Framing the world: films about photography
Beamafilm
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26/03/2026
Image: 'Smile' (dir. Harriet McKern), featuring photographs by Tawfik Elgazzar.
📸 Photography and perspective
Photography is all about perspective. It's about what we choose to capture, what we leave out, and the visual stories that can unfold in a single frame.From sweeping landscapes to intimate portraits, films about photography reveal much more than the images themselves - they also tell a story about the eyes behind the lens. They take us into the creative process, cultural memory, and personal expression, reminding us that every photograph captures a narrative that frames the world.
At Beamafilm, this week we’re spotlighting a curated collection of films that explore the art, craft, and impact of photography in all its forms. We’re also turning the focus onto photographers themselves.
🎞 The artist behind the camera
Behind every photograph is a creative vision.
Ans Westra: Private Journeys Public Signposts turns the camera around, offering a deeply personal look at one of New Zealand’s most influential documentary photographers whose work captured everyday life with honesty and depth.
In Smile, director Harriet McKern shows how photography becomes a human connection - an exploration of expression, vulnerability, and the moments we choose to share with the world - and how the joy of seeing subjects smile was also transformative for photographer Tawfik Elgazzar.
In Henry Winkelmann: The Panoramas, we step back in time to learn the story of an early panoramic photographer and the painstaking craft behind capturing expansive scenes long before the age of digital photography.
🌍 Seeing the world differently
Photography has a unique ability to shape how we see the world and how we remember it.
Films like From Scotland with Love blend archival images and film to create a powerful visual tapestry of place and history, while in Maidens, photographs are not just preserved - they are reimagined, woven into a cinematic language of memory, identity, and feminist storytelling.
We are taken out into the streets of central Auckland, where fashion, identity, and place intersect in Streetwear. Through the lens of significant collections such as Rykenberg Photography and the 1990 Project, and with insights from library and museum specialists, this film brings the evolving style and cultural landscapes of the 1960s and 1990s back to life.
In Welcome to Kandos, filmmakers Fran Tinley and Justin Hewitson show us how photography sits within the wider Cementa contemporary arts festival, where images become part of a broader creative dialogue, capturing, questioning, and reimagining the identity of a post-industrial town in transition.
Stories like these remind us that photography is not just about imagery - it’s about preserving culture, identity, and time itself.
📱 Photography in the modern world
Today, photography is more accessible than ever - and more immediate.
iPhone Photography with Dale McManus demonstrates how an everyday device can become a powerful creative tool, empowering anyone to capture compelling images and tell visual stories.
Meanwhile, You Myself and Art – Who We Are Through the Medium of Art reflects on artistic identity more broadly, exploring how visual expression - including photography - becomes a powerful tool for self-discovery and storytelling.
While a photograph can freeze time, the story behind it is often anything but still.
These films reveal:
* The emotion behind the image
* The relationship between photographer and subject
* The fleeting moments that, once captured, become timeless
They remind us that sometimes, the smallest moments can carry the greatest meaning.
🎥 Explore photography through film
Whether you’re a seasoned photographer, a creative enthusiast, or simply curious about the stories behind the lens, this collection offers a compelling way to see the world differently.
📸 Discover films that capture more than images - they capture perspective.
✨ Press play - and start framing the world.
Watch for FREE with a participating library card or on a 30-day trial. Also, you can rent a film for 72 hours.
This artful documentary turns the camera on photographer Ans Westra, a Dutch Emigree, who has captured New Zealand life in a series of iconic images.
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Annie Leibovitz has produced some of the most iconic images of the last 30 years. "Life through a Lens" reveals a woman who has become as iconic as the people she has photographed.
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Beautiful from the outside in, ‘Smile’ explores the nature of individuality, cultural diversity and the positive joy for the photographer of seeing his subjects smile.
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Photographer Bill Cunningham chronicles NY's fashions.
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Filmmaker Agnes Varda was a French film director, photographer, and artist, widely considered one of the most important and influential figures in world cinema. Often described as the “Grandmother of the French New Wave, she...
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French artist JR creates a global art project.
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Ordinary people, some long since dead, their names and identities largely forgotten, appear shimmering from the depth of the vaults to take a starring role in the history of Scotland.
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A photographer influences generations of street artists with her pictures of New York's graffiti.
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The man who revolutionized photography.
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Ordinary people, some long since dead, their names and identities largely forgotten, appear shimmering from the depth of the vaults to take a starring role in the history of Scotland.
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A documentary about an important American still photographer who captured New York City in the 1960s (his work there is said to have influenced the TV show Mad Men) and later the West in Texas and Los Angeles.
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Young photographer Dennis Stock tries to pin down rising actor James Dean for an magazine assignment - and ends up being swept into Dean's dizzying life.
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Owen, a young photographer with an incurable eye disease, goes on a photography expedition to Yellowstone National Park, but his life changes forever when he loses his sight.
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A poetic documentary on four generations of maternal family in Tasmania, using archival footage and excerpts from key early feminist films to trace significant changes in women’s place in the family and society.
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Nominated for an Oscar® for Best Documentary, celebrated filmmaker Wim Wenders captures the uniqueness and raw beauty of the work of photographer Sebastião Salgado.
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Photojournalists shoot evidence of atrocities in the final days of South African apartheid.
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An exploration into the glass plate photographic collection of Henry Winkelmann and the creation of panoramic views of early Auckland.
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A look at 50 years of the iconic magazine features interviews with and footage of journalists, photographers and performers who have graced its pages since it was launched by publisher Jann Wenner in 1967.
Wagstaff and Mapplethorpe - partners in the heady 1970s NY art world.
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An exploration into fashion and street photography from the 1960s and 1990s.
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The trailblazing late photographer Helmut Newton had a defining impact on the worlds of fashion and art.
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"Welcome to Kandos" is a unique documentary about inaugural contemporary art festival Cementa13, which transforms the former cement producing town Kandos in central New South Wales with inspiring results.
Eight years in the making, Jane Castle's poignant documentary about her filmmaker mother Lilias Fraser is an intimate mother-daughter story and eye-opening chronicle of women's roles in the film industry.
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The life and legacy of Picture Post, Britain's best-selling magazine during and after WWII. Through its powerful picture stories, Picture Post helped to transform post-war Britain, and changed the face of British photography.
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In 1948, Edith Piaf offered a Paillard-Bolex camera to Charles Aznavour, which would always be with him. Until 1982, Charles would shot hours and hours of material which would become the corpus of his film diary.
Featuring over 20 specialists, this documentary series explores who we are through the medium of art.
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An exploration through the J.T Diamond Collection that documented the history of industry in West Auckland.
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