It’s been fifteen years since the apparent murder of a young child. Detective Chang-Ho (played by Kim Sang-kyeong) discovers something astonishing at an emotionally charged location- a place only known by himself, the child’s mother, and the the girl’s kidnapper. With this, a race quickly begins to try and apprehend the criminal before the statute of limitations run out.Read More »

The Well is a modest but generally effective plea for racial tolerance. Based loosely on a real incident, the film tells of the disappearance of a little African-American girl in a small, segregated community. Caucasian Claude Packard (Harry Morgan, the nephew of the town’s richest man (Barry Kelley), is the last person seen with the little girl. Sensing a coverup when Morgan is not immediately charged, the black community is on the verge of a riot. But when it’s discovered that the little girl has fallen down a well, all racial differences are forgotten as black and white neighbors work shoulder to shoulder to rescue the child. The Well tries very hard to be equitable by 1951 standards, and is heartfelt enough to overcome its occasional lapses into stereotype and condescension. ~ Hal Erickson, RoviRead More »

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This is a pretty little student’s film with a peculiar background story. It was shot in spring 1968, produced by the Film- & Television Academy (dffb) of West-Berlin, which at that time was a hotbed of political turmoil. The recently founded film school played an important part during the escalation year of 1967/8. Among the students of these years were filmmakers such as Hartmut Bitomsky, Christian Ziewer, Harun Farocki and Wolfgang Petersen.

By 1967/68 the overall climate had become highly charged with politics and revolutionary fever. At least two students of that era abandoned filmmaking and turned into left-wing terrorists: the famous Holger Meins (1941-1974), who joined the RAF, and Philip Werner Sauber (1947-1975) who joined the lesser-known, but no less radical group “Bewegung 2. Juni”. While Meins died while on a hunger strike in the prison of Stammheim, the Swiss-born Sauber was killed during a shoot-out with the police in Cologne, just after he had shot to death a policeman.Read More »

Laurence Kardish, Sundance Film Festival wrote: “Edge and emotionally complex, Black & White is a very unusual film… [It] is a nocturnal love story suffused with the melancholy and anxiety of not belonging, and full of the sad understanding of what it means to be a stranger.”Read More »

SYNOPSIS

Basri is a lonely man who seems to be floating in his own life. He watches over the railroads, walking the endless tracks through the abundant landscape of Anatolia. His only son, Seyfi, has been taken into custody 18 years ago and no one has heard from him ever since. After the death of his wife, Basri has slowly isolated himself from society. But there is still hope in his life, as he keeps on writing petitions twice a month to look after his son..Read More »

IMDB:
A bag full of money lands in front of you. Is it luck? The answer to your prayers? Part of a predetermined plan? Or all of the above? Set in the chaotic streets of Istanbul, 40 is a story of three strangers making their way in a city of 12 million, all searching…for one bag. Shot entirely on location, ’40’ combines intense story telling with documentary style cinematography embarking on a synchronistic journey dealing with faith, love, luck, destiny, human trafficking…and a bag of cash that falls from the sky.Read More »

Wikipedia wrote:
The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a 1923 American film directed by Wallace Worsley and produced by Carl Laemmle and Irving Thalberg. It stars Lon Chaney, Sr., Patsy Ruth Miller, Norman Kerry, Nigel de Brulier, Brandon Hurst. The film is probably the second most famous adaptation of Victor Hugo’s novel, following the critically acclaimed, much reissued 1939 masterpiece by RKO Pictures. The film was Universal’s “Super Jewel” of 1923 and was their most successful silent film, grossing over $3 million.

The film is most notable for the grand sets that recall 15th century Paris as well as Lon Chaney’s performance and spectacular make-up as the tortured bell-ringer of Notre Dame. The film elevated Chaney, already a well-known character actor, to full star status in Hollywood. It also helped set a standard for many later horror films, including Chaney’s The Phantom of the Opera in 1925. In 1951, the film entered the public domain (in the USA) due to the claimants failure to renew its copyright registration in the 28th year after publication.Read More »

Review:
Italian writer-director Salvatore Mereu’s drama of Sardinian childhood adapts a short story by local author Sergio Atzeni.

There are films that gently invite the viewer into their world, and there are others which yank us in throat first. Salvatore Mereu’s Bellas Mariposas, a twelve-year-old’s precocious journal of one long summer day in her run-down Sardinian neighborhood, is a fine example of the latter. Writer-director Mereu, ably following up 2008’s well-received Sonetaula with another snapshot of life on his native island, accumulates detail and atmosphere to a claustrophobic degree, audaciously deploying direct-to-camera address to make the viewer more confidant than spectator.

Immersively evocative and grittily atmospheric, this is distinctive auteur fare whose hard-knock verisimilitude recalls more violent recent predecessors like Matteo Garrone’s widely-admired Gomorrah (2008) and Matteo Botrugno & Daniele Coluccini’s lesser-known Et In Terra Pax (2010). Somewhat overlooked when premiering in a Venice sidebar, Mereu’s “free” adaptation of an unfinished tale by influential Sardinian author Sergio Atzeni unfortunately faces an uphill battle to find room even at mainland Italian arthouses. Edgy festivals and those with a particular interest in young people’s issues should nevertheless definitely give it a try.Read More »

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Undeniably one of the strangest drug-related movies ever made (not to mention the title itself!). Dr Fink is a quite ruthless and cynic college professor. One of his students, is addicted to heroin. The professor invites him to his villa along with his wife to spend the weekend. The psychedelic, surreal and sleazy situations that take place have to be seen! One of the rarest, weirdest and most obscure Italian exploitation films of all time.Read More »