2000s

The movies are a little more than a century old. Imagine if we could see films from previous centuries — records of slavery, the Great Fire of London, the Black Plague. “Osama” is like a film from some long-ago age. Although it takes place in Afghanistan, it documents practices so cruel that it is hard to believe such ideas have currency in the modern world. What it shows is that, under the iron hand of the Taliban, the excuse of “respect” for women was used to condemn them to a lifetime of inhuman physical and psychic torture. No society that loves and respects women could treat them in this way.Read More »

After parodying the idiosyncrasies of community theater devotees in the mock documentary Waiting for Guffman, actor/director Christopher Guest returns with another semi-improvised comedy that casts a satirical gaze on the world of championship dog breeding and training. A television crew is on hand to document the prestigious Mayflower Kennel Club Dog Show, and competition is fierce among the canine devotees vying for top honors. Salesman Gerry Fleck (Eugene Levy), who is cursed with two left feet (literally), and his wife Cookie (Catherine O’Hara) have entered their Norwich terrier “Winky” in competition. Wealthy and neurotic Meg Swan (Parker Posey) and her husband Hamilton (Michael Hitchcock) are on hand with their Weimaraner “Beatrice,” who they fear may have been traumatized by watching them have sex.Read More »

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A sadly neglected gem of British Cinema, this stunningly inventive film takes in German Expressionism, the pop promo, the docudrama and film noir. And that’s just for starters. The story of a mysterious man who creates chaos and anarchy in his wake, this has buckets of sly humour and a pleasingly dark edge. With brilliant performances from Thomas Fisher and Ian McNeice, this is an astounding reminder that UK cinema is much more than gangsters and girls in corsets.Read More »

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It is the end of the Romanian war against the Soviet Union (but not the end of the WWII), as Germany and Romania are allies, but in a few weeks they will be enemies. Two German officers stop for a lunch with a group of Romanian officers and as the story develops, a pair of rare postage stamps are acquired in very different occasions, which underlines the differences between the group of officers. This deceptively simply short film has many complex ramifications about history, honor, about how material value translates in life and survival. Director Pintilie works beautifully with his actors, especially Victor Rebengiuc (a preferred actor of Pintilie) and his use of visual space in a small room is both inspired and effective.Read More »

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From the ashes of Dead or Alive’s apocalyptic ending comes Dead or Alive 2, both a continuation of the series and a stand-alone film on par with its predecessor. Serving up shockingly graphic violence, sincere character nuance, engaging humor and transcendent magical realism with equal mastery, Dead or Alive 2 offers definitive evidence of why the New York Post hailed director Takashi Miike (Audition, Ichi the Killer) as “one of the most exciting, versatile directors working today.”Read More »

The story of a man who fooled an entire country. A tale of cheats and impostors, taking its inspiration from true facts and from one of the most intriguing characters of recent decades: the spy Francisco Paesa.

Nominated at
31st Goya Awards
Premios Feroz 2017 Read More »

While covering the night shift at a small-town fire department, an ambitious young television reporter (Manuela Velasco) and her cameraman follow the crew on a call to rescue an elderly woman unable to escape the inferno that is consuming her home. Upon their arrival at the scene, the calm midnight air is pierced by the sound of horrific screams, and the television report takes an unexpectedly dark turn.Read More »

John Berger is a storyteller, essayist, novelist, screenwriter, dramatist and critic, whose body of work embodies his concern for, in Geoff Dyer’s words, “the enduring mystery of great art and the lived experience of the oppressed.”

He is one of the most internationally influential writers of the last fifty years, who has explored the relationships between the individual and society, culture and politics and experience and expression in a series of novels, book works, essays, plays, films, photographic collaborations and performances, unmatched in their diversity, ambition and reach. His television series and book Ways of Seeing revolutionized the way that Fine Art is read and understood, while his engagement with European peasantry and migration in the fiction trilogy Into Their Labours and A Seventh Man stand as models of empathy and insight.

John Berger in conversation with Michael Silverblatt at Berger’s home, a working farm, in Quincy, Mieussy, France, October 2002. Silverblatt is the host of the radio interview program, Bookworm.Read More »

Synopsis:
Set in the boarding school milieu, the film depicts the meeting of shy Gregor and mysterious Billie. Billie has a son, her husband is in jail. Arthur, Gregor’s friend, is a serial Lothario, forever unfaithful to his girlfriend Pia. Both Arthur and Billie have had a similar mystical experience related to someone’s death. While Gregor believes that an elective affinity between two people preordains their lives, Arthur does not even subscribe to any possibility of romantic feelings between the sexes.
Arthur is a failure at school and becomes mixed up with criminal elements, Gregor goes on to attend university, and remains in pursuit of Billie who passes in and out of his life on several occasions.Read More »