Blackball (2003)
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Bowl (Kenny Kwan) and Noodle (Steven Cheung) are two idle high school students who need to evade at least three menaces each day before they can get to school. There is nasty little neighbourhood bully Razor (Cheung Tat Ming) who chases them over every minor dispute, uniformed policeman David (Tats Lau) who lustily body-searches everyone he sees and small-time hood Ganker (Chan Wai Man) who is constantly on the lookout for new blood to replenish his ever shrinking gang. Pride and dignity seem so out of reach. If only they can find the guiding light to fame and fortune, then life will be rosy again. Some dreams do come true. Trying to stay ahead of Razor, Bowl and Noodle inadvertently join Ganker' s gang and end up at a gangster conference where the Boss (Ray Lui) gives them $300,000 to perform a Mission of Glory at 6am the next day. To Bowl and Noodle, this is a fortune and a shortcut to fame, but a deadly mission awaits them.
Oscar Wilde watches an outrageous staging of his banned play "Salome" at a London brothel, with parts played by prostitutes, Wilde's host, his lover Bosey, and Lady Alice.
He's Irish, he's ageing, he drinks, is a touch cynical and when he has time writes a newspaper column. On the eve of the country's first election as an independent state, Dan Starkey's life is about to change after he finds the young woman he has just made love to dead and his only ally is a nun
Nobody, nobody but...Juan tells the story of a U.S.-based senior citizen named Juan (Dolphy) who lives in a senior citizens' home run by his son (Eric Quizon) and daughter-in-law (G. Toengi). Juan's favorite pastime is watching Wowowee on The Filipino Channel, though he does not watch the show just for entertainment's sake. Aside from wanting to connect with the Philippines that he dearly misses, Juan is lonesome for his first love Aida, with whom he lost touch during the Japanese occupation of Manila. Wowowee is Juan's way of coping with homesickness and reliving the past.
After a one-night stand a couple is faced with the terrifying possibility of what they really want.
Napoleon, exiled, devises a plan to retake the throne. He'll swap places with commoner Eugene Lenormand, sneak into Paris, then Lenormand will reveal himself and Napoleon will regain his throne. Things don't go at all well; first, the journey proves more difficult than expected, but more disastrously, Lenormand enjoys himself too much to reveal the deception. Napoleon adjusts somewhat uneasily to the life of a commoner while waiting, while Lenormand gorges on rich food.
In the 18th century, Louis de Bourguignon is working with the Malichot's gang, but their ways are too 'unethical' for him. He creates his own band, acting under the name of Cartouche, making audacious robberies of the rich people, and even distributing the takings with the poor. Thus, cartouche attracts the people's sympathies, Venus's love, and hate from the Police and Malichot... Cartouche can escape all the traps they set at him - except the entrapments of love. Eventually, he will be saved by a woman, at her own cost.
A common thief and an employee of a Hong Kong stock company try to help an amnesia-plagued undercover cop to regain his memory and locate the whereabouts of the 50 million dollars cash used in a drug deal. In the meantime, they try to avoid becoming victims of the crime-lord that was responsible for embezzling 50 million dollars out of the stock company.
A strait-laced British banker hires an eccentric private detective to follow his free-spirited American wife, whom he suspects is cheating on him
Four cars get into an accident on the night road, and one unidentified woman ends up dead. At the police station, the police find a password-protected flash drive among her belongings. They work with the other drivers plus some delivery guys to crack the password in hopes that it will provide clues to her identity. Instead, they find the answer to the final million-dollar question for aquiz show. Naturally, everyone rushes to compete in the quiz show! They all know the final answer, but they have to get through 29 other questions first.
Véronique Chambon (Sandrine Kiberlain), a single schoolteacher and Jean (Vincent Lindon), discover an unexpected bond that causes them to question the direction of their lives. They move in different social circles but their relationship develops and their lives begin gradually to unravel.
"Oh My God" asks people from all walks of life, from celebrities, to the religious, to atheists and the common Man - the question - "What is God?"
