Kashima Paradise
Coréalisé avec Bénie Deswarte, 1973, 16 mm, 106 min 26
Entre Kashima et Tokyo, se construit vers 1970 l’aéroport de Narita : les paysans refusent de vendre leurs terres et affrontent les gardes mobiles envoyés pour les expulser

Between Kashima and Tokyo, Narita airport is built around 1970: the rural people refuse to sell their land and confront the mobile guards sent to evict them.

This 1973 French documentary explores the conflict between modern values and material comforts in Japan and the more traditional obligations (giri) and culture which are still the real backbone of the society. Among the topics touched on are the Osaka Expo, battles against pollution, and Japanese leftist movements. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie GuideRead More »

Boleslav Polivika stars as Slach the Jester in this metaphorical comedy fantasy. Slach is the caretaker of an abandoned Bohemian castle that is rented out to wealthy visitors during deer-hunting season. The German Konig (Jiri Kodet) and his French fiance Regina (Chantal Poulainova) arrive with flair in a white Mercedes. Slach imagines himself as a medieval court jester while the local villagers regard him as a simple buffoon. He imagines that Konig is the King and Regina the Queen, and Slach is seductively drawn to the Queen and does her bidding until she orders a beheading. Scenes shift between the present and the medieval court of the increasingly sadistic Queen. The gifted actor and playwright Polivika has parlayed his theatrical role into a successful film to make this one of the most popular of Czech features in 1988. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie GuideRead More »

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Chad, 2006. After a forty-year civil war, the radio announces the government has just amnestied the war criminals. Outraged by the news, Gumar Abatcha orders his grandson Atim, a sixteen-year-old youth, to trace the man who killed his father and to execute him. Atim obeys him and, armed with his father’s own gun, he goes in search of Nassara, the man who made him an orphan. It does not take long before he finds him. Nassara, who now goes straight, is married, goes to the mosque and owns a small bakery. After some hesitation Atim offers him his services as an apprentice. He is hired then it will be easy for him to gun down the murderer of his father. At least, that is what he thinks…Read More »

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A French young woman unexpectedly dies in Berlin, where she lives with her boyfriend. Her sudden passing ruins the lives of her famliy and partner. They struggle to find new meaning in Paris, Annecy and New York.Read More »

Plot: Günter, found in a German forest as a four-year old, grows up in a foster family. Four decades later, he leads a normal life: he earns a living as a stage actor, spends time with his daughter Lizzy, and has an affair with a married woman. He doesn’t start wondering about his origins until a stranger on a bridge whispers a single word in his ear.Read More »

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At 30, Jiro embarked into a year-long trip taking in the Soviet Union, North Africa, Europe, and the United States. Nearly half a century later, his daughter makes use of various memorabilia to take a step back in time and explore how such adventures have shaped the man’s take on the modern world.Read More »

When a chance encounter brings together two teens from opposite sides of life in post-war Sarajevo, a blossoming romance conceals their desperate and disturbing motives.Read More »

During World War II, a little girl is left without parents and is forced to hide from the Nazis, taking care of herself on her own. Day after day.

11 wins & 17 nominations.Read More »

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La Ville bidon describes precisely the historical path, in the parisian suburbs of the seventies, from slum cities (“bidonvilles”) to silly/fake cities (“villes bidon”). The film switch es constantly from a very documentary approach to a fictional delirium in a critical way that is tending to show how crazy the documentary parts are themselves, this is to say the reality itself ! For example, those realistic moments invite us through the process of decision taking : we see the different point of view of the architect, the politic leader, the real estate developer, the sociologist, each of them is quite mad and typical of a particular time. But they also invite us in the slum cities and in the “transitory buildings” where several communities were difficultly living together (the children characters of this film could be the parents of those who are even more desperate and loose and rejected today in all the french big cities suburbs). Read More »