Unfolding without narration, this is a spare and elegant film constructed entirely from archival footage shot between 1912 and 1933 in the former Dutch East Indies. Luminous nitrate images are set against a simple soundtrack of birdcalls, bells and murmuring voices, punctuated by native poems and songs. The film's careful construction reveals the face of systematic colonization and the effect of economic expansion on a culture. Footage shot by white Dutchmen as propaganda for their colonial causes now seems both comical and ominous, while the natives' songs and poems are laments against hunger and the drive for profit. A quiet yet pointed journey through the past, Mother Dao is both an informative time capsule and a moving tribute to a lost world.-Rachel Rosen