2000s

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The documentary film Tobacco Girls is a story of working class women that were made redundant from the Amer tobacco company in the spring of 2004. It describes the last days in the factory and what kinds of problems women face in trying to find new jobs. The film follows the lives of the few women made redundant over a year and especially how this affects them and the kinds of problems they have to solve.

Most of these women have been working in the factory for the best part of their working lives and it is difficult to take on a new job. Younger women try to retrain themselves or are looking out for new employment. One of the main characters has a case being heard in a labour court because associates have afflicted her. The other one finds a solution by undertaking to be her mother´s carer.

The theme developed shows how globalization has changed the thinking in manufacturing. Factories are disbanded so that the production can be removed to an area where labour costs are lower, and like at Amer, to enhance the company image. Older workers become unemployed.
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About the movie
While shooting “Flying over blue field” we lived in Bir�tonas sanatorium hotel. I was watching treatment procedures. People were plunging into bubble, mud and mineral water baths. They were going circles singing, were standing under cold water spouts. All this seemed like a sacred ritual, that frees from scurf of life. They were naked, like just born, without any signs of standing in society. Movie – silent impression about tired people “harbour”..(taken from his website www.stonys.lt)Read More »

AMG: Cristiano Bortone’s inspirational Italian-language drama Red Like the Sky recounts the incredible true story of the early life of blind sound editor Mirco Mencacci. The victim of a freak childhood accident in 1970 that robbed him permanently of his sight, Mencacci is shipped off to a Genoan boarding school for Catholic boys, per the stipulations of the Italian government. Not one to be daunted or repressed, Mirco forges a heartwarming friendship with the daughter of the school gatekeeper; the two abscond together, via her bicycle, on a series of secret trips to the closest cinema. Meanwhile, at the school, Mirco also begins recording his own sound dramas with the school’s tape recorder and the use of audio books in the institution’s library. In time, the innovative young man invites other students to participate, who eagerly accept, and Mirco uses the activity to help each fellow student identify his own innate gifts and pursue his dreams. But when he leads a cadre of boys on a covert expedition to the cinema, the school administrators take swift and decisive action.Read More »

Minna, 19, lives in a small dusty town. She and her friend Simone roam the streets, have tedious jobs, and try to entertain themselves by falling in love with the wrong men. Minna is still affected by her mother’s death a few years ago which has left her with heartache and uncertainty. Gradually Minna understands that she has to break up from her old life. One day opportunity comes knocking and Minna sees a chance to move on. A touching and comical film about a young girl’s quest to find love and happiness.
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A woman runs away from her robotic suburban life somewhere in the flatlands of French-speaking Europe in search of icebergs, and finds new friends along the way.Read More »

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Shunji Iwai’s Lily Chou-Chou offers eternal peace. She’s ethereal, the rebirth of death (indeed, she was born the moment Mark David Chapman shot and killed John Lennon), and all-powerful, a voice for a pop-cyber culture that feeds on her Björkness. In All About Lily Chou-Chou, fans of the fictional singer use her “amniotic” music to detach themselves from the violence that consumes Japanese culture. Yuichi (Hayato Ichihara) is obsessed with Lily: He gets busted for shoplifting one of her CDs and engages in endless conversations on the website Liliphilia with fellow Lily-heads, “connecting” with the so-called ether that is Lily, just like he melds into colorful rice fields whenever he listens to Lily sing. While Yuichi is quiet and reserved, his online handle (“philia”) suggests a boy erupting with adult emotions, and though his friendship with “blue cat” is elusive it still feels within reach. Such is the dreaminess and possibility the film taps into.Read More »

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Iranian pop star Googoosh was an unparalleled star in Iranian music until the 1979 Islamic revolution when female pop stars were forbidden to perform. This documentary takes a look back at Googoosh’s Elvis like fame before she was silenced, from her days as a child star to the end of her career, while also viewing this history in the context of women’s rights in the Middle East.
~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie GuideRead More »

How presumptuous of the prince to have disturbed Snow White in her beauty sleep, to have kissed her and removed her from her glass casket in order to restore her to life, i.e. in order to possess her in the flesh. But Snow White must learn that love and hate are never far apart. She understands. She was just being silly and now all’s well that ends well. She has opted for happiness. But at what price?Read More »

10 to 11 is the story of a passionate collector Mithat and the concierge of the building, Ali. For Mithat Istanbul is as vast as his collections and for Ali is nothing more than a few blocks around the building. When the neighbors decide to have the building rebuilt with the fear of earthquake and the wish for a more valuable house, Mithat’s most challenging struggle to save his collections begins. The building becomes the common destiny of these two men living alone. Their relationship that begins with the collaboration to save the continuity of the collections changes track with Mithat’s handing Istanbul over to Ali and ends when they involuntarily change each other’s fate. (IMDb)Read More »