Tag Archives: italian subtitles

Die Gebrüder Skladanowsky / A Trick of the Light (1995) Wim Wenders, Stefan Barber, Wiebke Bayer, Nadine Büttner, Biography, Drama, Documentary

A Trick of the Light (1995)
A rare gem of cinematic storytelling that weaves docudrama, fictional reenactment, and experimental photography into a powerful, reflective work on the early days of German cinema. The film tells the story of the Skladanowsky Brothers, the German-born duo responsible for inventing the “bioskop”, an early version of the film projector.
Read More »

Speed / Lotna (1959) Andrzej Wajda, Jerzy Pichelski, Adam Pawlikowski, Jerzy Moes, Drama, War

Speed (1959)
Poland, during the World War. Lotna is a magnificent specimen of Arabian horse, the pride of her owner, too old to actually ride her but to whom she remains faithful nevertheless. The Polish cavalry army is also proud of their land, and loyal to rules, and custom. The German army is leading an overwhelming speed attack with tanks, an almost unheard of weapon, and bringing a way of life to an end. It’s the last battle between Lotna (speed horse) and Blitzkriega (speed war).
Read More »

Subway (1985) Luc Besson, Christopher Lambert, Isabelle Adjani, Richard Bohringer, Comedy, Drama, Thriller

Subway (Luc Besson, 1985)
Helena, the beautiful young wife of a wealthy businessman, invites a stranger Fred to her party. Fred repays her by stealing compromising documents from her husband’s safe, with the aim of blackmailing the couple. Pursued by police and the henchmen of Helena’s ruthless husband, Fred goes on the run, taking refuge in the Paris metro. Here, he meets other social misfits, including a roller-blader the police have been hunting for several months. Whilst Helena realises that she has fallen in love with Fred and makes every attempt to contact him, Fred occupies himself with forming a band by recruiting buskers. Meanwhile, the police and Helena’s husband are getting closer to their target…
Read More »

Landscape after Battle / Krajobraz po bitwie (1970) Andrzej Wajda, Daniel Olbrychski, Stanislawa Celinska, Aleksander Bardini, Drama, Romance

Landscape after Battle (1970)
Film opens with the mad rush of haphazard freedom as the concentration camps are liberated. Men are trying to grab food, change clothes, bury their tormentors they find alive. Then they are herded into other camps as the Allies try to devise policy to control the situation. A young poet who cannot quite find himself in this new situation, meets a headstrong Jewish young girl who wants him to run off with her, to the West. He cannot cope with her growing demands for affection, while still harboring the hatred for the Germans and disdain for his fellow men who quickly revert to petty enmities.
Read More »

High Plains Drifter (1973) Clint Eastwood, Verna Bloom, Marianna Hill, Western

High Plains Drifter (1973)
“Who are you?” the dwarf Mordecai (Billy Curtis) asks Clint Eastwood’s Stranger at the end of Eastwood’s 1973 western High Plains Drifter. “You know,” he replies, before vanishing into the desert heat waves near California’s Mono Lake. Adapting the amorally enigmatic and violent Man With No Name persona from his films with Sergio Leone, Eastwood’s second film as director begins as his drifter emerges from that heat haze and rides into the odd lakefront settlement of Lago. Lago’s residents are not particularly friendly, but once the Stranger shows his skills as a gunfighter, they beg him to defend them against a group of outlaws (led by Eastwood regular Geoffrey Lewis) who have a score to settle with the town. He agrees to train them in self-defense, but Mordecai and innkeeper’s wife Sarah Belding (Verna Bloom) soon suspect that the Stranger has another, more personal agenda. By the time the Stranger makes the corrupt community paint their town red and re-name it “Hell,” it is clear that he is not just another gunslinger. With its fragmented flashbacks and bizarre, austere locations, High Plains Drifter’s stylistic eccentricity lends an air of unsettling eeriness to its revenge story, adding an uncanny slant to Eastwood’s antiheroic westerner. Seminal western hero John Wayne was so offended by Eastwood’s harshly revisionist view of a frontier town that he wrote to Eastwood, objecting that this was not what the spirit of the West was all about. Eastwood’s audience, however, was not so put off, and an exhibitors’ poll named Eastwood a top box-office draw for 1973.
Read More »

EQUUS (1977) Sidney Lumet, Richard Burton, Peter Firth, Colin Blakely, Drama, Mystery

