Cinema of the World

Plot / Synopsis

Writer/director Cédric Klapisch (L'auberge Espagnole) returns with the energetic and insightful My Piece of the Pie, a contemporary drama with a comedic edge, a timely social bent, and a surprising twist. France is s fiery single mother and a blue-collar worker who loses her job when the local factory in her French seaside town closes down. Faced with having to support her three children, with no job prospects in sight, France enrols herself in a housekeeper training program and lands a position cleaning the Paris apartment of handsome but cocky power broker Steve. France strikes more gold as the perpetual bachelor also hires her to watch his son for a few weeks. Being a part of the millionaire lifestyle, however servient, is not so bad. But what really lies behind Steve's bullish business ways and brash demeanor? Is he as innocent as France would like him to be? Is she?

Boldly intertwining the theme of personal accountability in today's money-driven world and a witty odd-couple story, Klapisch steadily unravels how seemingly harmless decisions in business and in life have broader consequences than what one would ever imagine.

major-3 @ IMDB wrote:
"Deserves to have a comeback"

German humour in the 50s and 60s? Oh, yeah, let's have a laugh about it! Sadly, it's true, during the 50s and 60s one could only seek and not find humour and art in German films. At least those who were striving for it didn't really stand a chance, as the so-called "Heimatfilm" was Box-Offing everyone else.
Still, there were exceptions. Like director Helmut Käutner who, from "Große Freiheit Nr.7" which was banned by the Nazis despite starring the times biggest star Hans Albers, to "Die letzte Brücke", which turned Maria Schell into an international celebrity, had shown his individualism and never gave in to the comfy no-style of the Adenauer era.

Plot / Synopsis

The peaceful cohabitation of bachelors Ender and Cetin is disrupted when they allow a friend's sister to move in with them. The 30-something longtime friends are overwhelmed by the presence of the uncommunicative Nihal. What possessed them to accept the responsibility of a university student in their home? Especially a girl struggling with the trauma of recently losing her parents in a car accident. But simple daily rituals like sharing meals eventually bring the three roommates together for more pleasant moments. Nihal soon comes out of her depressed shell and the two men discover a vibrant beautiful young woman. Always caring and protective gentlemen, Ender and Cetin are intent on being conscientious guardians. Nihal enjoys discussing literature and poetry with scholarly Ender, and she finds comfort in boisterous Cetin's earthy humor. Nihal is touched by the men's loyal friendship: in a sort of bromance since high school...

Plot Synopsis [AMG]
"A rootin', tootin', but sincere picture" was the advertising tag for the comedy western Waterhole No. 3. James Coburn plays the likeably amoral hero, who'll go to any lengths to get his mitts on a treasure map. Like his principal rival, renegade confederate cavalryman Claude Akins, Coburn knows that a fortune in gold bullion is hidden near a desert waterhole; the trick is finding the damned thing. Along the way, Coburn humiliates redneck sheriff Carroll O'Connor and "has his way" with O'Connor's far from unwilling daughter Maggie Blye. When Blye, cast aside by Coburn in favor of his treasure quest, screams rape, Coburn replies that his only crime is "assault with a friendly weapon." Just try to get that bit past an audience in 1996. Supervised by Blake Edwards, Waterhole No. 3 is agreeably irreverent, though a little editing here and there wouldn't have hurt.

Summary:

The film tells about the Decembrists’ revolt in the south of Russia.

Plot / Synopsis

Two oil prospectors, Robert and Rolf, head into the wilderness of Malaysia to meet with a camp of their colleagues for possible drilling sites. Upon landing, however, the plane breaks a wheel when it runs over the camp's radio, which was laying mysteriously in the runway. They all soon discover that the entire camp is missing, and they fear that local cannibals may be responsible. Their pilot fixes the plane, but they must wait for morning to fly. During the night, the pilot's girlfriend, Swan, is taken by the cannibals. When looking for her in the morning, the pilot is also killed. Rolf and Robert become lost and are soon separated in a raft accident. Robert is captured by the cannibals and faces certain tortures and humiliations until he escapes with a cannibal woman. The two then set out to find Rolf and the plane, with the cannibal tribe right on their heels...

