DAS KINO UND DER WIND UND DIE PHOTOGRAPHIE
Sieben Kapitel uber dokumentarische Filme
The Cinema and the Wind and Photography
Seven Chapters about Documentary Films
“That’s how we’ll begin: the street of the first film. This street is located in a suburb of Lyon. That’s where the factory of the Lumiere brothers was. They made the first films for cinema. These were documentary films.”Read More »
Synopsis:
Gohatto stars Beat Takeshi, Asano Tadanobu and a fifteen-year-old Matsuda Ryuhei as the beautiful son of a well-to-do merchant who joins the Shinsen Gumi militia in Kyoto for the “right to kill,” and ends up doing so both by his sword and his good looks. Gohatto explores themes of jealousy, madness and destruction within the context of bushido homoeroticism; not only does this violent love story play out within the bounds of same-sex relationships, but within a single militia.Read More »
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Innocents Abroad is a delightful, lighthearted film about forty American tourists visiting ten European countries in a whirlwind two weeks. Globus Gateway Tours allowed Les Blank and his film crew complete and uncensored access to “European Horizons” tour #KH1009A. The tour closely follows the nineteenth century traditional “Grand Tour”, starting in London and visiting Amsterdam, Heidelberg, The Black Forest, Lucerne, Innsbruck, Venince, Rome, Pisa, Nice, Avignon, and Paris. The film chronicles a diverse group of Americans experiencing Europe for the first time, struggling with and laughing about cultural differences, and seeing ancient sites and legendary cities, all led by witty and inimitable Englishman Mark Tinney. For some of the tourists, this is their first venture out into the world; for others, it is the fulfillment of a lifelong dream.Read More »
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Based on the fantastic book by Michel Houellebecq :
OUR hero in this gloriously dark piece is a depressed, cynical, sexually obsessed systems engineer moping through life perked up only by the fun he has putting others into a similarly suicidal state. When he is sent on a work trip to train up clients to use his company’s software he is forced to travel with the slimy Raphael, an unreconstruted male bursting with such sheer desperation that he is destined never to have success with the women he chases…Read More »
From IMDB:
A highly styled ‘genre’ film which can perhaps be seen as a pastiche of all gangster movies. Tom Reagan is the laconic anti-hero of this amoral tale which is also, paradoxically, a look at morals within the criminal underworld of the 1930s. Two rival gangs vie for control of a city where the police are pawns, and the periodic busts of illicit drinking establishments are no more than a way for one gang to get back at the other. Black humour and shocking violence compete for screen time as we question whether or not Tom, right-hand man of the Irish mob leader, really has a heart.Read More »
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Eddie, a small town ex-con, discovers he has talent for selling anything and everything. Eddie sees a way to rise above the low life by setting up on his own. What he didn’t bargain for, was the murder and mayhem along the way.Read More »
An interesting documentary about an interesting man, to say the least. Kazuo Hara follows up his controversial work “The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On” with a bio-documentary about Mitsuharu Inoue, a famous and popular (especially among women) post-war Japanese writer. The film follows the last few years of the life of Inoue before he dies of cancer in 1992. The film starts out as a usual bio-documentary like many others, but the second half of the film digs into the writer’s past and comes up with some unexpected discoveries.Read More »
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An Innuit hunter races his sled home with a fresh-caught halibut. This fish pervades the entire film, in real and imaginary form. Meanwhile, Axel tags fish in New York as a naturalist’s gofer. He’s happy there, but a messenger arrives to bring him to Arizona for his uncle’s wedding. It’s a ruse to get Axel into the family business. In Arizona, Axel meets two odd women: vivacious, needy, and plagued by neuroses and familial discord. He gets romantically involved with one, while the other, rich but depressed, plays accordion tunes to a gaggle of pet turtles.Read More »
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Divorce Iranian Style challenges preconceptions about what life is like for women in Iran. The most startling thing about the film is simply that it was made. The filmmakers follow the cases of three women who are attempting to divorce their husbands. Although Iranian religious law frowns on divorce, a man is allowed to claim the privilege without needing to show cause, provided he pays his ex-wife compensation. A woman, however, can only sue for divorce if she can prove that her husband is sterile or mad, or if he agrees to let her out of their marriage contract. In the last case, the compensation becomes the bargaining chip: the man will sometimes give his wife her freedom if he doesn’t have to pay.Read More »