When he finds himself in an Hokkaido prison for a minor firearms possession offence, it doesn't take long for Hanawa (Tsutomu Yamazaki) to surrender utterly to the routine, arbitrary rules and grinding sameness of life in the prison system. Indeed, he comes to find his stint in solitary confinement, cut off from fellow-inmates and with a mechanical task of creating hundreds of folded paper bags each day, a curiously satisfying experience.
An aged father and his younger, mentally challenged son have been working hard every day to keep the bathhouse running for a motley group of regular customers. When his elder son, who left years ago to seek his fortune in the southern city of Shenzhen, abruptly returns one day, it once again puts under stress the long-broken father-son ties. Presented as a light-hearted comedy, Shower explores the value of family, friendship, and tradition.
As the 18th descendant of an extremely insignificant philosopher and inventor from ancient China, McDull is fortunate that he does not have a lot to live up to. However, his mother has higher aspirations for him and decides to send him to a martial arts school in China. Overweight and slow on his feet, McDull is the last of his classmates to run away when the headmaster needs to choose someone to represent the school in an international children's martial arts competition.
Michael Hui plays a fortuneteller who indeed knows nothing about fortune telling, in other words, who makes a living on cheating. Leon Lai stars as an investigator from the Inland Revenue Department to check against Hui's tax evasion. But this pseudo- fortuneteller acquires the supernatural ability to predict future events all of a sudden, and to our surprise he even collaborates with the tax investigator who is supposed to be his enemy! In an unpredictable story about the prediction of future happenings, Micheal Hui, Leon Lai, and Dayo Wong unfold a lot of surprises to amuse the audience from start to finish!
A television actor drinks too much and gets blackballed from the industry, and then he decides to break back in by directing his own movie. Eventually, he gets sober, and then falls off the wagon and goes crazy and turns his film into a musical.
Caught cheating and banned for ten years, Bobby Dukes, paintball's first superstar, returns to reclaim his title and erase the memory of his tainted past.
TV producer Pierre Delacroix (Damon Wayans) becomes frustrated when network brass reject his sitcom idea. Hoping to get fired, Delacroix pitches the worst idea he can think of: a minstrel show. The network not only airs it, but it incredibly becomes a smash hit. Michael Rapaport co-stars in this searing satire.
Two prisoners, Saint Louis and Dannemora Dan, escape during a theatrical production in order to go to the aid of Steve, a former prisoner whose past is about to be exposed by the man who framed Judy unless Steve agrees to help him commit another crime.
A high-powered New York publicist finds herself in Montana promoting a charity calendar after being betrayed by her boss and fiancé. Unfortunately, matters of the heart are just as complicated in the wilds as they are in the big city.
On the day TÅma KamijÅ and Index see Academy City's space elevator, Endymion in the distance, they meet a Level 0 girl with an amazing singing voice, Arisa Meigo. As the three enjoy their time together after school, magic-user Stiyl Magnus suddenly attacks them. His target: Arisa. Why would a girl from the science side be targeted by someone from the magic side, TÅma wonders. In the chaos of Stiyl's attack, he tells TÅma, Index and Arisa that she might cause a war between the magic side and the science side.
Bucum Jackson (Cube) is a bounty hunter with a lot of attitude and no interest in taking on a partner. Working at Martinez Bail Bonds, Jackson has unorthodox methods of tracking down low-life criminals, but they work, and one day he hopes to become his own boss and open up his own private investigation firm. Reggie Wright (Epps) is a slippery con artist who is avoiding the law, and Jackson. During a cat and mouse chase, the two stumble on a multi-million dollar diamond heist. Hiding from Jackson, Wright finds himself in the thieves' getaway van and ends up having to escape from them after they discover their booty is fake, much to the displeasure of their ruthless boss (Flanagan). When Wright meets up with his girlfriend (Mendes), he discovers that his recently purchased lottery ticket is the sole winner of $60 million. Unfortunately, his wallet, which held the ticket, was left in the thieves' van, so he persuades Jackson to help him get it back.
The ongoing war between the canine and feline species is put on hold when they join forces to thwart a rogue cat spy with her own sinister plans for conquest.
