Drama

  • Michel Deville – Péril en la demeure AKA Death in a French Garden (1985)

    1981-1990CrimeDramaFranceMichel Deville

    Quote:
    A magnate and his younger wife hire David to teach guitar to their teenage daughter. The wife quickly seduces David, and simultaneously he strikes up an acquaintance with the family’s inquisitive neighbor. One night, David is mugged but rescued from injury by a stranger, Daniel, who also becomes David’s friend and admits to being a hit man. Video tapes of their activities appear in the lovers’ mail; David thinks they’re from the neighbor, Daniel is sure the husband is onto the affair and hired the mugger. After Daniel tells David that he’s been hired to kill the husband, an elaborate manipulation plays out, with murder, suicide, a payoff, more videos, and a surprise pairing.Read More »

  • Jazmín López – Si yo fuera el invierno mismo AKA If I Were the Winter Itself (2019)

    2011-2020ArgentinaDramaJazmín López

    Four friends meet on a remote estate to create a cinematic re-enactment of three iconic works that embodied the social and artistic revolution of 50 years ago: LA CHINOISE (1967) by Jean-Luc Godard, INEXTINGUISHABLE FIRE (1969) by Harun Farocki and the performance UNTITLED (FACIAL HAIR TRANSPLANTS) (1972) by Ana Mendieta.

    A mysterious and soulful exploration of the complexity of mourning and letting go of a love that is lost.Read More »

  • Gaspar Noé – Carne (1991)

    1991-2000ArthouseDramaFranceGaspar Noé

    After a dreadful incident coupled with an ungovernable paroxysm of violence, a butcher will fall into a downward spiral that will burn to the ground whatever dignity still remained in him.Read More »

  • Edgar Reitz – Heimat-Fragmente: Die Frauen (2006)

    Drama2001-2010ArthouseEdgar ReitzGermany

    Quote:
    “There is a time for sewing up and a time for tearing apart. That’s an old proverb of my mother’s”. The wise little saying is nothing less than a piece of “Heimat”. Or not really, since the words of a young woman from the Hunsrück, working as a tour guide in Munich even though she can’t tell the Frauenkirche from the Stadtmuseum, fell victim to the scissors. For Edgar Reitz the time for sewing together has begun again. Eight hours left over from the Heimats have turned up again, the montage film “Heimat –Fragmente” arising from them lasts 146 minutes and had its premiere last weekend at the Venice Biennale. The more work you turn on the lathe, the more shavings you get, and it’s not surprising that they are of good wood. Read More »

  • Lina Wang – Di yi ci de li bie AKA A First Farewell (2018)

    2011-2020ChinaDramaLina Wang

    When Isa is not at school or working on his parents’ farmyard, he spends carefree days with his friends – until the outside world starts forcing him to say one goodbye after another.Read More »

  • Eliane Caffé – Era o Hotel Cambridge AKA The Cambridge Squatter (2016)

    2011-2020BrazilDocumentaryDramaEliane Caffé

    Synopsis:
    Shows the unusual situation of homeless Brazilians movement and refugees that squat together an abandoned building in downtown São Paulo. The daily tension caused by the treat of eviction reveals the dramas and joys.Read More »

  • Xinyuan Zheng Lu – Ta fang jian li de yun AKA The Cloud in Her Room (2020)

    2011-2020ArthouseDramaHong KongXinyuan Zheng Lu

    It’s winter and 22-year-old Muzi has returned to her home town of Hangzhou for a visit, a new year is around the corner. Her parents are long since separated, her father has a wife and young daughter and her mother is dating, though the old family apartment is still furnished as was. Muzi befriends an older bar owner and her university boyfriend comes looking for her, although no relationships here are straightforward. It takes time to work out how everyone connects to Muzi anyway, there are no explanations or introductions and one scene can shift into another without warning, creating ellipses along the way; it’s less about telling a story than capturing a mood, the same sense of melancholy stasis that settles even over the sudden outbursts of feeling. Read More »

  • Gabriel Axel – Babettes gæstebud AKA Babette’s Feast (1987)

    Drama1981-1990DenmarkGabriel Axel

    In 19th century Denmark, two adult sisters live in an isolated village with their father, who is the honored pastor of a small Protestant church that is almost a sect unto itself. Although they each are presented with a real opportunity to leave the village, the sisters choose to stay with their father, to serve to him and their church. After some years, a French woman refugee, Babette, arrives at their door, begs them to take her in, and commits herself to work for them as maid/housekeeper/cook. Sometime after their father dies, the sisters decide to hold a dinner to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his birth. Babette experiences unexpected good fortune and implores the sisters to allow her to take charge of the preparation of the meal.Read More »

  • Sidney J. Furie – Lady Sings the Blues [+ Commentary] (1972)

    1971-1980DramaMusicalSidney J. FurieUSA

    Lady Sings the Blues, like many enjoyable biopics, has little to do with presenting fact and everything to do with presenting the essence of a life. It has been both rightly and unfairly reviled by passionate fans of Holiday’s music as being highly fictionalized—and so it is, just as Amadeus, Funny Girl, and St. Louis Blues also use seeds of fact to grow fanciful tales of their respective subjects’ lives. It is also true that Diana Ross has little in common with Billie Holiday; their singing styles are markedly different, and Ross is far too slender and beautiful to believably imitate Holiday; to her credit, she does not try.Read More »

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