EQUUS (1977)
Sidney Lumet directed this film version of Peter Shaffer’s dramatic play, transforming theatrical symbolism into cinematic realism. Richard Burton received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for his performance as Martin Dysert, a psychiatrist determined to unravel the disturbed mind of Alan Strang (Peter Firth), a young stableboy. In a fit of rage, Strang has blinded a stable of six horses. The court then assigns Dysert to probe the young man’s mind in order to understand why he committed such a violent act. But the doctor, who is battling demons of his own, wonders if he can save the boy–and whether saving him at all is the right thing to do. Joan Plowright stands out as Dora Strang, the young boy’s mother.
Read More »

The Fugitive (1993) Andrew Davis, Harrison Ford, Tommy Lee Jones, Sela Ward, Action, Adventure, Crime

The Fugitive (1993)
Ford is prison escapee Dr. Richard Kimble, a Chicago surgeon falsely convicted of killing his wife and determined to prove his innocence by leading his pursuers to the one-armed man who actually committed the crime. Jones is Sam Gerard, an unrelenting bloodhound of a U.S. Marshal. They are hunted and hunter. And as directed by Andrew Davis, their nonstop chase has one exhilarating speed: all-out. So catch him if you can. And catch an 11-on-a-scale-of-10 train wreck (yes, the train is real), a plunge down a waterfall, a cat-and-mouse jaunt through a Chicago St. Patrick’s Day parade and much more. Better hurry. Kimble doesn’t stay in one place very long!
Read More »

Era notte a Roma / It Was Night in Rome (1960) Roberto Rossellini, Leo Genn, Giovanna Ralli, Sergey Bondarchuk, Drama, War

Era notte a roma (1960)
During WW2, in Rome , a trio of escaped Allied POWs find themselves in limbo as they try to avoid re-capture and reach their dispersed units. Michael Pemberton is a British Major, Fyodor Aleksandrovic Nazukov is a Soviet Sergeant and Peter Bradley is an American Lieutenant. A beautiful young Italian woman, Esperia Belli, agrees to give them shelter. She knows that despite Italy’s efforts to break with Nazi Germany and join the Allies there are some Italians who are Fascist sympathizers and would gladly denounce Esperia to the German authorities. Hiding enemy soldiers or escaped POWs is punishable by death. Esperia hopes to get in contact with the Italian anti-Fascist resistance which could help the three escaped Allied POWs rejoin their respective armies. Until then, the fugitives are stuck in Esperia’s attic.
Read More »

L’Enfant Sauvage (1970) François Truffaut, Jean-Pierre Cargol, Françoise Seigner, Drama

l'enfant sauvage
France, 1798. In a forest, hunters discover and capture a 12 year old boy who appears to have spent his life living like a wild animal. He is taken to a school for deaf and dumb children in Paris, where is maltreated and used as an object of scientific curiosity. An eminent doctor, Jean Itard, takes an interest in the strange child and resolves to educate him. Little by little, the feral child, whom Itard christens Victor, responds to his benefactor’s patient attempts to civilise him.
Read More »

Oliver’s Story (1978) John Korty, Ryan O’Neal, Candice Bergen, Nicola Pagett, Drama, Romance

Oliver's Story 1978
In this sequel to the immensely popular tearjerker LOVE STORY, Ryan O’Neal reprises his role as poor little rich boy Oliver Barrett. This time, Oliver’s in love with someone every bit as wealthy as he is–the recently divorced career woman Marcie Bonwit (Candice Bergen). The two young professionals are perfectly suited for each other yet shy away from commitment due to their respective losses. But as the couple edge closer and closer to a relationship, they begin to once again embrace life and and the possibility of new love.
Read More »

Freejack (1992) Geoff Murphy, Emilio Estevez, Mick Jagger, Rene Russo, Action, Crime, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Freejack (1992)
In the year 2009, the super-wealthy achieve immortality by hiring “bonejackers,” mercenaries who utilize extensive time travel technology, to snatch people from the past just prior to their deaths, so their bodies could be used by the rich to extend their lives. Those who escape the bonejacking, known as “freejacks,” are considered less than human under the law. The film is set in a dystopic future where most people suffer from poor physical health as a result of rampant drug use and environmental pollution, making them unattractive as replacement bodies…
Read More »

Rejs / A Trip Down the River (1970) Marek Piwowski, Stanislaw Tym, Jolanta Lothe, Wanda Stanislawska-Lothe, Comedy

Rejs AKA The Cruise (1970)
A stowaway (Stanis?aw Tym) sneaks aboard a ship departing on a cruise down the Vistula River. The captain takes him for a Communist Party cultural coordinator and the intruder gladly adapts to his new role, immediately setting to work at manipulating the passengers and crew into silly and vaguely humiliating games. Before long, Tym has got everyone under his thumb and created his own comedic dictatorship.
Read More »