Minbo: the Gentle Art of Japanese Extortion (1992)
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The Grand Budapest Hotel tells of a legendary concierge at a famous European hotel between the wars and his friendship with a young employee who becomes his trusted protégé. The story involves the theft and recovery of a priceless Renaissance painting, the battle for an enormous family fortune and the slow and then sudden upheavals that transformed Europe during the first half of the 20th century.
The mostly true story of the legendary "worst director of all time", who, with the help of his strange friends, filmed countless B-movies without ever becoming famous or successful.
Jessie is an aging career criminal who has been in more jails, fights, schemes, and lineups than just about anyone else. His son Vito, while currently on the straight and narrow, has had a fairly shady past and is indeed no stranger to illegal activity. They both have great hope for Adam, Vito's son and Jessie's grandson, who is bright, good-looking, and without a criminal past.
Young Jackie was intrigued by Kung-Fu since an early age, but his father strictly forbade its practice. One day, he meets an old beggar who offers to teach Jackie how to fight. Jackie grows up to be quite good though he keeps his knowledge a secret until he is forced to fight by an extortion ring that's putting the squeeze on his uncle's restaurant.
Dubai-based criminal don Uday takes it upon himself to try and get his sister Sanjana married - in vain, as no one wants to be associated with a crime family. Uday's associate Sagar Pandey finds a young man, Rajiv, who lives with his maternal uncle and aunt - Dr. and Mrs. Ghunghroo. Through extortion he compels Ghunghroo to accept this matrimonial alliance. But Rajiv has already fallen in love with young woman in South Africa. When the time comes to get Rajiv formally engaged to this woman, he finds out that Sanjana and she are the very same. With no escape from this predicament, the wedding is planned, with hilarious consequences.
Police in Boston search for a mad bomber trying to extort money from the city.
Mona and Donâs seemingly perfect suburban bliss is disrupted by a sexy extortionist and Mona will stop at nothing, including killing the competition, to keep her little slice of heaven.
Three bad girls (a down-and-out stripper, a drug-running killer and a corporate powerbroker) arrive at a remote desert hideaway to extort and steal $200 Million in diamonds from a ruthless underworld kingpin.
Balabhaskaran (Jayaram) suffers from sleepwalking. He walks long distances in the night and many mishaps happen during this. He is cheated by his friend Johnie (Madhupal) who wants to extort some money from Balabaskar by blackmailing him. Balabasker's father marries him off to Chandrika in the hope that this will help him to get over his sleepwalking.
British retirees travel to India to take up residence in what they believe is a newly restored hotel. Less luxurious than its advertisements, the Marigold Hotel nevertheless slowly begins to charm in unexpected ways.
As the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel has only a single remaining vacancy - posing a rooming predicament for two fresh arrivals - Sonny pursues his expansionist dream of opening a second hotel.
A senatorial candidate falls for a hotel maid, thinking she is a socialite when he sees her trying on a wealthy woman's dress.
The film talks about a family that weathers all sorts of disasters and keeps going in spite of it all. It is noted for its wonderful assortment of oddball characters.
Film version of the Neil Simon play has three separate acts set in the same hotel suite in New York's Plaza Hotel with Walter Matthau in a triple role. In the first, Karen Nash tries to get her inattentive husband Sam's attention to spruce up their failing marriage. In the second, brash film producer Jesse Kiplinger tries to get his former one-time flame Muriel to see him for what he stands for. In the third, Roy Hubley and his wife Norma try and try to get their uncertain-of-herself daughter out of the bathroom before her approaching wedding.
Self-described misanthrope Elle Reid has her protective bubble burst when her 18-year-old granddaughter, Sage, shows up needing help. The two of them go on a day-long journey that causes Elle to come to terms with her past and Sage to confront her future.
Soon after his insufferably arrogant father (Alan Rickman) wins the Nobel Prize for chemistry, Barkley Michaelson (Bryan Greenberg) is kidnapped by Thaddeus James (Shawn Hatosy), a young genius who claims to be Barkley's illegitimate half-brother. Motivated not so much by money as revenge, Thaddeus tries to convince Barkley to help him carry out a multimillion-dollar extortion plot against their patriarch.
