After making such American noir classics as Brute Force and The Naked City, the blacklisted director Jules Dassin went to Paris and embarked on his masterpiece: a twisting, turning tale of four ex-cons who hatch one last glorious robbery in the City of Light. Rififi is the ultimate heist movie, a mélange of suspense, brutality, and dark humor that was an international hit, earned Dassin the best director prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and has proven wildly influential on the decades of heist thrillers that have come in its wake.
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Monthly Archives: March 2016
Kidnapped / Secuestrados (2010) Miguel Ángel Vivas, Fernando Cayo, Manuela Vellés, Ana Wagener, Horror, Thriller
Jaime, his wife Marta and their teenage daughter Isa move to a dream house in Madrid and they plan a family dinner to celebrate. Out of the blue, three violent hooded thieves break in their house and hold the Marta and Isa hostage while their leader goes to the bank with Jaime to withdraw money from the family bank accounts in a tragic night of terror.
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Shadow on the Wall (1950) Pat Jackson, Ann Sothern, Zachary Scott, Gigi Perreau, Crime, Drama, Film-Noir, Thriller
Angered that her sister Celia has stolen her fiance, Dell Faring kills her and allows Celia’s husband David, knocked out in an argument with Celia, to take the blame and end up on death row. Later Dell, finding out that David’s young daughter Susan was witness to the crime and is undergoing psychiatric treatment, plans to eliminate her before her memory returns.
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Zarak (1956) Terence Young, Victor Mature, Michael Wilding, Anita Ekberg, Action, Adventure, Romance
On the mountainous frontier between British India and Afghanistan, circa 1860s, Zarak Khan kisses Salma, the youngest wife of his father, Haji Khan. Outraged, his father orders Zarak to be flogged to death but spares his life at the urging of an elderly Mullah. Zarak now leaves his village and becomes a notorious outlaw, prompting the British to assign a Major Ingram to capture him. Zarak and Ingram have several encounters, developing a grudging respect for each other. When Ingram is captured by Ahmad, one of Zarak’s rivals, Zarak risks his life to save the British officer.
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Christmas Eve (1947) Edwin L. Marin, George Raft, George Brent, Randolph Scott, Comedy, Drama
The greedy nephew of eccentric Matilda Reid seeks to have her judged incompetent so he can administer her wealth; but she will be saved if her three long-lost adopted sons appear for a Christmas Eve reunion. Separate stories reveal Michael as a bankrupt playboy loved by loyal Ann; Mario as a seemingly shady character tangling with a Nazi war criminal in South America; Jonathan as a hard-drinking rodeo rider intent on a flirtatious social worker. Is there hope for Matilda?
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Snowbound (1948) David MacDonald, Dennis Price, Mila Parély, Stanley Holloway, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
A frequent visitor to the Late Late Show, the Anglo-American Snowbound is set in the frozen Alps. Robert Newton and Dennis Price head an expedition in search of a fortune of gold, stashed away by the Nazis in the last days of the war. Snowed into an old cabin, the men quickly get on one another’s nerves. Just when tension reaches the boiling point, one of the party saves the day. He happens to be a movie screenwriter, who uses his cinematic knowhow to reach a solution to their dilemma. Snowbound is based on The Lonely Skier, a novel by Hammond Innes.
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Lancelot and Guinevere / Sword of Lancelot (1963) Cornel Wilde, Jean Wallace, Brian Aherne, Action, Adventure, Fantasy
In and around the castle Camelot, brave Cornel Wilde (as Lancelot) and virtuous Brian Aherne (as King Arthur) vie for the affections of lovely Jean Wallace (as Guinevere).
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Urgences (1988) Raymond Depardon, Documentary
A documentary filmed in the psychiatric ward of the Motel Dieu at a large hospital in Paris. The patients arrive on their own, or with considerable help from the police, but all of them are in need of medical attention.
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Thieves Like Us (1974) Robert Altman, Keith Carradine, Shelley Duvall, John Schuck, Crime, Drama, Romance
Two convicts break out of Mississippi State Penitentiary in 1936 to join a third on a long spree of bank robbing, their special talent and claim to fame. The youngest of the three falls in love along the way with a girl met at their hideout, the older man is a happy professional criminal with a romance of his own, the third is a fast lover and hard drinker fond of his work. The young lovers begin to move out of the sphere in which they have met, a last robbery in Yazoo City goes badly and puts paid to the gang once and for all as a profitable venture, but isn’t the end of the story quite yet, as all three are wanted and notorious men with altogether different points of view on the situation they are faced with.
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Underground (1941) Vincent Sherman, Jeffrey Lynn, Philip Dorn, Kaaren Verne, Adventure, Drama, Romance
A World War II Hollywood propaganda film detailing the dark underside of Nazism and the Third Reich set between two brothers, Kurt and Erik Franken, whom are SS officers in the Nazi party. Kurt learns and exposes the evils of the system to Erik and tries to convince him of the immoral stance that marches under the symbol of the swastika.
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Vyhnání z ráje / Expulsion from Paradise (2001) Vera Chytilová, Bolek Polívka, Jan Antonín Pitínský, Milan Steindler, Drama, Comedy, Erotic
Philosophical movie, staged at the least philosophical environment imaginable: A closed scenery of a nudist spot, where some hired Czech stuff is making a plain erotic movie for a rich Russian producer. Nothing in this movie is what it seems to be at the first superficial glance.
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Une femme en Afrique / Empty Quarter (1985) Raymond Depardon, Françoise Prenant, Drama, Romance
A man invites a woman to share his room in a hostel in Djibouti because she seems to have some problems. Gradually he falls in love with her. They embark on a trip to the towns in the desert and, on the way, they learn more about each other. The man never appears on screen, so the camera becomes his point of view.
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Corvette Summer (1978) Matthew Robbins, Mark Hamill, Annie Potts, Eugene Roche, Adventure, Comedy
Ken loves to design and build exotic cars. When the High School shop class project car, a fully tricked out dream Corvette, is stolen, he begins searching for it. His search leads him to Las Vegas, where Vanessa, a teenaged prostitute wannabe, helps him try to track it down.
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Trash (1970) Paul Morrissey, Joe Dallesandro, Holly Woodlawn, Geri Miller, Drama
The movie follows Joe (Dallesandro), a heroin addict, throughout his quest to score more drugs. The episodic plot occurs over a single day and centers around Joe’s problematic relationship with his on-off, sexually frustrated girlfriend (Woodlawn). During the course of the day, Joe overdoses in front of an upper-class couple, attempts to fool Welfare into approving his methadone treatment by having Holly fake a pregnancy, and frustrates the women in his life with his drug-induced impotence.
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Totò e Carolina / Toto and Carolina (1955) Mario Monicelli, Totò, Anna Maria Ferrero, Arnoldo Foà, Comedy
The policeman stops Caccavallo Villa Borghese prostitutes: among women, there is also the young Carolina, ran away because she was pregnant. Authorities instructed Caccavallo to bring the girl to his country.
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