The wealthiest man in the world, John P. Merrick, is a private person who likes to stay anonymous. One of his many assets, so small that he didn't even knew that he owned it, is Neeley's Department Store. There is labor unrest at the store, and the employees' anger is directed at Merrick, who they hang in effigy outside the store despite not knowing what he looks like. Merrick, not happy at what he sees going on, decides to mete out the rabble-rousers. So he goes undercover as a sales clerk, Thomas Higgins, in the shoe department. However, he soon befriends many of the employees and begins to see things from their point of view.
A movie director-screenwriter finds a man to finance his latest project but soon discovers that the producer is actually an undercover FBI agent working on a mob sting operation.
Weird yummy goo erupts from the earth and is discovered by a couple of miners. They taste it and decide to market it because it tastes so good. The American public literally eats up the new dessert sensation now known as the Stuff but, unfortunately, it takes over the brains of those who eat it, turning them into zombie-like creatures. It is up to ex-FBI agent David Rutherford and a kid named Jason to stop the spread of the mind-devouring dessert.
A British butler goes to America duped by mobsters into believing he is the heir to a fortune.
Steve Martin presents selected sketches from "Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969)". It's the well known sketches, though the parrot sketch is not included. Steve Martin has some funny comments on the Pythons.
Beijing, the present day. Popular TV personality Da Peng (Da Peng) is invited by gangster businessman Wang Hai (Liang Chao) to make a film in which he will invest. Wang insists that Da Peng's co-star is TV drama actress Du Xiaoxiao (Yuan Shanshan). However, after a nightclub scandal involving Da Peng goes viral, he's blackballed by a powerful internet executive (Charles Zhang) and finds himself unable to attract any male co-star. Wang also wants his investment back. Da Peng decides to make his own movie on the cheap, using a script he has about an alien, A Li, who arrives on Earth and has various adventures as a superhero.
Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski, a Los Angeles slacker who only wants to bowl and drink white Russians, is mistaken for another Jeffrey Lebowski, a wheelchair-bound millionaire, and finds himself dragged into a strange series of events involving nihilists, adult film producers, ferrets, errant toes, and large sums of money.
A comedy that spoofs the inspirational sports movies, The Comebacks tells the story of an out-of-luck coach, Lambeau Fields, who takes a rag-tag bunch of college misfits and drives them towards the football championships. In the process, this life-long loser discovers that he is a winner after all by redeeming himself, saving his relationship with his family and friends, and finding that there is indeed, no "I" in "team"!
The Toro cheerleading squad from Rancho Carne High School in San Diego has got spirit, spunk, sass and a killer routine that's sure to land them the national championship trophy for the sixth year in a row. But for newly-elected team captain (Kirsten Dunst), the Toros' road to total cheer glory takes a shady turn when she discovers that their perfectly-choreographed routines were in fact stolen.
In "A Mighty Wind", director Christopher Guest reunites the team from "Best In Show" and "Waiting for Guffman" to tell tell the story of 60's-era folk musicians, who inspired by the death of their former manager, get back on the stage for one concert in New York City's Town Hall.
When three college guys get caught spying on a sorority ritual, they're forced to accompany the pledges on their next assignment: stealing a trophy from a bowling alley. But the token they pinch has a devilish imp who makes their lives a living hell.
Electrician Gus gets the chance to fulfill a childhood dream by buying an old bowling-alley with some of his friends.
Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl is a 1982 concert film in which the Monty Python team perform many of their greatest sketches at the Hollywood Bowl, including several pre-Python ones.
After bowler Roy Munson swindles the wrong crowd and is left with a hook for a hand, he settles into impoverished obscurity. That is, until he uncovers the next big thing: an Amish kid named Ishmael. So, the corrupt and the hopelessly naïve hit the circuit intent on settling an old score with Big Ern.