Quote:
Kozanoğlu Hüseyin, ne dağda ne şehirde yeri yoktur onun. Köylerini basıp haraç alan Bey babasını öldürür.Kozanoğlu Eşkiyaya sığınır, yüreğindeki öfke bir kılıca dönüşmüştür artık. Maksadı devlete karşı gelmek değildir zaten devletin de olan bitenden haberi yoktur. Osmanlının gerileme döneminde rüşvet, yolsuzluk, soygun alıp başını gitmiştir. Kısa zamanda eşkiya da olamaz. o hep halktan yanadır oysa eşkiya halkı da soymaktadır. Kısa zamanda dağlarda nam salan Kozanoğlu Beyden koruduğu halkı da yanına katar. Sonunda güçlü,zeki Kozanoğlu silah nakkaşının yanına girip mütevazi bir hayat yaşamak ister.Fakat o Kozanoğludur ve halkın ihtiyacı vardır ona. Nitekim iyi bildiği insanlar tarafından tuzağa düşürülür.Mahpustadır ve halkın gözü önünde idam sehpasına çıkarılır.Korkmamaktadır. Umudu Bunu gören halkın arkasından gideceğine olan inancıdır.Bir devletin çöküşü ve insanların çaresizliğinin en iyi anlatıldığı filmlerden biridir.- sinematurk.com

Plot:
Kati and Steffi are best friends since childhood.But as they step into adulthood, both their perfect friendship and their personalities get harshly tested by a series of unfortunate events; mainly caused by Steffi finding out her father wasn't quite faithful to her mother, and the two girls getting hit by the consequences of her delirious revenge plans. When things get out of hand, the two girls find themselves in the middle of a mess,
and Kati starts questioning whether or not Steffi is really so precious to her. Where will Steffi's plans of penalizing her father's "evil" lover will end up..? Will the girls' friendship be saved..?

Imdb:
Extraordinary Soap Opera
12 August 2009 | by GManfred (Ramsey, NJ)

I am not a fan of Soaps. Too often they are predictable and boring and descend into bathos -'Womens' Pictures'. But this picture was so spectacular in all respects that I was taken aback by its sheer accomplishment. Critic Kenneth Tynan said that one must 'suspend one's disbelief' to take part in the movie experience. If that is the case, this picture became real; it was not a play on the screen performed by mere actors.

The story is familiar but the production is not. Direction is skillful and the photography is perfect. The picture moves quickly and the acting is superb. Francis Lederer was good, Brigitte Helm was even better, and Warwick Ward, who plays Col. Beranoff, spit and polish and bent on revenge, was outstanding. He was the glue that held the cast together and was a riveting presence whenever he was on screen.

Imdb:
Summer begins, Aku graduates high school and faces a great emptiness. As his girlfriend, parents and friends all leave the city, it looks to be the dullest summer ever. Everything changes at Midsummer when Aku meets Juli, a beautiful, strange and wild girl. Juli asks Aku for a ride to eastern Finland. Aku agrees - without any idea what he's getting himself into.

The adventurer Hans Albers find himself on board a luxury cruiser. Because of a case of plague among the crew, the ship raises the yellow flag, anchors at some remote Caribbean harbour. All the passengers have to be put into quarantine in the fortress, under the evil commander Aribert Wäscher. Albers falls in love with the cool journalist Olga Tschechova. The nurse Dorothea Wieck wants him for herself and forges a medical report, so that Albers now believes he's mortally ill of a heart disease. Without telling Tschechova, he leaves with Wieck for Buenos Aires. Later they meet again during an expedition in the African jungle.

Plot / Synopsis

The son of the owner of a large Italian cheese factory is kidnapped, but as the factory is on the verge of bankruptcy the owner hatches a plan to use the ransom money as reinvestment in the factory.

Imdb:
I Want To Be A Soldier" is the story of Alex, an average eight year old kid who seems to grow a morbid fascination for images portraying violence. He begins to develop a communication problem with his parents and other kids at school, and closes in on himself, inventing two imaginary friends.

