Drama

  • Pablo Trapero – Leonera aka Lion’s Den (2008)

    Drama2001-2010ArgentinaArthousePablo Trapero

    Quote:
    We will never know if the young university student that one day wakes up surrounded by two men covered in blood, one dead, the other wounded, is the perpetrator. Julia is pregnant with the child of one of them. The maternity ward of a women’s prison is the location in which most of the 113 minutes of Leonera’s plot takes place. Shot in Buenos Aires’ prisons, with the participation of true inmates and guards, the film “maintains some of the codes of prison films, although developed in the context of the relationship between Julia, the mother and her son”, explained Trapero in an interview with BBC Mundo.Read More »

  • Ömer Kavur – Gece yolculugu AKA Night Journey (1987)

    Drama1981-1990ArthouseÖmer KavurTurkey

    Gece yolculugu is a 1987 Turkish film directed by Ömer Kavur. It was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival.

    NIGHT JOURNEY
    In this enigmatic work, a director settles in a ghost town to rewrite his script, and the audience enters into the mystical realm of his past and imagination. Kavur’s film is a seamless collage of thought, memory, and landscape reminiscent of Giorgio de Chirico’s psychic terrains. By the film’s ambiguous end we can not help wondering how much Night Journey is about Kavur himself and, like Fellini in 8 1/2 before him, how much he is embracing it all.Read More »

  • Anatole Litvak – L’Équipage aka Flight into darkness (1935)

    1931-1940Anatole LitvakDramaFranceWar

    Filmmaker Anatole Litvak was still one year away from his “breakthrough” picture Mayerling when he co-wrote and directed L’Equipage (The Crew). Charles Vanel and Annabella star respectively as a daring WW I aviator and his loving but neglected wife. Ostracized by the other pilots because of his recklessness and standoffishness, Vanel nonetheless befriends a young flyboy (Jean-Pierre Aumont). It is therefore a great source of consternation for Aumont when he discovers that the woman with whom he’s fallen in love is none other than Vanel’s wife Annabella.Read More »

  • Vittorio De Sica – La porta del cielo (1945)

    1941-1950DramaItalian Cinema under FascismItalyVittorio De Sica

    SYNOPSIS
    During War World II, Vittorio De Sica was approached by Goebbels to help relaunch the Italian film industry under the auspices of Musolini’s puppet regime. In order to escape collaboration with the Nazis, De Sica quickly invented the project “La porta del cielo” a film about religious miracles funded by the Vatican. Appalled by their plight during the German occupation of Rome, De Sica cast many Jews in the film to spare them from Nazi persecution, extending the shoot until the American allies arrived in the capital.Read More »

  • Markus Schleinzer – Michael (2011)

    2011-2020AustriaDramaMarkus Schleinzer

    Quote:
    A protege of Michael Haneke, Markus Schleinzer’s “Michael” is a triumph of uneasy cinema. With an unorthodox level of restraint, the director tells the story of a dull office drone who keeps a kidnapped young boy locked in his house. Despite its subversive edge, “Michael” successfully drains the shock out of a frightening premise and instead delivers a keen observational thriller. From its opening minutes, “Michael” reveals its alarming plot with a patient, naturalistic atmosphere.Read More »

  • Yasmin Ahmad – Mukhsin (2006)

    Drama2001-2010ComedyMalaysiaYasmin Ahmad

    Synopsis:
    The story takes place in Sekinchan, Sabak Bernam in 1993, revolving around the first love of a 10-year-old Orked when a 12-year-old boy, Mukhsin, comes with his elder brother and aunt to spend the school holidays in her village. Around this relatively simple plotline of a blossoming young romance between the film’s two young protagonists, are interweaved scenes of Malaysian village life and the dynamics of different types of families. Most of the family scenes revolve around Orked and her mother (Mak Inom), father (Pak Atan), and the family’s close maid who is almost like a family member (Kak Yam). Read More »

  • Emilio Fernández – Flor silvestre AKA Wild Flower (1943)

    1941-1950DramaEmilio FernándezMexicoRomance

    Hal [email protected]:
    Completed before his immensely successful Maria Candelaria, Emilio Fernandez’ Flor Sylvestre was released second in the US-and not until two years after its initial Mexican release. Also known as Wildflower, the film features Fernandez himself as a character named Rogellio Torres. The lion’s share of the footage, however, is devoted to the romance between Esperanza (Dolores Del Rio), granddaughter of a common laborer, and Jose Luis Castro (Pedro Armendariz), the firebrand son of a landowner. Joining a revolutionary movements, Castro is disowned by his father, but Esperanza remains loyally by his side. Later on, Castro’s father is killed by outlaws; in seeking vengeance, he sacrifices his own life, while Esperanza carries on his revolutionary work with their young son in tow.Read More »

  • István Dárday & Györgyi Szalai – A dokumentátor (1988)

    Drama1981-1990Györgyi SzalaiHungaryIstván Dárday

    IMDB says:
    Raffael is the rich owner of a video store. His girlfriend, the attractive Chip works there. They make some extra by making illegal copies of pornographic and horror movies. It is Rambo’s duty to deliver the video cassettes to the customers. Raffael doesn’t know Chip and Rambo are lovers.Read More »

  • Zhangke Jia – Ying sheng AKA The Hedonists (2016)

    Drama2011-2020ChinaShort FilmZhangke Jia

    Quote:
    In China, three unemployed Shanxi laborers are looking for work. Their last hope is to be employed as performers in a surreal amusement park.

    Tony Rayns wrote:
    A showstopper, a funny/sad tale of three unemployed miners – their faces will be familiar to fans of Jia’s films – trying for ridiculous new jobs as bodyguards and theme-park actors.Read More »

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