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Bo ra, a successful English institute manager, has became the financial pillar of the house since her seemingly much older husband, Min ki, once a successful banker has lost his job. Her boring, stressing, without passion,…. life has driven her to her former lover, Il bom. This movie is story of a hell that she has made for herself and her two men and their not so happy ending.Read More »
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This wicked adaptation of the Octave Mirbeau novel is classic Luis Buñuel. Jeanne Moreau is Celestine, a beautiful Parisian domestic who, upon arrival at her new job at an estate in provincial 1930s France, entrenches herself in sexual hypocrisy and scandal with her philandering employer (Buñuel regular Michel Piccoli). Filmed in luxurious black-and-white Franscope, Diary of a Chambermaid is a raw-edged tangle of fetishism and murder—and a scathing look at the burgeoning French fascism of the era.Read More »
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First off: Fatih Akin’s “The Cut” was an aberration, as we all suspected. The director celebrated for his edgy takes on intriguing characters more or less returns with “In the Fade,” a well-constructed, at times moving story of a Hamburg woman seeking justice after the murder of her Kurdish husband and son by a couple of Neo-Nazis. “More or less” because the excellent first quarter gives way to a relatively standard-issue though handsomely produced legal drama with several stock characters and a script that feels too guided by the presumed requirements of mainstream cinema. Diane Kruger’s powerhouse performance in her first German-language production goes a long way toward compensating for the narrative’s dip into overly crystalline waters, and international sales have been unsurprisingly brisk given the film’s incontrovertible general appeal.Read More »
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The power of co-incidence is explored to dramatic effect in The Edge Of Heaven, a Turkish-German production about two deaths that bring strangers together. Once the opening titles warn us of “Yeter’s Death”, we see Turkish prostitute Yeter meeting an elderly client, Ali, in Germany and watch her fate unfold. Shifting to Turkey and Germany and back again, this spirited, beautifully-acted drama follows both Ali’s son and Yeter’s daughter in the wake of the tragedy.Read More »
Synopsis
In an idyllic working class community, 13 year old Anka grows up, going through stages of adolescence, dreaming, first love and gossiping with girlfriends. Roughly disturbed by the shame and disgrace of alcoholism – leaves unwashable stains upon the community, that tries to cope with abuse and depression, and the system (including school teachers) who try to avoid the subject. This story was aimed at parents, to give them morally an insight into what happens when a young girl has to deal with the disgrace of an alcoholic father and a mentally instable mother. Very well acted by Grazyna Michalska as Anka.Read More »
From Allmovie:
Government bureaucracy and ineptitude, as well as social foibles, get a drubbing in this socio-political satire by director Fernando Birri. Everything starts when the families in a poor, mud-hut neighborhood lose what little they own in a bad flood. In steps the militia to rescue them, and then the local government comes next as the politicos hope to gain points by relocating the group of unfortunates. Nothing goes right for the essentially honest, simple villagers who are now the dispossessed. One family seeks temporary shelter in a boxcar and ends up being attached to a train that then takes them on an interesting journey. Meanwhile, no one seems able to help them out and when the hubbub has died down, the families are not much different than when the flood first washed them out. Director Fernando Birri was particularly interested in Neorealism and would eventually move to Cuba.Read More »
A couple in their thirties marry after years of friendship, and go on their honeymoon without having had a physical relationship. Over the course of their honeymoon they encounter sexual difficulties and conflict owed to their heightened self-consciousness and overbearing expectations for how things should be. Feeling that the marriage is hanging by a thread, the couple works desperately towards a solution.Read More »
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A couple traveling through the countryside strike a man on a bicycle. When they get out of their car to examine him, they find that he is injured but not dead. But instead of helping the man, Juan (Alberto Closas) and Maria Jose (Lucia Bosé) do the unthinkable. They flee – rather than reveal that they have been carrying on a long-term affair.
When they return to Madrid, the couple pay a terrible price for their deception. Guilt begins to gnaw away at them, especially at Juan, who is also experiencing conflict with his young students over an ethical issue at the university where he teaches…Read More »
A horsewoman in search of a steed. Gracieuse, a farmer’s daughter, is disgusted at the way the horses she trained to the top levels of jumping are taken away from her. She meets the legendary trainer Franz Mann, who now manages a rich landowner’s estate, and with his help starts over in the world of dressage. But just as she feels she has finally found the right horse, she realizes that talent counts for nothing when facing the personal and high financial stakes of the game.Read More »