Synopsis
One of the most popular Mexican films ever made, the cult sensation AVENTURERA is a famous example of a cabaretera, a curious film noir and Carmen Miranda-styled musical hybrid wildly popular in Mexico in the ‘40s and ‘50s. Shades of MILDRED PIERCE in this melodramatic rise and fall of a beautiful, popular nightclub star with a dark past. Delirious, delicious, and dangerous. Don’t miss!Read More »
Synopsis:
In the heart of the Japanese Alps, in Kamikochi, Nagano Prefecture, botany professor Kazuhiko Onuma spends time with Tsuruko, his lover. One night, Kazuhiko’s wife Kazuyo comes to see them and confronts the professor about his extramarital affair, and Tsuruko, an inevitable witness to the confrontation, leaves the professor the following morning. Over the next decade, whenever he visits the mountain cabin every autumn equinox, the memory of Tsuruko will forever haunt Kazuhiko…Read More »
Another early Masumura with Wakao Ayako, based on the novel by Blue Sky Maiden’s (青空娘) Genji Keita. This time we have Wakao as the third daughter of the Nonomiya family, whose two elder sisters have married the two elder sons of the Mihara family. While Kawaguchi Hiroshi plays the third, unmarried son… so you can imagine the ensuing events. Maybe not as much fun as Ichikawa Kon’s Goodbye, Hello (あなたと私の合言葉 さようなら、今日は), also made at Daiei around the same time with the same leads and a similar story, but Masumura can do no wrong either.Read More »
In a port area of France, clashes between a gang of young delinquents and a tribe of gypsies. From the initial peccadillo to the final drama, each action leads to a more violent reaction of vengeance, each treated with the excess and cruelty that he himself displayed.Read More »
In a remote region of post-independence India, the love of a blind British woman pricks the conscience of an arms dealer.Read More »
Quote:
In the sequel to Children of the Beehive, a journalist arrives in the secluded foothills of Shimizu’s cherished Izu in search of a hidden commune to ask, “What happened to the children of the Beehive?” Three years have passed and her question situates itself not only in the realm of Shimizu’s craft, but that of reality: What became of the war orphans Shimizu raised? Rewriting the past, Shimizu even renders one of the original’s most heartbreaking sequences into a work of fiction. Invoking meta-narrative elements, Shimizu reshapes the orphans’ narrative, which is quite well-known to visitors of the commune thanks to the popularity of the first Beehive film. A fascinating work of docudrama that treads between the realm of fact and fiction, Children of the Beehive: What Happened Next breathes the fresh air of Shimizu’s loose and reflexive approach, anticipating the works of Kiarostami.Read More »
Omar Khayyam was one of the greatest Persian poets. He was also a brilliant mathematician. Though his quatrains were written in the 11th century, they are still popular the world over. The details of his life are unknown, so this movie invents a biography for him and includes in it his real achievements – the invention of a new calendar and the penning of those epigrammatic poems. This film has him romancing a sultan’s bride and foiling the assassin sect’s plot to kill the sultan’s son.Read More »
Synopsis:
Having been caught stealing money from his employer to pay for a holiday with his girlfriend Juliette, Michel finds himself in a prison cell. He falls into a deep sleep and awakes to find the door of his cell open. Stepping through the doorway, he finds himself in the most beautiful sun-drenched countryside. A peaceful country road leads him to a remote village whose inhabitants have lost their memory. Husbands and wives no longer recognise one another but everyone seems to know Juliette when Michel enquires about her…Read More »
