Drama

Quote:
After a long time, some Iranian women singers are going to enter an unofficial competition in a coffee shop in Tehran. Pregnant Mahla along with the other members of Bandar Band, her husband and one of their closest friends, starts her journey to Tehran from a southern province just when they have lost all they had in the flood. They still keep their hopes alive, however every road they take leads to a dead-end in a flood-stricken land. They intend to go to Tehran, but they wonder if it is just another turn around a vicious circle. —Anonymous from IMDBRead More »

Synopsis:
Set in the last few years of the shogun’s rule, this period/ensemble movie depicts the lives of the young and the restless at a whorehouse. The protagonist is Saheiji, a resourceful, witty free spirit. It’s 1862, 6 years before the Shogun turned his political power over to the Emperor. Penniless Saheiji splashes out at a famous Shinagawa whorehouse. He’s forced to stay on at the whorehouse to repay his debt. At first Saheiji is regarded as an unwelcome guest who never leaves but it turns out he is not just a poor grifter. None of the whorehouse’s guests, hosts, servants and attending ladies are innocent but they are pragmatic schemers. Saheiji soon endears himself to them all and solves many whorehouse disputes with his wit. But it is slowly revealed that the seemingly perfect Saheiji is suffering from tuberculosis and his future is uncertain…Read More »

Quote:
In the twilight of his life, Jean-Baptiste, a painter who has always lived in Paris, says he wants to be buried in Limoges: “Those who love me can take the train”. So begins a sad, wild and marvellous journey which unites all the people that he had touched during his lifetime – his lovers, lovers’ lovers, ex-lover’s new wives, old friends, casual acqaintances, and relatives. But their shared mourning cannot conceal the heartbrakes, rivalries, jealousies and passions wich all simmer to the surface and will – over the course of the journey, funeral and wake, reach some kind of resolution.Read More »

A drama set in the days leading up to the 2008 Presidential election, and centered on a high-end Manhattan call girl meeting the challenges of her boyfriend, her clients, and her work.Read More »

Quote:
We all know that the white-bread cookie-cutter suburban lifestyle has its own dirty secrets, but when his camera explores the limits of this seemingly serene and ubiquitous American lifestyle, Larry Clark gives us a horrifying yet touching glimpse of what happens behind finely paved driveways and cute lawns.

The film itself portrays so many “unshowable” taboos—a threesome between three adolescents, a teen who masturbates on camera while asphyxiating himself, a tough-love alcoholic father attempting to give his son a blowjob—that you are tempted to delegate the film to nothing more than a provocation film. Yet, frighteningly, Larry Clark is able to pull off filming these morally antagonizing subjects with so much perception, light, and even humanity that he leaves the viewer stunned—stuck between laughter and disgust, horror and compassion, not knowing what we should feel or what we are.Read More »

Quote:
At the age of 20 Michel was going out with Sonia and was the charismatic leader of their group of friends, and the one that everyone thought would “go far”. But Michel did not live up to their expectations. Ten years later, the friends meet up again…
In 1987, Patrice Chereau had been heading up the Theatre des Amandiers for two years. The previous year he staged a contemporary production of Chekov’s Platonov with his students from the Ecole des comediens de Nanterre-Amandiers. It was them, Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, Vincent Perez, Marianne Denicourt, Agnes Jaoui, that he brought onto the film set to adapt his own theatrical adaptation for the cinema. It is a great pleasure to see the first steps in front of the camera of these as yet unknown actors in Hotel de France.Read More »

Lakha comes from a family of bird catchers, but questions the value of catching birds. He, and the older Bhushan, sell their caged birds to the local dealer. Lakha’s wife, Sari, complains that he is not ambitious enough because he cares more for the birds than for her, and she starts meeting Natobar. Kalicharan, a city dealer, suggests they sell their birds directly to him. So Bhushan and Lakha take their next catch of birds on the train to Calcutta. Kalicharan invites them to a feast for the ceremony of the birds, with disastrous consequences.Read More »

An ill man’s dying wish reunites four old friends. (IMDb)
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Friends brought together by tragic circumstances discover how sad their own lives have become in this bittersweet comedy-drama from German filmmaker Michael Klier. Harry (Henry Hübchen), Justus (Burghart Klaussner) and Bernhard (Armin Rohde) were close when they were young but haven’t seen each other in many years. However, they meet for the first time in decades when they learn another member of their circle, Manni (Peter Lohmeyer), has fallen ill and has only a short time to live. Manni has done well for himself and has a fine house with a pool as well as a vintage Ferrari, but as his life draws to a close he wants to spend time with his pals and asks them to help him with his one nagging regret. Manni used to date a beautiful girl named Rosi (Sibylle Canonica), but he treated her badly and she left him; all these years later, Manni asks his pals to find her so he can apologize and beg her forgiveness.Read More »

Jonathan Romney, Vienna IFF wrote:
A relatively concise example of Lav Diaz’s expansive essays on Filipino history and imagination, HISTORY OF HA is a period drama set in 1957, although Diaz is characteristically cavalier about authenticity, with modern wheelie suitcases visible and references to algorithms sprinkled across the dialogue. But the past is always visible in the present in his films, and vice versa. This is often expressed by the idea of living in the wake of something, in this case, the death of the Philippines’ then president Ramon Magsaysay in a plane crash.Read More »