Quote:
Stanisław, a worker at an art museum in Warsaw, is accused of stealing a painting from the store room. His boss gives Stanisław a 24-hour deadline to return it, or face a jail sentence. Since he does not possess the painting, he decides to go into hiding – by dressing up as a woman, Maria. He gets a job as housemaid – despite knowing little about cleaning a house – but a succession of amorous husbands, difficult children, and eccentric bosses drives him from one job to the next. The film, a nudge at Polish society in communist times, is a tragic-comedic reminder of what it was like to live in those times.Read More »
Comedy
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Stanislaw Bareja – Poszukiwany, poszukiwana AKA Man – Woman Wanted (1973)
1971-1980ComedyPolandStanislaw Bareja -
George W. Hill – Min and Bill (1930)
1921-1930ComedyDramaGeorge W. HillUSAPlot: Min owns the waterfront hotel where Bill, the captain of a fishing boat, lives. Also living and working in the hotel is Nancy, whom Min took in some years ago as an abandoned girl. Now that Nancy is older, the truant officer and the police think that she should be moved to a different environment, and Min is torn between her attachment to Nancy and her concern that the waterfront may not be the best place for a young woman. Matters are brought to a head by the sudden re-appearance of Belle, Nancy’s disreputable mother. Written by Snow LeopardRead More »
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Greg Watkins & Caveh Zahedi – A Little Stiff (1991)
1991-2000Caveh ZahediComedyDramaGreg WatkinsUSAMinimal in budget as well as in style, form, and content – the entire production is said to have cost a mere $10,000 – this black-and-white 16 millimeter tragicomedy was shot by two UCLA film students chiefly on and around their own campus. Both filmmakers play themselves in the movie, as do all the other characters; the slender plot is a literal restaging of events that actually happened, with everyone re-creating his or her original role. A single subject – Zahedi’s unrequited love for, or infatuation with, Erin McKim over the space of what appears to be two or three months – is the focus of practically every scene and shot.Read More »
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Richard A. Colla – Fuzz (1972)
1971-1980ActionComedyRichard A. CollaUSADetective Eileen McHenry (Raquel Welch) has just been given her new assignment and she is about to find out that there is never a dull day in the 87th Precinct. How could there be when the precinct’s top detectives are played by Burt Reynolds, Tom Skerritt, and Jack Weston? Or when Boston’s top criminal mastermind is played by Yul Brynner? There is always something happening in the 8th Precinct. Someone is stealing stuff from the precinct house. Someone else is attacking the city’s homeless. Even worse, Brynner is assassinating public officials and will not stop until he is paid a hefty ransom!Read More »
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Leonid Gaidai – Kavkazskaya plennitsa AKA Kidnapping, Caucasian Style (1966)
1961-1970ComedyCrimeLeonid GaidaiUSSRLeonid Gaidai’s irreverent comedy updates a Leo Tolstoy story for modern Soviet times, in the Caucasus region. Shurik, a naive Russian student mired in his own clumsy Soviet culture, sets off to the Caucasus to write down the folk culture of this region: its traditions, legends, sayings, and toasts.Read More »
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Martin Fric – Zivot je pes AKA A Dog’s Life (1933)
1931-1940ClassicsComedyCzech RepublicMartin FricYoung music composer Viktor Honzl in vain looks for work. He is prevented from committing suicide by a technician of the gasworks who shortly beforehand has disconnected his gas due to past due bills. In the disguise of an older, serious, musical scholar Viktor obtains work in a music publishing house. So he may court Eva, publisher Durdys’s daughter, who he likes quite a bit, he recommends to the owner that he also employ his nephew. Understandably, this is he himself, in his every-day form. For Viktor, however, this becomes an extremely complicated situation as he switches in the place of business from the clothes of the uncle and then back again from the clothes of Viktor the nephew.Read More »
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Aki Kaurismäki – Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö aka The Match Factory Girl (1990)
1981-1990Aki KaurismäkiComedyDramaFinlandQuote:
A woman’s terribly dull life is upended by a one-night stand pregnancy, causing her to seek retribution.Read More » -
Francis Girod – Le Trio Infernal AKA The Infernal Trio (1974)
1971-1980ComedyCrimeFranceFrancis Girod
Marseilles, 1919. Georges Sarret is a distinguished and respected lawyer, recently honoured for his services in the First World War. He takes as his lover Philomène Schmidt, a young German woman, who has just lost her job and home. To enable Philomène to remain in France, Georges finds her a husband – who dies conveniently of natural causes a month after the wedding. Georges repeats the trick with Philomène’s sister, Catherine – marrying her off to an old man who dies suddenly so that the scheming trio can profit from his life insurance. When an accomplice in the scheme, Marcel Chambon, threatens to blackmail them, Georges and his two lovers have no option but to kill him and his mistress…Read More »
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Aki Kaurismäki – Le Havre (2011)
2011-2020Aki KaurismäkiComedyDramaFinlandSynopsis:
A dock worker in Le Havre hears a human sound inside one of the containers in port, that container which left Gabon three weeks ago and which was supposed to arrive in London five days after its departure from Gabon, which didn’t happen. The Le Havre police and French border guards find a still alive group of illegal African immigrants inside. On the sign from one of his elders, a young teen boy among the illegal immigrants manages to escape, news of which hits the local media. The first friendly face that boy, Idrissa, encounters is that of former artist now aged shoeshine Marcel Marx. Marcel decides to help Idrissa by hiding him in his house, news which slowly trickles through his community of friends – most of whom he associates with at his local bar – and neighbors, most who assist Marcel in this task.Read More »








