Life Is Beautiful (1985)
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Two men and a woman happen to meet in a bar. We learn from their conversations both the intriguing and banal details of their lives. But is anyone really telling the truth? From the meat market, to the president's drinking habit or the soviet cloning project, this allegory opposes different aspects of contemporary Russian society
Rahul is a singer, who loses his career due to his drinking habits. He meets Arohi in a bar in Goa, where she works to earn a living. Impressed by her singing, he promises to take her to Mumbai and make her a star, where they fall in love with each other. Will they stay together accepting their success, or will their egos break them apart?
In the 1950s, Ludvik Jahn was expelled from the Communist Party and the University by his fellow students, because of a politically incorrect note he sent to his girlfriend. Fifteen years later, he tries to get his revenge by seducing Helena, the wife of one of his accusers.
Erasmus compiled a few thousand Adagia, each exemplifies the classical truths that are our timeless and everyday wisdom. Life is Beautiful shows us just how wondrous life really is, by reflecting, quietly manipulating and exposing every day moments and scenes in 30 short stories.
In a small town still occupied by the Germans as World War II's tide is turning toward the Allies, apprentice train-watcher Milos is oblivious to the war. Instead, he is obsessed with having his first sexual experience. Despite the favors of train conductor Masa, Milos has no luck. His quest leads him to a female Resistance fighter who, in passing, recruits him to the cause. As Milos finally finds love, danger draws closer.
After a young woman suffers a brutal rape in a bar one night, a prosecutor assists in bringing the perpetrators to justice, including the ones who encouraged and cheered on the attack.
In Jan NÄmecâs surreal fable, a picnic is rudely transformed into a lesson in political hierarchy when a handful of mysterious authority figures show up. This allegory about oppression and conformity was banned in its home country but became an international success after it premiered at the New York Film Festival.
An electro-technician falls in love with a bar singer, but her job environment, full of alcohol, despair and tired truck drivers, causes nothing but troubles for him.
When his only friend dies, a man born with dwarfism moves to rural New Jersey to live a life of solitude, only to meet a chatty hot dog vendor and a woman dealing with her own personal loss.
A group of young high society friends, aged between 18 and 25, are gathered at a friend's bar that they regularly frequent for the night. But when they finish of their last beer and prepare to head home they find themselves held captive at gunpoint by five strangers. With their mouths, hands and feet tied, they are tortured, raped and murdered until the next morning. The gang who have captured them have no clear reason, they just want to punish these young people for everything left incomplete in their lives.
This sprawling, surrealist musical serves as an allegory for the pitfalls of capitalism, as it follows the adventures of a young coffee salesman in Europe. Many actors play multiple roles, giving the film a stagy tone.
A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.
Among the travelers of varied backgrounds that meet and interact on one night at Union Depot, a metropolitan train station, are Chick and his friend Scrap Iron, both newly released from prison after serving time for vagrancy. Hungry and desperate for a break, Chick fortuitously comes across across a valise abandoned by a drunken traveler. In it he finds a shaving kit and a suit of clothes with a bankroll, which help transform the affable tramp into a dashing gent. After buying himself a meal, Chick seeks some female companionship among the many hustlers who walk the station. He propositions Ruth Collins, a stranded, out-of-work showgirl and takes her to the station's hotel.
This is the story of Mr. Brochu, whose friends like to call "the Boss". He runs his gas station the best he can and tries to stay happy no matter what happens. This movie relates all the small tragedies surrounding the gaz bar, such as hold-ups, competition from the big companies invading the neighbourhood, and the fact that is sons don't seem to be interested in the gas station.
A simple story of an ex-convict who comes home after 10 years, only to find two squatters in the form of a woman and her autistic daughter. Though Lazar initially plans to kick out Jasna and Jovana, he changes his mind after seeing the squalid conditions of the shelter they are to move into. It is an allegory of the Balkan wars. When first released in Serbia, it caused some public outrage because of the sharp criticism of Serbia's role in the war.
In the formally ravishing Every-Night Dreams, set in the dockside neighborhoods of Tokyo, a single mother works tirelessly as a Ginza bar hostess to ensure a better life for her young sonâuntil her long-lost husband returns.
The inhabitants of an institution in a remote country rebel against their keepers. Their acts of rebellion are by turns humorous, boring and alarming. An allegory on the problematic nature of fully liberating the human spirit, as both commendable and disturbing elements of our nature come forward. The film shows how justifiable revolt may be empowering, but may also turn to chaos and depravity. The allegory is developed in part by the fact that the film is cast entirely with dwarfs
Bekir is in love with Ugur, who loves Zagor, who loves to commit crimes.
