• Budd Boetticher – Wings of the Hawk (1953)

    USA1951-1960Budd BoetticherWestern

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    Synopsis
    Gringo miner Gallager is caught up in the Mexican revolution of 1910-11 when corrupt administrator Ruiz appropriates his mine. Gallager saves the life of guerilla leader Raquel, then finds there’s a price on his head; he becomes romantically involved with her in the course of a series of rescues and ambushes, leading up to Orozco’s march on Ciudad Juarez.Read More »

  • Catherine Breillat – À ma soeur! AKA Fat Girl (2001)

    2001-2010ArthouseCatherine BreillatDramaFrance

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    Quote:
    Twelve-year-old Anaïs is fat. Her sister, Elena, is a teenage beauty. While on vacation with their parents, Anaïs tags along with Elena as she explores the dreary seaside town. Elena meets Fernando, an Italian law student, who seduces her with promises of love, and the ever-watchful Anaïs bears witness to the corruption of her sister’s innocence. Precise and uncompromising, Catherine Breillat’s Fat Girl is a bold dissection of sibling rivalry and female adolescent sexuality from one of contemporary cinema‘s most controversial directors.Read More »

  • J. Lee Thompson – Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)

    1971-1980ActionJ. Lee ThompsonSci-FiUSA

    Synopsis:
    In this third sequel to “Planet of the Apes,” the apes turn the tables on the human Earth population when they lead a revolt against their cruel masters in the distant year of 1990. By doing this it creates the time loop that leads to the first film. “Conquest of the Planet of the Apes” is cinematically etched in broad, brash strokes slashing social satire and science fiction suspense with large-scale spectacle.Read More »

  • Catherine Breillat – Barbe Bleue (2009)

    Drama2001-2010Catherine BreillatFrance

    Plot : Catherine Breillat puts a new spin on an ancient story in this multi-leveled drama. In France in the mid-1950s, Catherine (Lola Creton) enjoys toying with her younger sister Marie-Anne (Daphne Baiwir) by reading her the story of the murderous and oft-married Bluebeard, embellishing the story with plenty of gore and scaring the child out of her wits. As Catherine rereads the story, we’re taken back to the year 1697, as Lord Bluebeard (Dominique Thomas) prepares to make Marie-Catherine (also played by Creton) his seventh wife. Marie-Catherine’s youth and innocence make her an especially attractive quarry to Bluebeard, and rather than murder her right away, he decides to wait a while in order to savor the terrible joy of claiming her life. Read More »

  • Adam Bhala Lough – Bomb the System (2002)

    2001-2010ActionAdam Bhala LoughDramaUSA

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    Summary:
    A daring and fresh ensemble cast and crew have crafted a remarkable tribute to graffiti art and the city where it all began with Bomb the System. The director, producers, cinematographer, and other key crew members are all in their early 20s, and their debut feature deftly gives an uncompromising look at the life of urban youths. Blest, a 19-year-old graffiti writer, has just graduated from high school. With no ambition toward mainstream goals of work and family, he spends his time bombing the city with graffiti messages until he and his crew become the most wanted bombers by the corrupt NYPD Vandal Squad. He even attracts major media and gallery attention for his tags. Also part of Blest’s crew are Buk 50 and his younger brother Lune, whose arrest and beating by the NYPD causes the crew to wage a full-on graffiti war against the city. As they fight with their spray cans and their tags, Blest meets a political activist, Alexandra. Soon after, Blest’s relationship with Buk 50 and the crew fragments as Blest ponders his position in life. Writer/director Adam Bhala Lough, 23, finely weaves parallel relationships between everyone in the crew. With a lustrous production design and cinematography that utilizes the backdrop of New York City with radiant color that evokes as much as the graffiti, Bomb the System is a triumphant debutRead More »

  • Catherine Breillat – La belle endormie AKA The Sleeping Beauty (2010)

    2001-2010Catherine BreillatDramaFrance

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    Catherine Breillat’s bracing explorations of female mythologies find epic resonance in her latest film. The Sleeping Beauty sees the eminent filmmaker working at the height of her powers, something those fortunate enough to have seen her beguiling canon at TIFF Cinematheque this summer have already experienced.
    Astonishing landscapes that circumnavigate the globe, and a dizzying mix of historical periods, provide a backdrop for the little girl at the film’s centre. Breillat’s cinematographic eye has rarely been expressed on such a large canvas or with such razor-sharp intent.
    Noah Cowan (tiff.net)Read More »

  • Catherine Breillat – Anatomie de l’Enfer AKA Anatomy of Hell (2003)

    2001-2010ArthouseCatherine BreillatDramaFrance

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    “A lonely and dejected woman (Amira Casar) learns that only when all inhibitions are cast aside will she be able to truly understand the truth about how men see women in this erotically charged exploration of sexuality from controversial director Catherine Breillat. Teetering on the edge of overwhelming ennui, the woman pays a man (Rocco Siffredi) to join her for a daring, four-day exploration of sexuality in which both reject all convention and smash all boundaries while locked away from society in an isolated estate. Only when the man and woman confront the most unspeakable aspects of their sexuality will they have a pure understanding of how the sexes view one another.”Read More »

  • Sergei M. Eisenstein – Bronenosets Potyomkin AKA Battleship Potemkin [2005 Restored Version] (1925)

    1921-1930PoliticsSergei M. EisensteinSilentUSSR

    29f7c043f76a2bde437fd0d52a185152

    The Battleship Potemkin (1925), accompanied by a new arrangement of Edmund Meisel’s orchestral score, which Eisenstein himself authorized for the film’s Berlin premiere in 1926. The Battleship Potemkin was recognized from the start as a landmark work both for its innovative use of montage and for its sheer power as propaganda. In particular, the “Odessa steps” sequence is arguably the single most famous and widely quoted passage in the history of film. But in a sense The Battleship Potemkin has been the victim of its own effectiveness. Reissued over the years in various censored and reedited versions, Eisenstein’s great vision has not been seen for several decades in anything like what the director likely intended. This new version, overseen by the film archivist and historian Enno Patalas, attempts to reconstruct, as closely as possible, the film as it was presented in Moscow during its initial release.Read More »

  • Adam Goldberg – I Love Your Work (2003)

    Drama2001-2010Adam GoldbergUSA

    The achingly hip I LOVE YOUR WORK arrives with trappings familiar to any keen-eyed independent film fan. With a cast that includes Giovanni Ribisi (LOST IN TRANSLATION) and Franke Potente (RUN LOLA RUN), a big-star-in-a-cameo-role appearance (in this case, Vince Vaughn), and the by now obligatory roles for people you wouldn’t expect to see in such a movie (Jason Lee, Elvis Costello), Adam Goldberg’s debut feature is positively dripping in cool, and he seems to have looked up every contact in his Rolodex for I LOVE YOUR WORK–even calling on the Flaming Lips’ Steven Drozd to carve out a few songs for the soundtrack.Read More »

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