1991-2000

Passions is a 1994 romantic comedy by Russian-Ukrainian director Kira Muratova based on the novellas of Boris Dedyukhin.
Blonde Lilia and brunette Violetta are fascinated by horse racing, and the young racers are more than a little attracted to them, too. However, the worlds of sporting and romance don’t always coexist peacefully as the two girls learn the hard way through a series of touching, surreal, and sometimes heartbreaking encounters. One of the most beautifully photographed Russian films in recent years, this acclaimed modern classic was hailed at numerous film festivals including the Berlin Film Festival and Russia’s Kinotavr Festival, where it won the Jury and Critics Prizes.Read More »

Description: The short is made in a typical Muratova style that merges surrealism and reality into a mesmerizing act full of understatement and metaphor.

Some trivia: this is nominally Muratova’s first short. However, she herself considers it her fourth – she prefers to think of her Three Stories as three short films instead of a single feature.

The film was made with no budget whatsoever – all Muratova was given were the camera and the film stock. None of the actors were paid. The rumor has it that the film was shot in Muratova’s own apartment.Read More »

In 1992, Wenders possibly bewildered a good portion of his fans by making a 30 minute short for children, titled Arisha, the Bear and the Stone Ring. It’s a fable about the Bear leaving Berlin (it’s the city’s emblem), featuring Wim Wenders dressed as Santa Claus…

SYNOPSIS
The story description posted on Wenders’ website reads as follows:
The bear leaves Berlin. He’s fed up. On the way, two Russian ladies – Anna and her daughter, Arisha – hire him as their driver. During the trip, a Santa Claus who cannot stand Christmas, and then a Vietnamese family, join the group whose destination is a spot by the sea. There, on the beach, lies a stone ring, which wants to be found.
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Quote:
Conceived as the ultimate road movie, this decades-in-the-making science-fiction epic from Wim Wenders follows the restless Claire Tourneur (Solveig Dommartin) across continents as she pursues a mysterious stranger (William Hurt) in possession of a device that can make the blind see and bring dream images to waking life. With an eclectic soundtrack that gathers a host of the director’s favorite musicians, along with gorgeous cinematography by Robby Müller, this breathless adventure in the shadow of Armageddon takes its heroes to the ends of the earth and into the oneiric depths of their own souls. Presented here in its triumphant 287-minute director’s cut, Until the End of the World assumes its rightful place as Wenders’ magnum opus, a cosmic ode to the pleasures and perils of the image and a prescient meditation on cinema’s digital future.Read More »

Quote:
Lisbon Story is more dream than story – and this, I think, defines and justifies it most effectively. There is no clear structure, no consistently cohesive or progressive dialogue. Wim Wenders subtly reveals some form of portrait of the city, but not in the way one might expect. The film is largely made up of sounds, scattered pieces of Lisbon, strange children, a mysterious filmmaker and Wenders’ protagonist, the sound engineer, Philip Winter. In Philip Winter’s efforts to understand his friend Friedrich’s disappearance, in his enchantment with Portuguese band Madredeus, the singer Teresa Salgueiro and his search for the sounds that would accompany Friedrich’s film about Lisbon, Wender’s self-proclaimed “most entertaining film” emerges.Read More »

Streetwalkers tired of being harassed by thugs stand up for their rights in this drama from sexploitation titan Barry Mahon. Madame Sue is the leader of a group of prostitutes working in New York City in 1964. Business is good, and thanks to the influx of tourists coming to the Big Apple for conventions and the World’s Fair, there are plenty of customers while cops are too busy to harass working girls. But while the upswing in business doesn’t attract the law, it does attract the attention of Carney Bill, a small-time gangster who wants in on the prostitution racket. Carney Bill demands that Madame Sue and her girls pay his mob a ten-percent protection fee, and his gunmen kill a few of Sue’s hookers to show he means business. Fearful but not about to be pushed around, the working girls form a vigilante group to protect themselves and get revenge for their fallen comrades, with Bill meeting an especially grim fate. — Mark Deming (AMG)Read More »

A collection of Wenders essays discussing all his film work up to Until the End of the World. Imaginative, very accessible, never dry, Wenders reveals a lot of interesting background to his films. Definitely a treat if you’re a Wenders fan.Read More »

1990-1991: “Face Value” Awarded the Dutch Press Prize, Netherlands

Rejecting linear narrative storytelling, the director offers us an epic on humanity and cultural diversity in Europe through a multitude of appearances, a cartography of faces, the reflection of an imaginary Europe made up of London, Marseille, Prague and the Netherlands.

“Everything revolves around faces and the act of looking: the desire to show oneself, the fear of being seen, the impossibility of seeing oneself, the fear and desire of seeing the other. And, as well, within this theme of looking and seeing, the uncertain struggle for identity, the ferocious struggle for territory, the sweeping movements of love and death” (JVDK)Read More »

Book Description:

Although no one knows exactly what postmodernism is, Postmodernism for Beginners gives a perfectly clear explanation of the subject. Author Jim Powell describes postmodernism as a series of “maps” that helps people find their way through a changing world. For reinforcement, he cites views from modern thinkers from Foucault to Guattari. Illustrated throughout.Read More »