Author Archives: rarefilm

Der Herrscher / The Sovereign (1937) Veit Harlan, Emil Jannings, Paul Wagner, Hannes Stelzer, Drama

Der Herrscher (1937)
Der Herrscher (The Sovereign) was based on Before Sunset, a play by Gerhart Hauptmann. The great Emil Jannings stars as Mathias Clausen, a self-made businessman who is forced to do a great deal of soul-searching when his wife unexpectedly dies. Determining to start life anew, he falls in love with his secretary Inken (Marianne Hoppe) and impulsively takes a vacation to Italy. Clausen’s selfish grown children, not wishing to share their father’s affections – nor his money – with his new wife-to-be, go to court demanding that Clausen be declared mentally incompetent. Upon finding this out, Clausen flies into a rage, leaving the audience to wonder whether or not he really as gone off his trolley.
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Adam Had Four Sons (1941) Gregory Ratoff, Ingrid Bergman, Warner Baxter, Susan Hayward, Drama, Romance

Adam Had Four Sons (1941)
Emilie has been hired to care for the four sons of wealthy Adam Stoddard and his wife, Molly. After Molly dies, Adam and the boys grow to depend on Emilie even more. At the same time, Emilie falls in love with Adam. The boys grow up, but Adam insists that Emilie stay on as part of the family. Her relationships with both the boys and Adam become strained after one son marries a gold-digging viper named Hester.
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Le grand bleu / The Big Blue (1988) Luc Besson, Jean-Marc Barr, Jean Reno, Rosanna Arquette, Adventure, Romance, Sport

Le grand bleu AKA The Big Blue (1988)
Enzo and Jacques have known each other for a long time. Their friendship started in their childhood days in the Mediterranean. They were not real friends in these days, but there was something they both loved and used to do the whole day long: diving. One day Jacques’ father, who was a diver too, died in the Mediterranean sea. After that incident Enzo and Jacques lost contact. After several years, Enzo and Jacques had grown up, Johanna, a young clerk in an insurance office, has to go to Peru. There she meets Jacques who is being studied by a group of scientists. He dives for some minutes into ice-cold water and the scientists monitor his physical state that is more like a dolphin than human. Johanna can not believe what she sees and gets very interested in Jacques but she’s unable to get acquainted with him. Some weeks later back in her office, she finds out that Jacques will be competing in a diving championship that takes place in Taormina, Sicily. In order to see Jacques again she …
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Time Without Pity (1957) Joseph Losey, Michael Redgrave, Ann Todd, Leo McKern, Drama, Crime, Mystery, Film-Noir

Time Without Pity (1957)
Alec Graham is sentenced to death for the murder of his girlfriend Jennie, with whom he spent a weekend at the English country home of the parents of his friend Brian Stanford. Alec’s father, David Graham, a not-so-successful writer and alcoholic who has neglected his son in the past, flies in from Canada to visit his son on death row. Alec repudiates his father’s attempts for a final reconciliation. David Graham, convinced of his son’s innocence and, despite his preoccupation with himself and his own alcoholism, mounts a last-ditch effort to find the true murderer in the 24 hours remaining until the planned execution. Graham encounters the wealthy and famous car manufacturer Robert Stanford, tyrant at home and in the office and an apparent womanizer, Stanford’s young, curiously troubled wife Honar, their ill-at- ease son Brian, himself disturbed by his parents’ relationship, and Vicky Harker, a young, brainless secretary at Stanford’s factory who has been climbing up the career …
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Heaven’s Gate (1980) Michael Cimino, Kris Kristofferson, Christopher Walken, John Hurt, Adventure, Drama, Romance

Heaven's Gate (1980)
In Michael Cimino’s bleak anti-western based on events in 1890s Wyoming, Sheriff James Averill attempts to protect immigrant farmers from wealthy cattle interests, and also clashes with a hired gun, Nathan Champion, over the woman they both love. Both men find themselves questioning their roles in the furious conflict between wealthy landowners and European immigrants attempting to build new lives on the American frontier, which culminates in a brutal pitched battle.
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The Group (1966) Sidney Lumet, Candice Bergen, Joan Hackett, Elizabeth Hartman, Drama

The Group (1966)
It’s 1933, and eight young women are friends and members of the upper- class group at a private girl’s school, about to graduate and start their own lives. The film documents the years between their graduation and the beginning of the World War in Europe, and shows, in a serialized style, their romances and marriages, their searches for careers or meaning in their lives, their highs and their lows.
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L’Ora di Religione / Le Sourire de ma Mère (2002) Marco Bellocchio, Sergio Castellitto, Jacqueline Lustig, Chiara Conti, Drama

L'Ora di Religione 2002
Marco Bellocchio’s My Mother’s Smile was deemed blasphemous by the Roman Catholic Church for what the Church referred to as Bellocchio’s “systematic destruction of family and religious values.” Contrary to the Church’s presumptions about Bellocchio, My Mother’s Smile is a fascinating portrait of a man (Sergio Castellitto as Ernesto) who is forced to reconcile with his own atheism after receiving a shocking appeal from the Church requesting his participation in the canonization of his “saintly” mother.
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Midare karakuri / Murder in the Doll House (1979) Susumu Kodama, Shin Kishida, Koichi Kitami, Yûsaku Matsuda, Drama, Sci-Fi, Horror

Midare karakuri AKA Murder in the Doll House (1979)
In the best traditions of Japanese mystery stories which place fiendishly elaborate plots at their centre, Murder at the Doll House more than succeeds as a classic detective story. We’re presented with a set of strange occurrences which our master sleuth will explain to us in a long lecture at the end and even if one or two twists are a little obvious, the satisfaction involved in having figured them out ahead of time outweighs any kind of disappointment. Toshio may say he wants to be like Philip Marlowe but in actuality his detective is a little more in the European mould – almost like a more active Poirot or a slightly less obtuse Sherlock Holmes. Still, donning a trench coat with a turned up collar yet eschewing the classic hat which would have obscured his giant ‘70s perm, Matsuda once again turns in a very “cool” performance as super smart private eye.
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The Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981) William A. Fraker, Klinton Spilsbury, Michael Horse, Christopher Lloyd, Action, Adventure, Western

The Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981)
When the young Texas Ranger, John Reid, is the sole survivor of an ambush arranged by the militaristic outlaw leader, Butch Cavendich, he is rescued by an old childhood Comanche friend, Tonto. When he recovers from his wounds, he dedicates his life to fighting the evil that Cavendich represents. To this end, John Reid becomes the great masked western hero, The Lone Ranger. With the help of Tonto, the pair go to rescue the President Grant when Cavendich takes him hostage.
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Donovan’s Brain (1953) Felix E. Feist, Lew Ayres, Gene Evans, Nancy Reagan, Sci-Fi, Horror

Donovan's Brain (1953)
Valiant scientist Dr. Cory (Lew Ayres) knows he must resort to unorthodox methods in order to save ailing tycoon Tom Donovan, so the surgeon removes the wealthy man’s brain and manages to keep it functioning with electrical stimulation. Unfortunately, it isn’t long before Donovan’s brain somehow possesses the kindhearted Dr. Cory, who then begins to behave like the heartless Donovan. Cory’s wife, Janice (Nancy Davis), and friend Dr. Schratt (Gene Evans) try to intervene, with horrific results.
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