The story takes place in Carhaix, in the heart of Brittany. A small hospital, with a calm maternity clinic, where few births take place. Mathilde, a mid-wife, Firmine, a pediatric nurse, and Louise, the owner of the Carhaix bowling alley, are all friends and lead a happy existence. Catherine, director of the establishment's Human Resources, is sent to restructure the hospital and, most importantly, to eventually shut down the maternity clinic, which is losing money. Four women whose age, personalities, and origins are different, but who will form a quartet overflowing with humanity and humor as they join forces to save the clinic. Life, love, friendship, Brittany and... bowling.
Paddy O'Riley and Ossie Merrill, Bellport high school football heroes, enroll in distant colleges; Paddy at a small school in the East, where he is barely a substitute, and Ossie at a powerhouse-football school, where he is an instant star and all-American candidate. They leave behind Cheers Reynolds, who is fond of Paddy, who works in her family's drugstore, but she loves Ossie almost as much as he loves himself. Paddy makes friends with team fullback Dutch Schultz, who accompanies him on vacation, and they arrive back in Bellport just as Ossie is also coming home on break. Florence Taylor is also in town on a film junket. Unknown to any of the others, Paddy and Florence had gone to high school together. Back at school and three years later, Paddy and Dutch learn that their football team could get invited to the coveted Rose Bowl to play against Ossie's team, if it could get enough publicity (pre-BCS days) that would attract a large crowd...
Kosuke is 31, and tired of his hometown where nothing happens. On a whim, he departs for New York with dreams of making it big. 6 months later, he straggles home... defeated, and saddled with debt. Awaiting him are his old friends, a caring sister, a disgruntled father ...and a bowl of noodles. Namely, "udon" noodles. The town is built around udon, sustained by udon, nationally famous for udon.
Coming of age story for two girls, Mary Clancy and Rachel Devery, who find themselves as students at the St. Francis Academy, a catholic boarding school for girls. The story spans three years and follows the girls and their many pranks including setting off fire alarms, smoking cigars in the basement and putting bubble baths in the nuns' sugar bowls. As the girls mature, they gain a greater respect for their teachers and the commitment and devotion required to be a nun, leading one of them to make a life changing decision.
When dwindling membership and increasing overheads makes a local bowling club and prime candidate for a takeover, it's all hands on deck to save the club, in what turns into an epic battle where young meets old, greed meets good and people rise to the occasion in extraordinary circumstances.
Two brothers separated by one continent and two decades reunite when one of them becomes sick with cancer.
Byung-ki (Cha Tae-hyun) is a clumsy village policeman who helps out with trivial tasks like distributing promotional papers, though he dreams of fighting evil. One day, he runs into Min-kyong (Kim Sun-a), an employee at the neighborhood bowling alley, and falls for her at first sight. However, his attempts to woo her go unnoticed. Meanwhile, Sang-doo, the boss of the local gang (with whom Byung-ki harbors a boyhood grudge) also swoons over Min-kyong and vows to take her virginity on Christmas Eve.
So you think you know the real story behind Santa Claus? So starts "Elf Bowling the Movie: The Great North Pole Elf Strike" and it takes you on a laugh filled journey from pirate filled oceans to the North Pole to Fiji. There are several toe tapping musical numbers along the way including Wrapplestiltskin rapping and Dingle, the evil brother, crooning. Oh and let's not forget the "Elf Bowling". I'm not familiar with the video game but it sure is funny seeing how the game is fit into the film. The elves signature reaction of joy cracked me up. First rate writing, brilliant voice work by Joe Alaskey and Tom Kenney (of Spongebob fame), and superb animation will make this a holiday treat that everyone will enjoy.
Every summer, Jon (Jon Schmidt) gathers ten friends together in his adopted city of Los Angeles to play the Turkey Bowl â bringing a piece of small-town tradition to the urban sprawl â all for the beloved prize for the winning team⦠a turkey. Friendships flare and fade, jealousy is met with both laughter and pain, old and unrequited love threatens to remain old and unrequited, and all of these undercurrents are revealed in the unique, improvised rhythm of backyard football.