Plot / Synopsis

A father becomes unhinged as his son casually violates a widely held taboo in this darkly satiric comedy-drama from Icelandic filmmaker Aleksi Salmenpera. Mikael is a judge who has been raising his son Dani on his own since he split up with his wife. Mikael keeps a close watch over Dani, obsessively keeping track of every aspect of his life, and as the boy has grown into a good-looking teenager, he's begun to chafe under his father's obsessive attention. Mikael is particularly focused on his son's love life, and when his long-missing daughter Tilda returns to the household, he's horrified when Dani takes a decidedly non-familial interest in her. Mikael does everything in his power to dissuade Dani from pursuing Tilda, but when nothing reasonable seems to work, he embraces strange and desperate means, and Mikael's behavior begins to sink from fatherly concern into madness. ~ Mark Deming, Allrovi

Quote:
Kurtuluş Savaşı yılları...İstanbul'dan Anadolu'ya gizli olarak yürütülen silah sevkiyatı padişahın casuslarınca ortaya çıkarılarak durdurulur. Mustafa Kemal Paşa'yı İstanbul'dan destekleyenlerden Hulusi Bey, Ethem Bey gibi ileri gelenler yakalanarak kurşuna dizilir. Bunun üzerine yeni tedbirler düşünülür ve yeni hareket planlarında iletişimi sağlamak üzere İstanbul'da göze batan Yüzbaşı Nazmi, Anadolu'ya gönderilir. Yanında Teşkilattan Makbule Hanım'ın yanı sıra İdris bey de bulunmaktadır. Yüzbaşı Nazmi yola çıktığında kendisine ve dolayısıyla teşkilata yönelik tuzaktan habersizdir...

CAUTION
This is a very brutal and graphic documentary. I stronly suggest everyone to take a peek at the trailer first to see if their stomach is up to it : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eABS_fR1y4&feature=related
In anycase, don't take it if you can't stand the sight of bowels, intestines and eyes gouged out.
Intensely explicit, Tsurisaki Kiyotaka’s work is REALLY not for the squeamish. But while there is an voyeuristic element of shock and gore value, Orozco, el embalsamador is far from being a tasteless shockumentary. It is also strangely compelling.

PLOT SUMMARY :
Bogota, Colombia. Orozco is the oldest embalmer for the "Institute for Legal Medicine" where he has been working for more than 40 years. He survived the so called "La Violencia" - the age of internal disturbances in the 50's. He embalms five to ten bodies a day. He has embalmed over 50 000 bodies in his lifetime.

A teenage girl whose inaction caused her mother's death arranges a similarly gruesome fate for her stepmother and brother.

Whilst moving into her new apartment in the rue Picpus, Madame Dumont discovers a dead body in her wardrobe. Inspector Maigret is called in to investigate...

Made by Continental Films at the time of the Nazi Occupation, Picpus was the first of three films to feature popular actor Albert Préjean in the role of Inspector Maigret. (The other two were Cécile est morte (1944) and Les Caves du Majestic (1945)). Whilst the film manages to evoke the dark atmosphere of Georges Simenon’s famous Maigret novels – by some obvious leanings towards German expressionism and American film noir – it is handicapped by a complex plot, clumsy comedy and lacklustre direction.

Quote:
A very young William Friedkin produced and directed this documentary for television in 1962 when Paul Crump had been in prison for nine years, waiting on death row. Crump was convicted for the shooting death of a Chicago meat-packing plant's security guard during an armed robbery, which netted some $20,000. Chicago police quickly moved in, arrested Crump, and convicted him, primarily based on the testimony of one of those convicted for the crime. Crump claims he's innocent, was with a woman the day of the crime, and the woman later testifies in his defense, only to disappear later due to a public outcry and ridicule.

