1961-1970

  • Sergei Bondarchuk – Voyna i mir AKA War and Peace (1966)

    1961-1970DramaRomanceSergei BondarchukUSSR

    Quote:
    At the height of the Cold War, the Soviet film industry set out to prove it could outdo Hollywood with a production that would dazzle the world: a titanic, awe-inspiring adaptation of Leo Tolstoy’s classic tome in which the fates of three souls—the blundering, good-hearted Pierre; the heroically tragic Prince Andrei; and the radiant, tempestuous Natasha—collide amid the tumult of the Napoleonic Wars. Employing a cast of thousands and an array of innovative camera techniques, director Sergei Bondarchuk conjures a sweeping vision of grand balls that glitter with rococo beauty and breathtaking battles that overwhelm with their expressionistic power. As a statement of Soviet cinema’s might, War and Peace succeeded wildly, garnering the Academy Award for best foreign-language film and setting a new standard for epic moviemaking.Read More »

  • Jens Ravn – Manden der tænkte ting AKA The Man Who Thought Life (1969)

    1961-1970DenmarkHorrorJens RavnSci-Fi

    The main character is Dr. Max Holst, a successful neurosurgeon. One day an intense little man named Steinmetz shows up, who has the real ability to create objects out of thin air, using only his mind. As no one believes him at first, he is held at a ward for mental patients, but manifests the key to his door and escapes. As he has a special interest in Dr. Holst, Steinmetz subsequently invites Holst to his large mansion, which is full of expensive paintings and sculptures, and proves to him that he can in fact materialise objects. Steinmetz’s abilities are evolving by leaps and bounds, and is progressing from being able to create objects only to being able to create living things. Read More »

  • Jack Gold – The Bofors Gun [+Extras] (1968)

    1961-1970DramaJack GoldUnited KingdomWar

    A drama set in post-war Germany. A small detachment of British National Servicemen faces
    internal strife and a meltdown of Army discipline.Read More »

  • Christopher Morahan – Diamonds for Breakfast (1968)

    1961-1970Christopher MorahanComedyUnited Kingdom

    Quote:
    BRAND NEW 2K MASTER! Four thieves try to steal the Imperial Jewels of Russia! Swinging playboy Grand Duke Nicholas Wladimirovitch Goduno (Marcello Mastroianni, Marriage Italian Style), a direct descendent of the Romanov family who were overthrown in the Russian Revolution of 1917, learns that his family’s crown jewels will be exhibited at a London museum and plots to steal them. He gathers a crew of beautiful but dangerous women, led by Bridget Rafferty (Rita Tushingham, The Knack… and How to Get It), to assist in his plot against Popov (Warren Mitchell, The Crawling Eye), the Soviet functionary in charge of the exhibit. Wonderfully directed by Christopher Morahan (Clockwise) and beautifully shot by Gerry Turpin (Seance on a Wet Afternoon, The Whisperers).Read More »

  • Raoul Ruiz – Tres Tristes Tigres AKA Three Sad Tigers (1968)

    1961-1970ArthouseChileDramaRaoul Ruiz

    The drunken nights of several listless chancers in Chile’s capital city build inexorably to violence.

    Review by Gonzalo San Martin @IMDb:
    This movie is the best portrait of Chilean society. Ruiz show us like a group of little people with little problems, with a very special way of life. The strangest Spanish in all South American with the funniest accent too. This movie is like Martin Scorsese’s Mean Street but without the crime ingredient. You must see it if you wanna know what’s to be a Chilean, how you can feel believing that you’re in the center of the world but actually living in the end, almost hanging from the continent. Raul Ruiz right now is living in Paris and making the most bizarre but fascinating films of the french production. “Tres tristes tigres” is very difficult to find but if you can, i tell you that you’ll have a real gem.Read More »

  • Artur Vojtetsky – Gde-to est syn aka My Son is Out There (1962)

    1961-1970Artur VojtetskyDramaUSSR

    An old fisherman spends his days waiting to hear from his son who left the village long time ago.

    One of the first films shot by Yuri Ilyenko.Read More »

  • Guy Green – A Patch of Blue (1965)

    1961-1970DramaGuy GreenUSA

    Quote:
    While perhaps too consciously schematic in its pairing of a black man and a blind white girl during an era of heightened racial awareness, this small film is a tender and moving story of friendship. Sidney Poitier stars as a man who befriends a blind girl (Elizabeth Hartman) he often sees in the park, and as he comes to understand the harshness of her family life, encourages her to reach out for a better life.Read More »

  • William Greaves – Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968)

    1961-1970DocumentaryPoliticsUSAWilliam Greaves

    Quote:
    Filmmaker William Greaves auditioned acting students for a fictional drama, while simultaneously shooting the behind-the-scenes drama taking place.

    Jonathan Rosenbaum wrote:
    Seeing this singular 1968 American experimental feature by William Greaves a second time (on video; the first time was in 1980, in its original 35-millimeter format) has led me to value it more, though arguably the fact that it loses relatively little impact on video constitutes one of its limitations. Greaves, a pioneering black actor whose career stretches back to postwar films made for black audiences as well as the underrated Hollywood feature Lost Boundaries, went on to direct over 200 documentaries, host and executive produce NET’s Black Journal, and teach acting at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute. Read More »

  • Mark Donskoy – Serdtse materi AKA A Mother’s Heart (1965)

    1961-1970DramaMark DonskoyUSSR

    allmovie.com (slightly corrected): The formative years of Bolshevist leader Vladimir Ulyanov (aka Lenin) provides the basis of this Russian biopic that begins the a provincial town of Simbirsk in the late 19th-century (1884-1890) where a widow contends with her six socially-conscious and politically active children. Her husband had also been a staunch supporter of peasant rights. Her eldest daughter and son are studying in the university and trouble ensues when they are arrested for conspiring to murder the czar. Because the son refuses to deny his desire to kill the czar, he is executed. The daughter is then exiled and the widow moves her family to remain close to her. Read More »

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