Misadventures of four groups of guests at the Beverly Hills Hotel.
Set in a five star Tokyo hotel on New Year's Eve, the film follows the misadventures of various hotel staff and guests in the run-up to midnight. The plot involves numerous characters, the different problems or situations they face in the run-up to midnight, and the ways that these different storylines interact and are resolved. The film is reminiscent of the Hollywood screwball comedies of 1930s and 1940s, and explicitly references the 1932 film Grand Hotel, whose plot also followed the interlinked lives of various characters in a fictional hotel over a short period.
After serving 10 years in prison due to a drug-induced assassination of a rival gang boss Tachibana (Ryo Ishibashi) enters a world that's nothing like it was when he went in. Once a respected and feared Yakuza mastermind, he now must try and adapt within the confines of the new generations vision of honor. As he still garners a somewhat decent amount of respect he just tries to get by. Hooking up with a prostitute he's been in passing by with he begins to feel some sense of comfort. Upon stumbling across her being beaten down by her pimp, Tachibana can't just sit by and do nothing. So he commences in putting down an old school Yakuza ass whipping, thus beginning a showdown with the "now" boss, Sato.
A man returns to the hotel he grew up in and recounts the quirky goings on of his youth.
In Japan, gonzo filmmakers hatch a three-pronged plan to save an actress's career, end a yakuza war and make a hit movie.
This erotically charged drama from Japanese director Ryuichi Hiroki (Vibrator) traces the intersecting stories of a group of employees and visitors at a notorious "love hotel" in Tokyo's red-light district.
As sadomasochistic yakuza enforcer Kakihara searches for his missing boss he comes across Ichi, a repressed and psychotic killer who may be able to inflict levels of pain that Kakihara has only dreamed of.
A comedy-drama about best friends - one a straight woman, Abbie, the other a gay man, Robert - who decide to have a child together. Five years later, Abbie falls in love with a straight man and wants to move away with her and Robert's little boy Sam, and a nasty custody battle ensues.
Ricky is a defiant young city kid who finds himself on the run with his cantankerous foster uncle in the wild New Zealand bush. A national manhunt ensues, and the two are forced to put aside their differences and work together to survive.
A former world-famous conductor of the Bolshoï orchestra, known as "The Maëstro", Andreï Filipov had seen his career publicly broken by Leonid Brezhnev for hiring Jewish musicians and now works cleaning the concert hall where he once directed. One day, he intercepts an official invitation from the prestigious Théâtre du Châtelet. Through a series of mad antics, he reunites his old orchestra, now composed of old alcoholic musicians, and flies to perform in Paris and complete the Tchaikovsky concerto interrupted 30 years earlier. For the concerto, he engages a young violin soloist with whom he has an unexpected connection.
Kelly, Dan and Louis are students at a prestigious business school, destined to become tomorrow's elite. The industrious trio are determined to start putting their education into practise from the off in an attempt to make as much money as they can from their fellow students. Working on the theory that relationships between the sexes can be regulated by market principles, they begin to inflate the popularity of certain individuals artificially, by hiring beautiful and sexy off-campus women as their dates for exclusive and riotous college parties. However their perfect business model soon spirals out of control as their moneymaking scheme takes off in a big way across campus.
Four black students attend an Ivy League college where a riot breaks out over an âAfrican Americanâ themed party thrown by white students. With tongue planted firmly in cheek, the film explores racial identity in 'post-racial' America while weaving a story about forging one's unique path in the world.
In the tradition of âFerris Buellerâs Day Offâ comes this refreshing comedy about a rebellious prankster with a crafty mind and a heart of gold. Rascal. Joker. Dreamer. Genius... You've never met a college student quite like "Rancho." From the moment he arrives at India's most prestigious university, Rancho's outlandish schemes turn the campus upside downâalong with the lives of his two newfound best friends. Together, they make life miserable for "Virus," the schoolâs uptight and heartless dean. But when Rancho catches the eye of the dean's sexy daughter, Virus sets his sights on flunking out the "3 idiots" once and for all.