A politically neutral man is arrested and tortured in prerevolutionary Lisbon, and forced to make, and act on, a political commitment. â¦
A dense film that cuts up footage of a primary plot of two young Yugoslavian girls, one a politico and the other a sexpot, and an affair with a visiting Russian skater. Mixing metaphors of Russia's relationship with Yugoslavia, intercut with footage and interviews with Wilhelm Reich and Al Goldstein of Screw magazine. The film applies Reich's theories of Orgone energy and analogies of Stalinism as a form of Freudian sexual repression. Also known as W.R. The Mysteries of the Organism in English subtitled version. Was banned in Yugoslavia shortly after it was made.
A tough cop meets his match when he has to guard a gangster's moll on a tense train ride.
Harry and Inez are a dance team at the Wonder Bar. Inez loves Harry, but he is in love with Liane, the wife of a wealthy business man. Al Wonder and the conductor/singer Tommy are in love with Inez. When Inez finds out that Harry wants to leave Paris and is going to the USA with Liane, she kills him.
Salma Zidane, a widow, lives simply from her grove of lemon trees in the West Bank's occupied territory. The Israeli defense minister and his wife move next door; the Secret Service orders the trees removed for security. The stoic Salma seeks assistance from the Palestinian Authority (useless), Israeli army (dismissive), and a young attorney, Ziad Daud, who takes the case; this older client attracts him. While the courts deliberate, the Israelis fence her trees and prohibit her from entering the grove. As the trees wither, the defense minister's wife and, separately, an Israeli journalist, look on Salma with sympathy. In this allegory, does David stand a chance against Goliath?
Jed, an airline pilot, (Widmark) is resting in a hotel when he notices Nell (Monroe), a young woman babysitting for a wealthy couple. As Jed gets to know Nell better he realises that the woman is not as stable as perhaps she should be. A unique thriller featuring a rare dramatic performance from Monroe, illustrating a broader range than most people might expect..
A killer holds the customers at a bar hostage.
This is a story of a great love facing the greatest drama of the history of Russia. Admiral Kolchak is a true war hero and beloved husband and father. One day he meets Anna, the love of his life and the wife of his best friend. The revolution in his heart faces the revolution in his own country His destiny is to become the Supreme Rules of Russia.
A tribe of primitive "mudpeople" encounter a croquet ball, rolling through their forest. Following it, they find themselves on a vast, deserted Long Island estate. Entering, they begin to become civilized and assume the stereotypical roles and dress of people at a weekend party. There follows an allegory of upper-class behavior. At last, they begin to devolve toward their original status, and after a battle at croquet, they disappear into the woods.
Melé is a bar singer, her husband Chaka is out of work and the couple is on the verge of breaking up... In the courtyard of the house they share with other families, a trial court has been set up. African civil society spokesmen have taken proceedings against the World Bank and the IMF whom they blame for Africa's woes... Amidst the pleas and the testimonies, life goes on in the courtyard. Chaka does not seem to be concerned by this novel Africa's desire to fight for its rights.
Harrison Lloyd is a Pulitzer-winning photojournalist. His wife and family are making it hard for him to keep his mind on his work when he's in a war zone, and he wants to change jobs to something less stressful. But he's got one last assignment, in war-torn Yugoslavia, in 1991, at the height of the fighting. Word comes back that he apparently died in a building collapse, but his wife Sarah (also a journalist for Newsweek) refuses to believe that he's dead and goes looking for him. She's helped immensely by the photo-journalists Eric Kyle and Marc Stevenson that she runs into over there; together, they're determined to make it through the chaotic landscape to Vukovar, which is not only the nexus of the war but where she believes Harrison is located. Meanwhile, Harrison's son Cesar is looking after his father's prized greenhouse, keeping hope, and flowers, alive.
A businessman finds himself trapped at a hotel and threatened by women en masse.
Brian Cox stars as Jacques, the curmudgeonly owner of a gritty New York dive bar that serves as home to a motley assortment of professional drinkers. Jacques is determinedly drinking and smoking himself to death when he meets Lucas (Dano), a homeless young man who has already given up on life. Determined to keep his legacy alive, Jacques deems Lucas is a fitting heir and takes him under his wing, schooling him in the male-centric laws of his alcoholic clubhouse: no new customers, no fraternizing with customers and, absolutely no women. Lucas is a quick study, but their friendship is put to the test when the distraught and beautiful April (Isild Le Besco) shows up at the bar seeking shelter, and Lucas insists they help her out.
The wife of a barbaric crime boss engages in a secretive romance with a gentle bookseller between meals at her husband's restaurant. Food, colour coding, sex, murder, torture and cannibalism are the exotic fare in this beautifully filmed but brutally uncompromising modern fable which has been interpreted as an allegory for Thatcherism.
