Drama

  • Marco Ferreri & Isidoro M. Ferry – El pisito AKA The Little Apartment (1959)

    1951-1960ComedyDramaIsidoro M. FerryMarco FerreriSpain

    Quote:
    Based on the novel by Rafael Azcona, screenplay by Azcona and Marco Ferreri. Rodolfo and Petrita each live in separate quarters in dilapidated Madrid, while looking to have a little apartment (or “pisito”, in Spanish). Unfortunately their low salaries prevent them from acquiring one. Soon, Rodolfo’s co-workers urge him to marry the old and frail Doña Martina, who is the main tenant in the apartment he boards in. According to Spanish rent-control law, he could inherit the lease from his spouse. Thus begin his misgivings and Petrita’s.Read More »

  • Barbet Schroeder – La virgen de los sicarios AKA Our Lady of the Assassins (2000)

    1991-2000Barbet SchroederCrimeDramaFranceQueer Cinema(s)

    Quote:
    A Colombian writer returns to his native Medellín to mourn his lost youth and, while he’s at it, pick up a new one. That, more or less, is the tale that Barbet Schroeder’s new movie has to tell. Schroeder has made some spicy pictures in his time, but this one feels lacklustre by comparison, and the two main performers-Anderson Ballesteros as the hustler and German Jaramillo as his aging mentor-tend to drift through their scenes, trying not to notice the hellfire around them. Whether they are genuinely ground down by the woes of the world or simply exhausted by years of casual sex is hard to work out; to be fair, few directors could make a film about moral anesthesia without sinking into glumness, and Schroeder does a pretty good job of insuring that no one in the audience will book a Colombian vacation in the near future.Read More »

  • Nobuhiro Yamashita – Tennen kokekkô AKA A Gentle Breeze in the Village (2007)

    Drama2001-2010JapanNobuhiro YamashitaRomance

    Quote:
    In “A Gentle Breeze in the Village,” Soyo Migata (Kaho) is a quirky 8th grade student who resides in a tiny rural village somewhere in Japan. The village is small enough where there’s only 6 students that attends their school (from 1st grade through 8th grade). Soyo’s been friends with her classmates since early childhood and they all hang out together like an extended family. One day, a new student named Hiromi Osawa (Masaki Okada) arrives. He’s a good looking boy from Tokyo and all the other students view as something of a celebrity.Read More »

  • George Fitzmaurice – Suzy (1936)

    Drama1931-1940ClassicsGeorge FitzmauriceUSA

    Synopsis:
    When American showgirl Suzy (Jean Harlow) finds herself in London without work, she plans to leave her career behind and find a rich husband. Instead, she falls for brilliant but broke inventor Terry (Franchot Tone), who is developing an airplane stabilizer. When Terry is mistakenly shot by a spy, Suzy fears she will be blamed and flees to Paris, where she returns to a life of singing and marries flyboy Andre (Cary Grant). But things get complicated when Suzy learns that Terry has survived.Read More »

  • Whit Stillman – Barcelona (1994)

    1991-2000ComedyDramaUSAWhit Stillman

    Quote:
    Before there was Woody Allen’s 2008 Vicky Cristina Barcelona, there was Whit Stillman’s far rawer, less warm and fuzzy Barcelona, released in 1994. Set in 1980s Barcelona, the film explores a period of particularly notable anti-American sentiment. While marketing/sales rep Ted Boynton (Taylor Nichols) does his best to keep a low profile while working abroad for his Chicago-based company, the unexpected arrival of his naval officer cousin, Fred Boynton (Chris Eigeman), throws a wrench into Ted’s plans for tranquil solitude.Read More »

  • Mohsen Makhmalbaf – The President (2014)

    2011-2020DramaGeorgiaMohsen MakhmalbafPolitics

    The President is the story of a dictator of an imaginary country in the Caucasus, who is forced to escape following a coup d’état, and begins a journey to discover his country in the company of his five-year-old grandson. The two travel across the lands that the President once governed. Now, disguised as a street musician to avoid being recognized, the former dictator comes into contact with his people, which he comes to know from a different point of view.Read More »

  • Izuru Kumasaka – Pâku ando rabuhoteru aka Park and Love Hotel (2007)

    Drama2001-2010AsianIzuru KumasakaJapan

    A movie set in a love hotel, but without a single sex scene? A 59-year-old woman as the heroine? It’s hard to imagine that particular pitch loosening purse strings at major Japanese media companies. A fatally ill teenager? That’s more like it.

    Mark Schilling’s review from the Japan Times: No sex at a love hotel
    A movie set in a love hotel, but without a single sex scene? A 59-year-old woman as the heroine? It’s hard to imagine that particular pitch loosening purse strings at major Japanese media companies. A fatally ill teenager? That’s more like it.
    Director Izuru Kumasaka has incorporated these and other decidedly uncommercial elements into debut feature “Park and Love Hotel” (titled “Asyl” — short for “Asylum” — internationally), which won the Best First Feature Award at this year’s Berlin Film Festival. Read More »

  • Ruy Guerra – Os Fuzis AKA The Guns (1964)

    1961-1970ArthouseBrazilDramaRuy Guerra

    In an extremely poor region in the Northeast of Brazil, a group of soldiers try to stop the population from sacking a food deposit.Read More »

  • Janusz Morgenstern – Zólty szalik AKA The Yellow Scarf (2000)

    1991-2000DramaJanusz MorgensternPolandTV

    The Yellow Scarf is a film by Janusz Morgenstern from 2000. Janusz Gajos plays its protaganist, a man fighting with alcoholism, and is proof that television productions do not have to be worse than feature films.

    The protagonist – a middle-aged man at the top of his career – does not have a name, nor a surname; he is a universal character, an everyman that everyone can identify with. On the Christmas Eve he consecutively meets with his employees, his ex-wife, his son and his present partner. His persistently prolonged rambling is meant to postpone the inevitable Christmas visit to his mother.Read More »

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