Eccentric 70-year-old widow purchases the Windmill Theatre in London as a post-widowhood hobby. After starting an innovative continuous variety review, which is copied by other theaters, they begin to lose money. Mrs Henderson suggests they add female nudity similar to the Moulin Rouge in Paris
Single drama telling the story of Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise's formative years, from child stars to national treasures. 'Big head, short legs' is Eric Bartholomew's first impression of Ernie Wiseman, but their friendship endures and, encouraged by his well-meaning but determined mother Sadie, Eric became the funny man to Ernie's 'feed'. After a successful stint in children's variety, they work their way up the ladder of live performance, but after a disastrous television debut in the series Running Wild, Morecambe and Wise learn to trust their own instincts and just make people laugh.
Shortbus revolves around a sexually diverse ensemble of emotionally challenged characters trying desperately to connect in New York City. The characters converge in a weekly Brooklyn artistic/sexual salon loosely inspired by various underground NYC gatherings that took place in the early 2000's. The film includes a variety of explicit scenes containing non-simulated sexual intercourse with visible penetration and male ejaculation.
Acrobat Eddie Marsh is in the army now. His first act is to become friendly with Kathryn Jones, the colonel's pretty daughter. Their romance hits a few snags, including disapproval from her father. Eddie's also plagued by fear of having an accident during his family's trapeze act in the army variety show, which also features a gallery of MGM stars.
With this debut film, nominated for a prestigious Independent Spirit Award as Best First Feature, writer-director Kyle Patrick Alvarez has fashioned a brilliantly nuanced and superbly written comedy-drama that explores in affecting, often humorous and deep emotional honesty the multilayered complexities of sex, love and relationships. Starring acclaimed newcomer Brian Geraghty (The Hurt Locker, We Are Marshall) in a breakout, star-making performance, Easier with Practice tells the touching and provocative story of Davy, a 28-year-old writer on a road trip to promote his unpublished collection of short stories. A random phone call in Davy's motel room from a mysterious, sexy woman named Nicole leads to a series of phone sex sessions that surprisingly over time become emotionally and sexually satisfying for the shy writer. Later, when he meets a former girlfriend, he must try to choose between them - but only if he can arrange a meeting with his reclusive phone mate.
Over the course of three days Ross, a college dropout addicted to crystal-meth, encounters a variety of oddball folks - including a stripper named Nikki and her boyfriend, the local meth producer, The Cook - but all he really wants to do is hook up with his old girlfriend, Amy.
A documentary that follows six young dancers from around the world as they prepare for the Youth America Grand Prix, one of the most prestigious ballet competitions in the world.
The story, based on true events occurred in Colombia en May 2003, tells the dreams and adventures of Porras, Venegas, Lloreda and Perlaza, four of the 147 soldiers that were in a company of the anti-guerrilla "Destroyer" battalion. It begun when these soldiers found in the middle of the jungle, during a rescue mission, 46 million dollars inside a FARC "guaca". Instead of give it to the Government, they take it all for themselves instead. They desperate when realize that they're completely isolated because the bridge, the only way to return to civilization, has been blown up. Everything's ironic, almost surreal: These soldiers don't have food, water, or toilet paper, but they sleep on their dollar-ful bags. This discovery will change their lives forever, and will allow them to have everything they've dreamt about: some authority, power and respect, others help their families and have a no-longer poor life. Their big challenge: return to civilization and make their dreams come true.
Four Lions tells the story of a group of British jihadists who push their abstract dreams of glory to the breaking point. As the wheels fly off, and their competing ideologies clash, what emerges is an emotionally engaging (and entirely plausible) farce. In a storm of razor-sharp verbal jousting and large-scale set pieces, Four Lions is a comic tour de force; it shows that-while terrorism is about ideology-it can also be about idiots.
Paulino and Carmela are husband and wife, troubadours touring the countryside during the Spanish Civil War. They are Republicans, and with their mute assistant, Gustavete, they journey into rebel territory by mistake. They are arrested, fear a firing squad, and receive a reprieve from an Italian Fascist commander who loves the theatre. He arranges a performance for his troops, bargaining with Paulino to stage a burlesque of the republic in exchange for the actors' freedom. Will the fiery and patriotic Carmela consent?
