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A relatively short film by Satyajit Ray standards, the director’s 1965 film Kapurush (The Coward) actually forms part of a double-bill with Mahapurush (The Holy Man), also included separately in this collection. The first part of the diptych is in some ways complementary to the films around it, moving on from the themes in the earlier Mahanagar and Charulata, where women are forced suppress their own individuality and desires in favour of the direction laid down by a male-dominated society, but it also anticipates Nayak’s look at the weaknesses in men (that one a “hero”, this one a “coward”), and is also similarly connected in this way with the workings of the movie industry. The combination of the strength of the female characters when confronted with weak male behaviour makes for a particularly interesting situation in Kapurush.Read More »

Synopsis
In Japan’s bubble economy everyone is looking for ways to increase their wealth and assets. But the Kimura family is particularly determined – in fact it is abnormally determined – to accumulate wealth. They don’t want a palatial mansion, they have no outstanding loans and they’re not planning to travel abroad. They just love money so much that they work day and night for even the smallest amounts. And of course nothing is allowed to go to waste.Read More »

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Our figurine sized supermen hero embarks on an epic surreal journey that will take him across the Ethiopian post apocalyptic landscape in search of a way to get on the hovering spacecraft that for years has become a landmark in the skies.Read More »

Rat Life and Diet in North America is a short film that tells a story about rats (actually pet gerbils) held as political prisoners in the United States (their jailer a cat), who make a heroic escape to Canada. Although this narrative is recounted through wryly worded intertitles, Wieland’s film nonetheless conveys a sense of menace and urgency. For these protagonists “Canada” becomes a utopian destination, promising abundance, pleasure, and peace. The film was created in 1968, a time of international student protests against the military and capitalist establishments, the rise of the New Left, and worldwide demonstrations against the Vietnam War; many young American men were fleeing to Canada to avoid being drafted into the military.Read More »

This is a film about a group of ten-year-old who are defending their independence at school, in the street and at home. Their methods of resisting brutality and overcoming the lack of understanding are so ingenuous that eventually they succeed in making a laughing stock of their parents, teachers and neighbors. And indeed, compulsion is completely futile if Mitko is to be prevented from moving the ears in class. The unfair punishment only helps spread his fame throughout the school, so that he gets an army of followers and imitators. The war with Uncle Tanas, the cheating grocer of neighborhood store, also ends victoriously. After many ups and downs, and mainly thanks to the solidarity of the children, they manage to get back their football, which has fallen into a passing lorry and disappeared.Read More »

When her classmate Ritsuko disappears, her friend Ryoko is desperate to find her. When she discovers that Ritsuko was playing a strange game online of hide and seek, she begins to wonder if it could be related to her disappearance somehow. Ryoko then discovers that the game is more sinister than it appeared at first. It is linked to demonology and the supernatural. Will she be able to get past her fears and superstitions to discover what secrets the game of hide and seek might hold?Read More »

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Today, the «Römerstrasse» in Italy’s Aosta valley, is a significant traffic artery in the center of modern Europe. Nestler’s journey explores the moving history of the Aosta valley, which passed through many hands – from the Roman Empire to Burgundian and Frankish kingdoms – until it was acquired by Italy in the 11th century. The now busy motorway, which runs from the Po Valley to the Great and Little St. Bernhard passes, is revealed through the timeless eyes of a historian. At the same time, the documentary sheds light on cultural traditions and contemporary life in the region.Read More »

Synopsis:
Built around the publicity “feud” between newspaper-radio-gossip spreader Walter Winchell and band leader Ben Bernie, a radio star, Alice Huntley (Alice Faye), who does an advice-and-inspiration program, helps a mike-shy singer, Eddie Kane (Jack Haley) to success by tricking him into singing with Bernie’s orchestra. Winchell uses it to expose Bernie as the trickster. But Kane becomes a great hit with the radio public, and falls in love with Alice. And Bernie and Winchell shake hands to show there’s no business like show business and fabricated feuds.Read More »

A female coal miner in communist Korea aspires to be an acrobat in a circus.

The original Korean title is 김동무는 하늘을 난다.Read More »