The exploits of three young Roman criminals are chronicled in this socially conscious drama. The young men commit petty crimes all day begin with arms theft, and culminating with a night with three streetwalkers. After their pleasure, the boys try to cheat the hookers, but they ladies are smarter than that and have stolen their cash ahead of time. The punks then return to the city for more crimes. Exploits include the harassment of three homosexuals, and attempts to seduce some women.
Kinawi, a physically challenged peddler who makes his living selling newspapers in the central Cairo train station, is obsessed by Hannouma, an attractive young woman who sells drinks. While she treats Kinawi in a sympathetic way and jokes with him about a possible relationship, She is actually in love with Abu Sri', a strong and respected porter at the station who is struggling to unionize his fellow workers to combat their boss' exploitative and abusive treatment.
Filmmaker Shirley Clarke ("The Connection") directs this powerful, stark semi-documentary look at the horrors of Harlem ghetto slum life filled with drugs, violence, human misery, and a sense of despair due to the racial prejudices of American society. There is no patronizing of the black race in this cinematic cry for justice. A fifteen-year-old boy called Duke is ambitious to buy a "piece" (a gun) from an adult racketeer named Priest, to become president of the gang to which he belongs, and to return them to active "bopping" (gang fighting) which has declined in Harlem. It is a clearly patent allegory of an attempt by Duke to attain manhood and identity in the only way accessible to him - the antisocial one.
Kosmet in the fall of 1944. The Partisans have successfully liberated the town of Prizren from occupying Germans,and Ramiz Leshi, a brave and cunning KNOJ captain, has to liquidate the remainder of the local Quislings, called Balists. They are led by a ruthless, German-trained soldier Kosta and by Ahmet, the brother of the famous Captain. As Ramiz is trying to get Ahmet out of the gang and hunt down the rest of the Balists, 2 new girls arrive in town. One of them is Lola, a bar singer with a questionable agenda, and the other is Vida, a withdrawn music teacher from Belgrade.
A story set in the former Yugoslavia and centered on a guy who returns to Herzegovina from Germany with plenty of cash and hopes for a good new life.
Every day, Cop 223 (Takeshi Kaneshiro) buys a can of pineapple with an expiration date of May 1, symbolizing the day he'll get over his lost love. He's also got his eye on a mysterious woman in a blond wig (Brigitte Lin), oblivious of the fact she's a drug dealer. Cop 663 (Tony Leung Chiu Wai) is distraught with heartbreak over a breakup. But when his ex drops a spare set of his keys at a local cafe, a waitress (Faye Wong) lets herself into his apartment and spruces up his life.
The O'Leary brothers -- honest Jack and roguish Dion -- become powerful figures, and eventually rivals, in Chicago on the eve of its Great Fire.
In this luminous tale set in the former Yugoslavia, Perhan, an engaging young Romany with telekinetic powers, is seduced by the quick-cash world of petty crime that threatens to destroy him and those he loves.
Three American brothers who have not spoken to each other in a year set off on a train voyage across India with a plan to find themselves and bond with each other -- to become brothers again like they used to be. Their "spiritual quest", however, veers rapidly off-course (due to events involving over-the-counter pain killers, Indian cough syrup, and pepper spray).
A lawyer, wanting to give meaning to his life, transforms an amusement park into an out-of-season health spa.
An allegory set in an archetypal Czech village, it tells of what happens when a sequence of mysterious events take place, including the disappearance of the stationmaster. While everything has a rational explanation, collective paranoia takes hold and everyoneâs worst instincts are released. Interrogations, the abolition of rights and the search for scapegoats ultimately lead to murder
In order to use the publicity to get re-elected, a judge sentences a notorious gangster to fight in the war.
A man struggles after his release from ten years as a political prisoner.
In this melodramatic tale, the well-made plans of a career-obsessed woman are derailed when she sets her sights on a young man who is plainly not very interested in her. In the story, Katherina is an ambitious reporter for German television, and her Yugoslavian family background makes her a natural to cover stories in that country. While preparing a story on children with dual nationalities, she encounters Peter, a German lad who is researching his father's war record to see if he was guilty or innocent of war crimes. She brings Peter to see her family, and later her wooing efforts finally seem to bring her some promise of a relationship.
A drama based on the true story of a college professor's bond with the abandoned dog he takes into his home.
Ajita Wilson plays an African diplomat who comes to Milan to head a trade delegation. At the delegation she feels haunted by her past in which she appeared in a pornographic magazine. In a series of psychedelic scenes, we learn the sordid secrets of her racy past.
In January 1943 the German army, afraid of an Allied invasion of the Balkans, launched a great offensive against Yugoslav Partisans in Western Bosnia. The only way out for the Partisan forces and thousands of refugees was the bridge on the river Neretva.
