed people to navigate the disconnect between propaganda and reality and provided a means of resisting the system despite the absence of free speech. Using animated sequences, manipulated archival footage, and sketches to resurrect the jokes, the film offers an ironic take on the history of Communism while simultaneously investigating the social and political impact of jokes under Soviet rule. Interviews with Solidarity leader and former Polish president Lech Walesa, hard-line Polish leader General Jaroszelski, German actor Peter Sodann, German satirist and author Ernst Roehl, East German newspaper editor and Politburo member Guenter Schabowski, and academics Christie Davies and Roy Medvedev address the role that jokes played in challenging and weakening the Communist system from the inside even as joke-tellers faced censure or time in the Gulag for voicing their humor. Light and irreverent in its tone, Hammer and Tickle is really about the ultimate seriousness of joking and the use of the power of laughter to overcome hardship. This history of humor under the Soviet regime offers a direct, incontrovertible way to understand what it was like living in a Communist society, and is also proof that the human spirit can never be broken.

In early-18th-century London, Queen Anne, the last of the House of Stuart, is a weak ruler. She is committed to peace in the War of Spanish Succession. The Duchess of Marlborough, whose husband is commander-in-chief of the British Army, has high hopes of a war.

Following a nefarious plot by Kozukenosuke Kira Takuminokami Asano Tono is ordered to take the blade and commit suicide. he has loyal foot soldiers however. Kuranosuke is one. He vows vengeance and is ready to wield his sword. to enact his revenge he needs funds and turns to an accountant in the fiefdom. Together they hatch a plan. It is time to put the plan into motion.

In this second installment of comedian Robert Wuhl's take on American history, "Professor Wuhl" removes the wool covering the eyes of his "students" in an attempt to challenge some preconceptions about commonly held cultural beliefs.

In "The Arabian Horse", the respectable bourgeois Francesco Vergellesi is so firmly convinced of his wife's virtue that he does not hesitate to bet her against the rare stallion he has his eye on... "The Earring" shows how a poor girl can help herself to a precious jewel and what intrigues are needed to finally bring an elderly aristocratic couple to an heir.

This is the story of Tehran from the Qajar time (middle of 19th century) to today. Tehran has become a metropolis from a small village, now a developed city with many social problems.