1981-1990

Desdemona lives on an isolated island with her strange family: her father Mario, her stepmother Dulcinea and her mentally challenged sister Paulova. As the only inhabitants on the island loneliness and desolation engulf all members of her family. Desdemona tries to ward off her boredom by taking long walks along the beach or engaging in acts of self-gratification. She often tries to seduce her own father Mario to engage in acts of a sexual nature. Their daily routine is interrupted by the arrival (by boat) of a robust male stranger who brings friction into Desdemona’s family.Read More »

Malgortzata and Paul have a rendezvous in West Berlin to spend some time together before she has to go back to Warsaw and he returns to his wife and daughter. The two talk, disagree, argue, make-up, quarrel and talk some more.Read More »

Review (Geraldine Bloustien, ‘Jane Campion: memory, motif and music’. Continuum)
Passionless Moments, although possibly one of Campion’s most whimsical pieces, has all
the hallmarks of her later films. It is concerned with the insignificant, unsolicited
moments of daydreaming when one is caught almost unawares. The film consists of ten
self-contained vignettes of the sudden thoughts of ten very different individuals.
Classical Hollywood cinema concerns itself with the heightened moments of passion of
individuals with whom we identify in some way because of their bravery, humour, innocence,
heroic qualities and so on. In traditional feature films and documentaries we are usually
introduced to the characters’ backgrounds, motives and problems. However, in Passionless
Moments the characters serve only to illustrate some quirky aspect of human nature and
relationships.Read More »

Without having met, a famous orchestra conductor and a beautiful woman seem destined to be together. They see one another’s faces in their dreams, reflected in mirrors, and in crowded streets before finally meeting in person.Read More »

Quote:
Hungarian filmmaker Bela Tarr began his career making social realist domestic dramas, similar to the work of John Cassavetes. The feature before Damnation, Almanac of Fall, showed Tarr moving toward a more visually stylized form of filmmaking. With Damnation, the first of his collaborations with novelist Laszlo Krasznahorkai, Tarr adopts a formally rigorous style, featuring long takes and slow tracking shots of the bleak landscape that surrounds the characters. Shot in black-and-white, Damnation tells the story of Karrer (Miklos B. Szekely), a depressed man in love with a married woman (Vali Kerekes) who sings at the local bar, Titanik. The singer has broken off their affair, despite her profession of love for him.Read More »

Why do people wave their hands when they say goodbye? We embark on a dreamlike journey from Borges’ ‘The Circular Ruins’. Filmed in 16mm by filmmaker, graphic artist and manga author Isao Yamada. Co-produced by Yumekichi Minatoya and starring Hiroko Ishimaru.Read More »

Robert Jones (Nigel Havers) works as a Russian translator at GCHQ in Cheltenham. Meanwhile, a couple of operatives suspected of being Soviet agents have died in apparent accidents, and GCHQ staff are encouraged to look out for suspicious behaviour in their colleagues. He confides to his father Frank (Michael Caine), a former GCHQ operative turned business-machine salesman, that he thinks the CIA are insisting that the British “plug the leaks” and that British Intelligence themselves, anxious to preserve their relationship with and funding from the Americans, may be behind the killings. The two men don’t know that they themselves are under surveillance. Then one day Robert dies in a fall…Read More »

This film tells the story fighters who are fighting against the feudal order in Georgia.Read More »

Quote:
This visually striking drama is taken from the classic Japanese novel Tales Of Genji by Marasaki Shikibu. Set in modern Portugal, Joao (Luis Miguel Cintra) is a left-wing political leader and ladies man with a bright future. His ex-wife Isabel (Manuela de Freitas) both loves and hates him as Joao plays on her wavering emotional state. He is sent to Italy to retrieve wayward family member Antonia (Caroline Chaniolleau), the beautiful young woman with a terrorist boyfriend. Joao is forced to recognize his feelings as the political and amorous climate changes around him.Read More »