A young man with a backpack walks all on his own into the endless Mexican cactus desert. He takes some peyote. How does he get out again? Pure cinema in the long-take tradition of Lisandro Alonso or Gus Van Sant.Read More »
2000s
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Matias Meyer – Wadley (2008)
2001-2010ArthouseMatias MeyerMexico -
Paul McGrath – John & Yoko’s Year of Peace (2000)
1991-2000CanadaDocumentaryPaul McGrathPoliticsIt’s 1969 and headlines blare war and civil unrest while John Lennon and Yoko Ono -rock ‘n’ roll’s most eccentric couple- are in love. They have just gotten married,they are happy to be together and they see that the world needs some changew. They announce their mission for peace and they invite the rest of the world to do the same as they do: they are lying on their bed. But people call them silly and naive they see clowns instead of true believers.
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Shunji Iwai – Ichikawa Kon monogatari AKA The Kon Ichikawa Story (2006)
Documentary2001-2010AsianJapanShunji Iwai

Summary from yesasia – “It has been three years since pop auteur Iwai Shunji’s last film Hana and Alice, and his latest offering may seem a bit surprising. In a marked departure from his previous youth-centric works, his new film is a documentary about legendary director Ichikawa Kon, whom Iwai cites as one of his greatest influences. In a momentous career spanning over fifty years, 91-year-old Ichikawa Kon has long established himself as one of the great masters of Japanese cinema. A lifetime his junior, 44-year-old Iwai Shunji has, through acclaimed films like Swallowtail Butterfly and All About Lily Chou-Chou, emerged with a distinct voice and language of his own amongst the current generation of filmmakers.Read More »
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Stephen Chow – Cheung Gong 7 hou aka CJ7 (2008)
2001-2010AsianDramaHong KongStephen ChowA poor Chinese laborer learns important lessons after his son gets a strange new toy.
Plot:
Construction worker Ti (Stephen Chow) lives in a ramshackle shanty and scavenges everything from shoes to toys from the trash dump. Despite his state of abject poverty, the earnest, lesson-spouting Ti is determined to send his son Dicky (Xu Jiao) to a posh private elementary school. Dicky, however, is a lot more interested in playing than studying, and he’d like nothing more than a CJ1 robot dog to show up his bullying classmate. Unable to afford a CJ1, Ti brings home “CJ7”, a curious rubbery green ball he found at the dump. His son isn’t impressed – until the ball shows its true alien form, morphing into a little green dog whose penchant for mischief gives even Dicky a run for his money. Stephen Chow has helped launched the careers of many a starlet, and this time CJ7 co-stars Mainland newcomer Kitty Zhang and talented child actress Xu Jiao who genderbends as Chow’s son. Chow was so impressed with Xu Jiao’s performance, he not only has more plans in store for the budding ingenue, he’s adopted her as his goddaughter. Other key comedy players include portly Stephen Chow regular Lam Chi Chung and the cuddly titular alien that serves as another testament to Chow’s ability to effectively integrate state-of-the-art CGI into his films.Read More » -
Luke Fowler – Jarman Award 2008 (2008)
2001-2010ExperimentalLuke FowlerShort FilmUnited KingdomAs the winning artist of the 2008 Film London Jarman Award, Luke Fowler was commissioned to produce four short films for 3 Minute Wonder, Channel 4s shorts strand.
The four films premiered on Channel 4 over four consecutive nights in April 2009. Entitled, Anna, Helen, David and Lester, they are a series of portraits of four diverse individuals brought together through a shared residence – a flat in a Victorian tenement in the West End of Glasgow. Composer: Lee PattersonRead More »
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Naoko Ogigami – Kamome shokudo AKA Ruokala Lokki AKA The Seagull Diner (2006)
2001-2010ComedyDramaJapanJapanese Female DirectorsNaoko OgigamiOn a summer day, a small Japanese restaurant by the name of Ruokala Lokki (The Seagull Canteen) opens for business in the Punavuori district of Helsinki. The restaurant is run by 38-year-old Sachie who wishes to offer her Finnish patrons not only Japanese food but Japanese-style food for the soul, too. Attracting Finns to the small restaurant run by a lone Japanese woman proves quite difficult, however.
Luckily Sachie gets to know Midori and her restaurant’s only customer, Tommi Hiltunen, with the help of whom she slowly begins to bring in more customers and settle down in her new life. Kamome Shokudo is a charming little tale of people in the middle of a foreign culture. The film is based on a novel by popular Japanese writer Yoko Mure. Director Naoko Ogigami received an award at the Berlin International Film Festival for her previous film Barber Yoshino.Read More »
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Dori Berinstein – ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway (2007)
2001-2010DocumentaryDori BerinsteinPerformanceUSAFrom Amazon.com –
The real drama happens behind the curtain in this fascinating and rare look at four high-profile Broadway musicals (Wicked, Taboo, Caroline, Or Change, and Avenue Q) and their fearless journey to the Tony Awards®. Including a star-studded cast, this entertaining film takes viewers on an unprecedented behind-the-scenes view of the creative process that captures all the heartbreak and hilarity of trying make it big in Show Business!
The playful but intense and vastly informative Show Business: The Road to Broadway is a documentary about four musicals that were contenders for top Tony Awards prizes in the 2004 Broadway season. Following the parallel action between the quartet–“Wicked,” “Avenue Q,” “Taboo,” and “Caroline, or Change”–from concept through casting, rewrites, rehearsals, opening nights and the relative box-office fortunes of each, the film dazzles a viewer by seeming to be everywhere at once. Along the way, one encounters cascades of neuroses and anxieties from the creative community involved in these shows, but there is also tremendous insight shared by the various playwrights, composers, lyricists, producers, directors, and stars who get these productions up and running. There’s sundry drama, too, especially concerning the brief run of “Taboo,” the financially disastrous musical about Boy George that was largely bankrolled by Rosie O’Donnell and ran into a variety of problems. Excellent fly-on-the-wall moments include a dinner sequence involving a handful of well-known theatre critics, whose tastes vary and who often champion shows no one else seems to like. Everything leads to highlights from the 2004 Tony Awards show, which was full of surprises. A final sequence in which one catches up with the many talents involved says everything about how success and failure is often a mere roll of the cosmic dice.
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Kazim Öz – Bahoz AKA Firtina AKA The Storm (2008)
Drama2001-2010Kazim ÖzPoliticsTurkeyQuote:
A film about Kurdish students activism during ’90s in Turkey. After passing his university entrance exam, Cemal (Cahit Gok) a Kurdish boy from Tunceli (Dersim) goes to Istanbul. In time Cemal starts to involve in student activists who are mainly from Kurdish background.Read More » -
Ahmed Imamovic – 10 minuta aka 10 minutes (2002)
2001-2010Ahmed ImamovicBosnia HerzegovinaDramaShort FilmWon the Best European short film Award in 2002
Description: The film follows two simultaneous story lines: one set in Rome, and one in Sarajevo, in 1994, the worst time of the war in Bosnia.
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