Two teenage girls, both named Marie, decide that since the world is spoiled they will be spoiled as well; accordingly they embark on a series of destructive pranks in which they consume and destroy the world about them. This freewheeling, madcap feminist farce was immediately banned by the government.
A group of men hire some prostitutes and go to a villa in the countryside. There, they engage in group sex and resolve to eat themselves to death.
This French farce chronicles one special day in the lives of a married pair of Parisian architects, Fabienne and Bruno, as they anxiously await the results of an important architectual contest they have entered. Unable to handle the stress of waiting, both turn to sexual liason's to ease their tension. Bruno ends up enacting a dark sexual fantasy with a stranger while Fabienne eventually succumbs to the advances of Bruno's friend Simon, a fortyish Lebanese businessman and part-time drug dealer. The comedy takes on overtones of psycho-drama when the contest winner announced and the couple discovers the truth of each other's actions. A cache of drugs, discovered in an apartment only adds to their troubles.
Isabelle Adjani and Gerard Depardieu star in director Jean-Paul Rappenau's amusing farce set on the eve of World War II, which follows the intersecting lives of four Parisians as they cope with the impending invasion of their city by German forces. As the French government braces for impact, the lives of a young writer, a vain movie star, a French politician and a young scientist are examined as they attempt to deal with war and evade German spies.
Welcome to Sunrise Village, a little piece of trailer park heaven where retired war vets Sam (Burt Reynolds), Carl and Eddie are enjoying their golden Years while vying for the affection of their sexy neighbor (Raquel Welch). When they stumble upon a stash of mob money, they find themselves on the run from the Mafia and the Feds in this hilarious farce about the myth that age brings wisdom.
Jean-Marc is a man without qualities living in times that are out of joint. His wife and children ignore him; he's a mid-level government functionary in Montreal doing his job without care. He has an active imagination of sexual conquest, but his only real feelings come when he visits his aged mother, whose health is failing. When his wife leaves abruptly to work in Toronto, Jean-Marc sets out to reorder things with his daughters, his social life, and at work. In a world that at best is a farce, does he stand a chance?
In this Shakespearean farce, Hero and her groom-to-be, Claudio, team up with Claudio's commanding officer, Don Pedro, the week before their wedding to hatch a matchmaking scheme. Their targets are sharp-witted duo Benedick and Beatrice -- a tough task indeed, considering their corresponding distaste for love and each other. Meanwhile, meddling Don John plots to ruin the wedding.
A charismatic lieutenant newly assigned to a remote fort is captured by a group of mountain bandits, thus setting in motion a madcap farce that is Lubitsch at his most unrestrained. A wonderfully anarchic and playfully subversive satire of military life from one of the great comedy filmmakers.
Leung plays Jennifer, the spoiled-rotten daughter of a millionaire. When Jennifer's father realizes that she's spending way too much money, he hires Kit (Lau) to pretend to be a Filipino chauffeur and chaperone her. Then, Jennifer's father decides that he's going to teach her the value of money and hard-work, so he pretends to be ill, leaving all the money to Pamela, his business partner. Pamela kicks Jennifer out into the street to live with Kit/Mario. The two learn to live together and work hard to get back on top.
Alesha Popovich has to catch Tugarin Zmey and bring back the stolen money with the help of a talking Horse (which talks all the time and has an opinion on everything), a wise granny, a donkey and a beauty Lyubava.
Newly single, 35, and uninspired by his job, Jesse Fisher worries that his best days are behind him. But no matter how much he buries his head in a book, life keeps pulling Jesse back. When his favorite college professor invites him to campus to speak at his retirement dinner, Jesse jumps at the chance. He is prepared for the nostalgia of the dining halls and dorm rooms, the parties and poetry seminars; what he doesnât see coming is Zibby â a beautiful, precocious, classical-music-loving sophomore. Zibby awakens scary, exciting, long-dormant feelings of possibility and connection that Jesse thought he had buried forever.
The Brothers Bloom are the best con men in the world, swindling millionaires with complex scenarios of lust and intrigue. Now they've decided to take on one last job - showing a beautiful and eccentric heiress the time of her life with a romantic adventure that takes them around the world.