From Imdb:
Walter is a professional killer and has messed up a job. He has to leave the city and takes up an offer of crime boss Berger to protect Berger's house in a remote region of the Carpathian Mountains. At his side: old friend Mickey. By accident Berger's young wife Sybille is killed and Walter and Mickey hide her body because they fear Berger's vengeance. What seemed to be a nice holiday trip with little work for Walter and Mickey soon becomes a fight for survival for all parties involved. Written by Anonymous

Plot Outline :

With the help of the Malanese family (a.k.a. the Sicilian Clan), a convicted crook and murderer, Roger Sartet, escapes from a police van which is transporting him to prison. When he meets the head of the family, the aging gangster, Vittorio Manalese, Sartet suggests that they join forces and in an incredible robbery. The plan is to steal a collection of jewels whilst is being transported on an aeroplane between Paris and New York. Inspector Le Goff, who has sworn to bring Sartet to justice, learns of the planned robbery and attempts to prevent it. Meanwhile, the seeds of mistrust begin to appear between Startet and Vittorio…

From AMG:

After several years working along the margins of the underground film scene in New York, director Robert Downey broke through to wider recognition with the arthouse hit Putney Swope, a wildly irreverent satire of race and advertising in America. Putney Swope (Arnold Johnson) is the token African-American executive at an otherwise all-white advertising agency when the chairman of the board unexpectedly drops dead. Through a fluke in the chain of command, Swope becomes the new head of the firm, and decides its time to do things his way. He fires nearly all the staff (except for his one token white employee), renames the agency Truth and Soul, Inc., and announces they'll no longer accept accounts advertising tobacco, alcohol, or war toys. The ads they do produce -- for acne remedies and breakfast cereal, among other things -- are wildly successful, and the iconoclastic ad agency (which only accepts payment in cash) is targeted by government operatives as a threat to the national security. Antonio Fargas and Allen Garfield lead the supporting cast; Mel Brooks makes a cameo appearance. -- Mark Deming

review :

After Calderón and Proust, Comédie de l'innocence is another literary adaptation, this time from the little-known Italian surrealist Massimo Bontempelli. Updated from the last fin de siècle to this more recent time of uncertainty, Comédie de l'innocence's plot is small but perfectly formed. With Aristotelian rigour it moves from the opening conundrum (a child torn between two mothers), through the complication (the confrontation between the mothers and Ariane's brother Serge), to a satisfying conclusion. Ruiz, who takes a co-credit as scriptwriter with Françoise Dumas, keeps up the tension, however, with laconic and enigmatic dialogue. When Ariane visits the empty flat of Isabella, a nosy neighbour remarks: 'I really don't want to know.' Ariane replies: 'There is nothing to know.'

How much we would like to have the film!, 1 March 2007
Author: Dr Jacques COULARDEAU from Olliergues, France
*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This concerns the only public artifact connected to the film, the book entitled "The film Murder in the Cathedral" The film itself, by T.S. Eliot and Hoellering is not available. A copy exists in the archives of the British Film Institute but it does not seem easy to get to it. What a shame for a cult play like « Murder in the Cathedral » ! The book presents the complete scenario with of course the text and all the directions necessary to imagine what is happening on the screen. Plus a great number of illustrations taken from the film, which gives us a sample of the atmosphere on the screen. And that makes this book really beautiful, like an art book of kinds. But we are altogether reduced to analyzing the script and comparing it with the play itself. A short introduction (in the film of course) is added to explain the audience the political situation at the moment when Thomas Becket comes back to Canterbury after a seven years' exile.

Imdb User comment:
Warm and friendly
20 January 2007 | by kaplanekrem (Turkey)

Not technically, but emotionally that is the best film I have ever seen. I did watched it maybe more than 10 times and every time I see it on TV I cannot take myself watching it again and again. It is full of joy and kindness, it tells the life of great people, those who love each other with purity, those who share everything and those who care for each other. The music of the movie- which is cheerful when played fast and sorrowful when played gently- is perfect.. Just as perfect as those people in good old times and as the life they represent. The act is so natural that you either find yourself shed tears or laughing as loudly as you can. Every little detail is so fascinating. I do not know what more to say about this film, but it is certainly worth watching again, again and again.