In a poor neighborhood in Recife, the lives of exotic and bizarre characters entwine in a bar and in a very low-budget hotel. The queer Dunga works in the hotel and has a crush on the butcher Wellington that is married with the religious Kika and has an affair with his mistress Dayse. The sick necrophiliac Isaac owns a yellow Mercedes Benz and wants to have sex with LÃgia that owns of Bar Avenida.
The story is an allegory of Adam and Eve, in a modern (made in the '60s) Health Retreat. The action involves our hero wandering the grounds where she becomes obsessed with a mysterious man in red, who may or may not be a killer.
Dr. Jekyll faces horrible consequences when he lets his dark side run wild with a potion that changes him into the animalistic Mr. Hyde.
In America it frequently shows under the title Hey Babu Riba. In 1985, four middle-aged Yugoslav emigres return to Belgrade for the funeral of Mariana, their beautiful compatriot. They called her Esther, for Esther Williams, she was the coxswain for their four-man rowing team, and they each loved her. They'd last seen her in 1953, when they rowed her across the Adriatic, pregnant, to join her exiled father in Italy. In flashbacks we learn the story of their youthful baptism into sex, smoking, rock and roll (Hey Ba-ba-re-bop), Hollywood and Swedish films, blue jeans on the black market, and their rivalry with Ristic, the Communist Party youth leader for whom they had instant antipathy.
International Security Affairs agent Jon is on a dangerous mission to escort a criminal scientist to another country. En route, a member of his team turns out to be a traitor and shoots Jon in the head while kidnapping the scientist. When Jon wakes up in the hospital, a doctor tells him that within weeks, the bullet in his brain will cause complete paralysis. Jon returns to Beijing to see his mother, who confesses that Jon has a brother in Malaysia who was raised by his father, a gambler. Jon takes a flight to Malaysia to find his brother, Yeung. On the plane he forms a bond with Dr. Kan, who promises to look into possible treatments for his condition. However, when they arrive, Yeung tries to kidnap the doctor and when Jon intervenes, he's also taken hostage. The two soon realize they're brothers, and decide to work together in order to keep the criminals behind the kidnappings from reinfecting the world of a disease long thought cured.
John and Mary meet in a singles bar, sleep together, and spend the next day getting to know each other.
Hitting an off-the-charts level of subversive allegory, Zulawskiâs second feature is a blood-splattered rampage through a war-charred 1790s Poland that turns the historical epic inside out, and dances on its carcass. Immediately banned in the directorâs Communist Poland for over a decade and a half, The Devil writhes with nonstop demonic energy as it follows an nobleman who, after escaping from prison, swandives into insanity and mass murder. Returning home to his once-rich family â one now reduced to savages â and manipulated by a black-cloaked Satanic stranger at the center of a web of political treachery, the nobleman eventually enacts a Hamlet-like pyrrhic revenge on just about everyone in sight. But The Devilâs most spectacularly intense violence is all emotional, with near-constant outbursts of grief, and desperation of a seizure-like intensity that is downright mesmerizing. â The Cinefamily
Traces of a Black Haired Girl (Serbo-Croatian: Tragovi crne devojke) is a 1972 Yugoslav film directed by Zdravko RandiÄ. It was entered into the 22nd Berlin International Film Festival.
A Russian emigrant sings in a Shanghai nightclub under the assumed name of Kay Murphy. All she dreams of is a peaceful life with her daughter Vera. But this is only a pipe dream as she has been forced by her former lover Ivan to work for a secret criminal organization, "The Black Dragon". Vera, who studies in a Hong Kong boarding-school, knows nothing about her mother's past. When Ivan, who is also Vera's father, resurfaces and blackmails Kay, the young woman is determined to fight back...
Also known as Moritorium and Georgia's Friends, Four Friends follows the titular quartet from high school to young adulthood. The film is set during the tumultuous 1960s, an era when everyone's values were turned inside out, shaken around, and reassembled. The central character is first-generation American Craig Wasson, who confounds his Yugoslavian father (Miklos Simon) by pursuing his own let-it-all-hang-out lifestyle. Wasson's best friends are athlete Jim Metzler and chubby Michael Huddleston; all pursue the affections of bewitching Jodi Thelan. Though they are obviously deeply in love with one another, Wasson and Thelan continue to foolishly avoid a long-term commitment as the sixties unfold around them. Four Friends calls for a fresher approach than the one offered by director Arthur Penn, whose handling of the material is much too pat and old-fashioned.
A young and cynical female journalist learns love may transcend trials and time as she discovers a story that will change her life forever. When war separates lovers on their wedding anniversary Feb. 14, 1944 at LA Union Train Station, Navy pilot Neil Thomas makes a promise he isn't sure he can keep - to return to the train station safe by their next anniversary. For sixty years Caroline Thomas keeps her promise by waiting at the train station until her missing in action husband can finally keep his with the "lost valentine." The message and meaning shows romance and love can be real; worth fighting, and maybe even dying for.
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