1981-1990

IMAGES OF A RELIEF
Written and directed by Lars von Trier. Produced by Per Årman. Photographed by Tom Elling. Edited by Tómas Gislason. Costume Design by Manon Rasmussen. Original Music by Pierre de la Rue. Principal cast: Edward Fleming and Kirsten Olesen.
From Lars von Trier by Jack Stevenson (British Film Institute: London, 2002):
Von Trier’s final Film School production, Befrielsesbilleder (Images of a Relief), shot in 1982, was his graduate project and was not a film audiences would laugh at….Read More »

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Summer people in Maine: things are changing. Whales no longer pass close to the shore as they did during the youth of two elderly widowed sisters who have a seaside home where they’ve summered for 50 years. Libby is blind, contrary, and seemingly getting ready to die. Sarah is attentive to her sister, worried about continuing to care for her, and half interested in an old Russian aristocrat who fishes from their shore. It’s the eve of Sarah’s 46th wedding anniversary. The Russian offers some fish he’s caught, Sarah invites him to dinner, and Libby gets her back up. Sarah wonders if it isn’t time to sell the place and find a home for Libby. What alternatives do old people have?Read More »

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Bouka is a gifted young teenager. He lives with his parents in a village and forms with them a solid family. His father gives him a traditional education close to the nature. Unfortunately this happiness will be troubled by the brutal death of the father…
Remained widow Bouka’s mother will suffer the consequences of a relentless traditional principle. She becomes the new wife of the nephew of her late husband, Bouka doesn’t accepts this new condition of her mother. He suspects his stepfather to be involved in his father’s death. He stops to go to school and organizes a gang in the forest.
In this tormented atmosphere, he develops a mortal hate towards its new “father”…Read More »

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A young opera-loving mailman, Jules, becomes inadvertently entangled in murder, when a young woman fleeing two mob hit men drops an incriminating cassette into his mailbag. Jules has just recently recorded opera star Cynthia Hawkins’ latest concert, something of a coup as Hawkins refuses to make recordings of any kind. Soon Jules finds himself the target of the hit men, who want the voice recording, and also of another couple of ominous and mysterious agents.Read More »

Utu is the Maori word for “Retribution,” which sums up the chief motivating factor of this New Zealand-produced drama. Set in the 1870s, the film details the exigencies of British Colonial rule. A Maori scout, Te Wheke (Anzac Wallace), stumbles across a native village that has been destroyed in a British raid. Since it is the scout’s own village, he deserts the British army, the better to seek “utu.” Leading a vigilante force consisting of his fellow Maoris, Te Wheke kills as many British settlers as he can get his hands on. The feverish conviction of his crusade is in stark contrast to the attitudes of the British, who seem more concerned with material possessions than with human beings. Popular down under star Bruno Lawrence is cast as a vengeance-driven settler who makes it his personal mission in life to end Te Wheke’s reign of terror.Read More »

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Kurt Gerber, an intelligent high school student is in his senior year. He is burdend with personal and scholastic problems. Since his weak subject is math, Professor Kupfer who teaches his course and is also his class teacher, uses every occasion to humiliate the bright and self-assured boy. Even though the odds are against him, Kurt fights back and his struggle with the sadistic teacher develops into a matter of life and death. A faithful version of the best-seller novel by Friedrich Torberg which was published in 1930.Read More »

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The opening scene is a single shot showing a family and their dog descending a hill, a large tree in the foreground, the distant countryside vanishing into the rolling fog. The camera pushes in imperceptibly, but continuously from the beginning. On the soundtrack, possibly diegetic, a sole woman sings. Meanwhile, the film credits scroll up over the scene. The family and dog, upon reaching the area in front of a hut, stop moving. Verdi’s Messa da Requiem fades in, overlapping for a brief moment with the woman singing. Once the foreground tree fully disappears, the scene freezes; the credits continue until the title appears, and the scene fades to black. The Requiem continues an audible transition to the second scene.Read More »

The story takes place in Germany at the beginning of the last century. Edouard, the wealthy baron and Charlotte, who had loved each other since their youth, could only marry after both became widowed. Edouard invites his childhood friend, Captain Otto to manage the reconstruction work of the castle.Read More »

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On a movie set, in a factory, and at a hotel, Godard explores the nature of work, love and film making. While Solidarity takes on the Polish government, a Polish film director, Jerzy, is stuck in France making a film for TV. He’s over budget and uninspired; the film, called “Passion,” seems static and bloodless. Hanna owns the hotel where the film crew stays. She lives with Michel, who runs a factory where he’s fired Isabelle, a floor worker. Hanna and Isabelle are drawn to Jerzy, hotel maids quit to be movie extras, people ask Jerzy where the story is in his film, women disrobe, extras grope each other off camera, and Jerzy wonders why there must always be a story.Read More »