• Lewis Seiler – Pittsburgh (1942)

    1941-1950ClassicsDramaLewis SeilerUSA

    Quote:

    This film is a hard one to assess. It is like a Western taken out of context, replacing the cowboys and Indians with coal miners and steel impresarios.

    Ostensibly two coal miners, Pittsburgh Markham and Cash Evans, best friends, chance upon Josie “Hunky” Winters a high-class “countess” and both men fall in love with her. She persuades them that they need to take chances if they are to get anywhere and they do, by shaving three cents off the price of coke and persuading a steel company owner, Morgan Prentiss to sign a contract with them to provide it.Read More »

  • Géza von Bolváry – Ein Tango für Dich (1930)

    1921-1930ComedyGermanyGéza von BolváryMusicalWeimar Republic cinema

    This is Willi Forst’s second collaboration with director Géza von Bolvary, made shortly after the far better known “Zwei Herzen im Dreivierteltakt” (in which he didn’t have first billing, though). Again, the script is by Walter Reisch and the music is by Robert Stolz.

    In “Ein Tango für Dich”, Forst plays Jimmy Bolt, who is working as a singer and dancer (and occcasionally as a waiter) at a varieté. The man may be talented, but he’s not exactly a big success, and things get complicated when a young orphan girl (Fee Malten) falls in love with the voice of another singer (Oskar Karlweis) but then mistakes Bolt for him…Read More »

  • Kurt Neumann – Rocketship X-M (1950)

    1941-1950AdventureKurt NeumannSci-FiUSA

    Synopsis:
    Astronauts (Lloyd Bridges, Osa Massen, John Emery, Noah Beery, Jr., and Hugh O’Brien) blast off to explore the moon. Because of craft malfunction and some fuel calculations, they end up landing on Mars. On Mars, evidence of a once powerful civilization is found. The scientists determine that an atomic war destroyed most of the Martians (who surprisingly look like humans). Those that survived reverted to a caveman-like existence.Read More »

  • Hayao Miyazaki – Kaze tachinu AKA The Wind Rises (2013)

    2011-2020AnimationDramaHayao MiyazakiJapan

    Synopsis
    Jiro dreams of flying and designing beautiful airplanes, inspired by the famous Italian aeronautical designer Caproni. Nearsighted from a young age and unable to be a pilot, Jiro joins a major Japanese engineering company in 1927 and becomes one of the world’s most innovative and accomplished airplane designers. The film chronicles much of his life, depicting key historical events, including the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, the Great Depression, the tuberculosis epidemic and Japan’s plunge into war. Jiro meets and falls in love with Nahoko, and grows and cherishes his friendship with his colleague Honjo.Read More »

  • Amit Dutta – Drawn From Dreams (2019)

    2011-2020Amit DuttaArthouseIndiaShort Film

    Synopsis
    An eighteenth century notebook from the Western Himalayan Hills has recorded in it dreams as omens. Scenes from the waking memory of the artist seem to have enlivened dreams from a bygone era.

    Coming from the family ateliers of the master painter Nainsukh of Guler, this journal of dreams is interesting not only for its ethnographical documentation but also for the excellent artistic qualities of the illustrations, underlined delightfully with sound and rhythm by the director Amit Dutta.Read More »

  • Henri Decoin – La chatte aka The Cat (1958)

    1951-1960CrimeDramaFranceHenri Decoin

    Synopsis: Paris 1943. After her husband’s death, killed by the Germans, Cora joins the résistance under the pseudonym “La Chatte” (the she-cat). Very skillfully she succeeds in a dangerous mission. The same evening she meets a Swiss journalist, Bernard, and falls in love with him. Bernard is a German officer who now has to decide between his love for Cora and his mission.Read More »

  • Claude Miller – La question ordinaire (1969)

    1961-1970Claude MillerFranceShort Film

    Chains, a hook, white walls. A young woman came to film a man who is tortured … A relentless indictment.Read More »

  • Andrzej Munk – Czlowiek na torze AKA Man on the Tracks (1957)

    1951-1960Andrzej MunkDramaMysteryPoland

    In 1950, at night, a passenger train kills a man on the tracks. He is Orzechowski, an engineer since 1914. An inquiry immediately follows. Testimony takes the form of flashbacks. Tuszka, the station master, believes Orzechowski was a saboteur; at least one on the inquiry panel agrees. Zapora, the young engineer on the train that hit Orzechowski, gives more complicated testimony about the dead man – stiff-necked, proud, imperious, critical of Zapora and other younger workers. The signalman at the crossing where Orzechowski died also testifies. Can the panel arrive at the truth in a world where workers unite, inferior coal is a badge of honor, and the old order is suspect?Read More »

  • Blake Edwards – What Did You Do in the War, Daddy? (1966)

    1961-1970Blake EdwardsComedyUSAWar

    Synopsis:
    American officers Lt. Christian (James Coburn) and Capt. Cash (Dick Shawn) are among the soldiers ordered to take over a small town in Sicily during World War II. Remarkably, the townsfolk have no problem being occupied by the American troops — they just want to ensure that their annual festival goes on as planned. With wine flowing freely, Christian, Cash and their peers soon get in over their heads, leading to lots of confusion on the part of both Allied and Axis forces.Read More »

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