Category: Foreign Cinema

The Fabulous Baron Munchausen [aka Baron Prášil ] (1961)

September 21, 2017

The Fabulous Baron Munchausen [aka Baron Prášil ] (1961) Czechoslovakian animator Karel Zeman combines live action with puppets and animation to create a highly stylized picture about the outrageous lies of Baron Munchausen. Influenced by the engravings of Gustave Doré, in the tradition of Ray Harryhausen, Zeman’s fantasy world revels in a childlike delight and … More The Fabulous Baron Munchausen [aka Baron Prášil ] (1961)

L’Immortelle (1963)

September 15, 2017

L’Immortelle (1963) Alain Robbe-Grillet wrote and directed this black and white cubist narrative about an unidentified traveler from France who meets and then searches for a woman who disappears in Istanbul. Lovely travelogue sequences glide by to Turkish music, as, from the rubble of exotic romance, variations on narrative tropes assemble and reassemble themselves. Istanbul … More L’Immortelle (1963)

Cronos (1993)

July 9, 2017

Cronos (1993) Guillermo del Toro’s first gothic masterpiece studies the relationship between a grandfather and his granddaughter through a surreal allegory about immortality and the limits of life on earth. Federico Luppi gives a stunning performance as the elderly antiques dealer who discovers a treasure that rejuvenates his blood and turns him younger. But there … More Cronos (1993)

King of Hearts (1966)

June 19, 2017

  King of Hearts (1966) Alan Bates stars as a Scottish WWI ornithalography specialist mistaken for a munitions expert who is sent into a small provincial French village of Marville to disarm a booby trap rigged by retreating Germans. only to accidentally release inmates from the local mental asylum who assume identities of the absent … More King of Hearts (1966)

Kagemusha (1980)

June 8, 2017

  Kagemusha (1980) A common thief, discovered to bear a striking resemblance to his feudal lord, is employed as a decoy to keep civil war from breaking out. Akira Kurosawa drew from the Sengoku period, based upon a history of Takeda Shingen, known for his military skills. Mortally wounded by a sniper, the lord requests … More Kagemusha (1980)

La Promesse (1996)

May 17, 2017

La Promesse (1996) Belgian brothers Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne draw from their documentary experience to fashion this savage critique of trafficking and exploitation of illegals in Liege, Belgium. The father [Olivier Gourmet] involves his son Igor [Jéréme Renier] to cover up the accidental death of a worker who falls from a scaffold. Igor makes the … More La Promesse (1996)

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988)

March 26, 2017

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988) Carmen Maura gives a defining performance in Pedro Almodóvar’s Spanish screwball comedy. Inspired by Jean Cocteau’s La Voix Humaine, the film reveals a ‘new woman’ of the Post-Franco generation, someone who, like Pepa, caught in a whirlwind of passionate breakup, takes control of her life, and, … More Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988)

La Noire de… [Black Girl] (1966)

February 25, 2017

  La Noire de… [Black Girl] (1966) Ousamane Sembène directs the elegant dressmaker Mbissine Thérèse Diop in what has come to be recognized as the first ”  Sub-Saharan African film by an African filmmaker to receive international attention.” Winner of the Prix Jean Vigo for best feature film, Sembène dramatizes the conflict between French colonialism … More La Noire de… [Black Girl] (1966)