1951-1960

  • Tomu Uchida – Dotanba AKA The Eleventh Hour (1957)

    1951-1960AsianClassicsJapanTomu Uchida

    Quote:
    Based on a 1956 television feature on Japan’s national network, NHK, this is one of Uchida’s rarest films. A socially conscious drama with a contemporary backdrop, Dotanba focuses on the attempts to rescue a group of trapped miners. The title is a figure of speech — (essentially “last minute” or “eleventh hour”) — that refers to a situation of peril. The film boasts a script co-written by Uchida and Akira Kurosawa’s frequent screenwriter, Shinobu Hashimoto, and stars Kurosawa’s frequent star Takashi Shimura.Read More »

  • Gillo Pontecorvo – Giovanna (1955)

    1951-1960DramaGillo PontecorvoItalyPolitics

    This short is set in the early 1950s in a small textile factory in central Italy (Prato). Giovanna and her fellow female workers decide to enact a protest against the direction of the factory’s dismissal plan, by occupying the factory and continuing to work until the proprietor cancels the dismissals. None of these women can really afford to lose their jobs, as it is the only income in the family. All workers receive moral and material support from their families, apart from Giovanna, who bravely endures her husband’s disapproval. Almost all the women hold out for thirty-five days in spite of the proprietor’s attempts to break their resistance. At first he blocks the road to the factory, then he cuts off electric power to increase their isolation; finally, he tries to convince them to accept the dismissal of at least a smaller number of them. But the women overcome these obstacles, determined to resist… (IMDB)Read More »

  • José Antonio Nieves Conde – Balarrasa AKA Reckless (1951)

    1951-1960DramaJosé Antonio Nieves CondeSpainSpanish cinema under Franco

    Reckless (Spanish: Balarrasa) is a 1951 Spanish drama film directed by José Antonio Nieves Conde. It was entered into the 1951 Cannes Film Festival.

    Quote:
    Javier Mendoza, a Spanish missionary known as Balarrasa, recalls his life while waiting for the worst after being trapped in a snowstorm in Alaska. Of disorderly life in his youth, during the Civil War he suffered a traumatic event, when playing cards with the guard that played with his companion. He loses and dies while replacing him. Followed by the sensation of guilt, he decides to straighten its life and enters the seminary.Read More »

  • Leni Riefenstahl – Tiefland (1954)

    1951-1960GermanyLeni RiefenstahlMusicalRomance

    After spending the 1930s as the Third Reich’s principal cinematic chronicler, Leni Riefenstahl returned to fictional films with Tiefland. According to Riefenstahl, she had refused to make any more propaganda pictures–“for good reasons,” she explained enigmatically–choosing instead to direct a period romance, based on an old Spanish play and opera by Eugen d’Albert. Riefenstahl cast herself as the central character, Marta, a Spanish dancer who becomes the romantic bone of contention between humble shepherd Franz Eichberger and imperious marquis Bernhard Minetti. While the material seems to cry out for music, Riefenstahl plays the story straight, though much of the acting can certainly be described as operatic.Read More »

  • Peter Schamoni – Moskau ruft! aka Moscow Is Calling! (1959)

    1951-1960DocumentaryGermanyPeter SchamoniShort Film

    12′ – West Germany 1959 – Directed and written by: Peter Schamoni – Cinematography by: Jost Vacano
    Music by: Occamstreet Footwarmers – Produced by: Schongerfilm

    A film made secretly in Moscow by Peter Schamoni during the World Festival of Youth and Students in the summer of 1957. His cameraman was Jost Vacano. During their trip, they made authentic film and audio recordings of a kind that had never been seen before in Western countries.Read More »

  • Tai Katô – Ayame kasa: kenka kaidô aka Road Warriors (1960)

    1951-1960ActionJapanTai Katô

    Wandering gambler movie filled with humor and compassion. An odd couple of a gangster and a masterless samurai becomes involved in a variety of events as they travel.

    Rare film from Tai Kato, one of the all-time greats.Read More »

  • Vojtech Jasný – Touha AKA Desire (1958)

    1951-1960ArthouseCzech RepublicDramaVojtech Jasný

    A poignant overview of how short life can be, this interesting drama from Czech director Vojetch Jasny is divided into four separate segments. In the first skit, a young child’s impressions are observed as his newborn baby sister becomes a part of the family. In the second, a young woman falls in love for the first time one summer, and in the third, a tough, older peasant woman battles against the farming cooperatives. Finally, in the last segment, everything comes full circle as a woman who is about to become a grandmother dies while her daughter-in-law has not yet given birth.Read More »

  • Edith Carlmar – Ung frue forsvunnet AKA A Young Woman Missing (1953)

    1951-1960DramaEdith CarlmarMysteryNorway

    Synopsis:
    ‘The film “Ung frue forsvunnet” by acclaimed female Norwegian film maker Edith Calmar starts off this story in 1949 with a husband come home from a mountain trip, finding his young wife for two years, being traceless missing. She’s been gone for days, and the police is immediately contacted. A couple living on boat finds the woman’s hat floating, and it seem she’s dead either by being killed or falling into the river.
    The manuscript is quite well done, and the story unfolds as the husband tells about his life with his wife, from meeting her casually. There’s a secret she’s never told him, because he didn’t want to hear it. This secret obviously is the reason for her disappearance.’
    – OJT (IMDb)Read More »

  • Antonio Santillán – El ojo de cristal AKA Eyes of the Dead (1956)

    1951-1960Antonio SantillánFilm NoirSpainSpanish cinema under Franco

    With the intention of stealing the compensation for a work accident, Enrique kills an old man. However, it turns out that he had not yet collected it, so he will try, then, to falsify the signature of the check. Meanwhile, at the same time that the police are investigating the case, the son of the police inspector investigates on his own.Read More »

Back to top button