Erik Nietzsche is an intelligent but in many ways inexperienced shy young man who is convinced that he wants to be a film director. In the late 1970s, Erik is accepted by the Danish National Film School where he enters a world of angry and unhelpful tutors, weird fellow students and unwritten rules. In this both exhilarating and angst-provoking period for him, Erik feels increasingly like a foreigner in the film industry. Frequently, he is merely an observer of the absurdities that surround him. He encounters trade union disputes, falls in love and experiences self-assured empowered women who refuse to make a commitment. The film is a drama full of comedy - a sharp portrait of a conceited but entertaining world of film which we suspect our dogged young director will eventually conquer with his vision.
Wojnar is a wealthy man who is marrying off his beautiful daughter Kasia, in a small town in present day Poland. Wojnar had to bribe the groom with a fancy car, since Kasia was pregnant by another man. At the end of the ceremony, the car is delivered by a gangster, who immediately demands the promised money and the deed to land from Kasia's grandfather. Unfortunately grandpa is unwilling to let go of the land. Meanwhile each of the workers at the reception demand to be paid, so Wojnar, who is very reluctant to part with his money, tries to haggle and bribe his way out of all the situations.
There are lots of poor people in India who want to get rich soon. A woman named Seema is one of them. She is very beautiful and has an admirer by the name of Sidharth. This man is very rich, and says he wants to marry Seema. But Seema finds out that he is already married, and has no intention to marry her. He assures her that he does not love his wife, and will divorce her, and then marry Seema. Then there is the story of another poor person, a man by the name of Rahul. Rahul is also an admirer of Seema. But Rahul works for Sidharth. Rahul knows that Sidharth is going to betray Seema and have an affair with someone else very soon. Rahul also knows that Seema wants to get rich very quickly. How will be convince her about Sidharth? Rahul is also afraid If Sidharth finds out he will fire Rahul, thus he will remain a poor man all his life
France is a factory worker who lives in Dunkirk with her three daughters. When her factory closes, she and her three colleagues find themselves without work. She decides to go to Paris to look for a new job and finds a work placement as a housekeeper. She is soon in the employ of a man who lives in a completely different world to her. This man, Steve, is a successful stockbroker who divides his time between London and Paris. How will France react when she learns that her new employer was partly responsible for the bankruptcy of her previous company and her present financial woes?
Two women love the same man in a world of few prospects. In Budapest, Liliom is a "public figure," a rascal who's a carousel barker, loved by the experienced merry-go-round owner and by a young, innocent maid. The maid, Julie, loses her job after going out with Liliom; he's fired by his jealous employer for going out with Julie. The two lovers move in with Julie's aunt; unemployment emasculates him and a local weasel tempts him with crime. Julie, now wan, is true to Liliom even in his bad temper. Meanwhile, a stolid widower, a carpenter, wants to marry Julie. Is there any future on this earth for Julie and Liliom, whose love is passionate rather than ideal?
Guinevere Pettigrew, a middle-aged London governess, finds herself unfairly dismissed from her job. An attempt to gain new employment catapults her into the glamorous world and dizzying social whirl of an American actress and singer, Delysia Lafosse.
The film stars two of Itami's regular actors, Nobuko Miyamoto as a geisha who brings luck to the men with whom she sleeps, and Masahiko Tsugawa as her unfaithful, sometimes partner. As well as showing her relationships with the man she loves and the men who employ her, it satirizes corruption and the influence of money in Japanese politics.
Sylvia Scarlett and her father, Henry, flee France one step ahead of the police. Henry, while employed as a bookkeeper for a lace factory, was discovered to be an embezzler. While on the channel ferry, they meet a "gentleman adventurer", Jimmy Monkley, who partners with them in his con games.
Four directors tell tales of Eros fit for a 1970s Decameron. Working-class lovers, Renzo and Luciana, marry but must hide it from her employer; plus, they need a room of their own. A billboard of Anita Ekberg provocatively selling milk gives a prudish crusader for public decency more than he can handle. The wife of a count whose escapades with call girls make the front page of the papers decides to work to prove her independence, but what is she qualified to do? A buxom carnival-booth manager who owes back taxes offers herself for one night in a lottery: a nerdy sacristan and a jealous cowboy make for a lovers' triangle. In each, women take charge, but not always happily
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