Slice-of-life look at a sweet working-class couple in London, Shirley and Cyril, his mother, who's aging quickly and becoming forgetful, mum's ghastly upper-middle-class neighbors, and Cyril's pretentious sister and philandering husband. Shirley wants a baby, but Cyril, who reads Marx and wants the world to be perfect, is reluctant. Cyril's mum locks herself out and must ask her snooty neighbors for help. Then Cyril's sister Valerie stages a surprise party for mum's 70th birthday, a disaster from start to finish. Shirley holds things together, and she and Cyril may put aside her Dutch cap after all.
The film details the travails of a working-class family in London's East End, struggling to stay afloat during the recession under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's premiership. Only the mother Mavis (Pam Ferris) is working; father Frank (Jeff Robert) and the couple's two sons Colin (Tim Roth), a timid, chronically shy individual and Mark (Phil Daniels), an outspoken, headstrong young man, are on the dole. This situation is contrasted by the presence of Mavis's sister Barbara (Marion Bailey), and her husband John (Alfred Molina), whose financial and social loftiness, in suburban Chigwell, appears to be a comfortable facade over the unspoken soreness of a lacklustre marriage.
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.
Diggers is a coming-of-age story directed by Katherine Dieckmann. It portrays four working-class friends who grow up in The Hamptons, on the South Shore of Long Island, New York, as clam diggers in 1976. Their fathers were clam diggers as well as their grandfathers before them. They must cope with and learn to face the changing times in both their personal lives and their neighborhood.
Based on a theatrical text by Romanian writer Ion Luca Caragiale (1852-1912), who was a bitter and funny witness of the turn-of-the-20th-century Romanian bourgeois mores, Carnival Scenes manages to preserve and further enhance the slightly hysteric atmosphere of his plays. Pintilie creates a strange combination of carnival scenes which is brought to the screen as a burlesque, fast-paced, screwball comedy with a meditative undertone. This film was banned in Romania for a decade until the death of Ceausescu in 1989 and was only released after the 1989 revolution.
A pair of teenage boys growing up in a working-class neighborhood become aware of their homosexuality. While both were vaguely aware they might be gay, neither had ever acted on their impulses. Once they decide that they're attracted to each other, neither is sure just what to do.
Based on the true events surrounding Frank Sinatra's tour of Australia. When Sinatra calls a local reporter a "two-bit hooker", every union in the country black-bans the star until he issues an apology.
The boy who wasn't supposed to grow upâPeter Panâdid just that, becoming a soulless corporate lawyer whose workaholism could cost him his wife and kids. But a trip to see Granny Wendy in London, where the vengeful Capt. Hook kidnaps Peter's kids and forces Peter to return to Neverland, could lead to a chance at redemption, in this family-oriented fantasy from director Steven Spielberg.
Witty, romantic look at life in the corporate jungle. Tess McGill is an ambitious secretary with a unique approach for climbing the ladder to success. When her classy, but villainous boss breaks a leg skiing, Tess takes over her office, her apartment and even her wardrobe. She creates a deal with a handsome investment banker that will either take her to the top, or finish her off for good.
Set in "Barrytown", a fictitious working-class quarter of Dublin. "Bimbo" Reeves gets laid off from his job. With his redundancy, he buys a van and sells fish and chips with his buddy Larry. Due to Ireland's surprising success at the 1990 FIFA World Cup, their business starts off well, but the relationship between the two friends soon becomes strained as Bimbo behaves more like a typical boss.
A limo driver's blind date sparks a tale of love, betrayal, friendship, and grace centered around two working-class New York City couples.
In 1970s England, three friends spend their days joking, drinking, fighting and chasing girls. Freddie wants to leave their working-class world but cool, charismatic Bruce and lovable loser Snork are happy with life the way it is. When Freddie gets a new job as a door-to-door salesman and bumps into his old school sweetheart Julie, the gang are forced to make choices that will change their lives forever.
Whatever Works explores the relationship between a crotchety misanthrope, Boris and a naïve, impressionable young runaway from the south, Melody. When Melody's uptight parents arrive in New York to rescue her, they are quickly drawn into wildly unexpected romantic entanglements. Everyone discovers that finding love is just a combination of lucky chance and appreciating the value of "whatever works."
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