Author Archives: rarefilm

Afterimages (2014) Tony Kern, Sheena Chan, Pamelyn Chee, Daniel Jenkins, Fantasy, Horror, Thriller

afterimages-2014
A group of film students burn paper effigy cameras for the wandering spirits during the ghost month in Singapore and receive a collection of horror movies in return. The first film received, GHOST POOL LEG, revolves around Chinese superstition in which ghosts are believed to pull swimmers legs to drown them. The second movie, XIAO BAO BAO, focuses on a young woman’s haunting experience after taking a postmortem photograph of a suicide jumper. The third movie, SKIN DEEP, finds a group of shoppers stuck in a mall elevator with a mysterious and beautiful woman who holds a terrible secret. The fourth film, REKINDLING, features a heartbroken hawker, a missing China bride, and the mysterious ring she left behind. The final film comes with a price.
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Bananas (1971) Woody Allen, Louise Lasser, Carlos Montalbán, Comedy

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One of Woody Allen’s earlier, more slapstick-oriented efforts, Bananas tells the story of Fielding Mellish (Allen), a neurotic New Yorker who follows the object of his affections, Nancy (Louise Lasser), to the fictional Central American country of San Marcos, where she is involved in a revolution. Nancy wants nothing to do with Fielding, but he soon becomes a guest of the country’s dictator (Carlos Montalban), before accidentally becoming the leader of San Marcos himself. Fielding is eventually shipped back to the US and tried as a subversive, but being that this is a comedy, and an especially light one at that, everything works out in the end. A far cry from Allen’s later, more somber films, Bananas still works as an often hilarious amalgam of sight gags, one-liners, and bizarre asides.
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Jug jugoistok / South by Southeast (2005) Milutin Petrovic, Radivoje Andric, Nedeljko Despotovic, Balsa Djogo, Thriller

jug-jugoistok-aka-south-by-southeast-2005
Sonja, once a popular Serbian actress settled in Slovenia is on a short visit to Belgrade. She panics claiming that her daughter Sofia has been kidnapped, then disappears. Inspector Despotovic is assigned to the case and when he finds Sonja, she admits that she made everything up, that she never had a child, and therefore there was no kidnapping. But a Secret Service veteran approaches Despotovic and tells him that the story about kidnapping is true. It is highly classified information. The father of the child is Foreign Affairs Minister. On the other hand, Minister claims that the Secret Service has made everything up trying to compromise him. Despotovic is puzzled… Who is lying? Who is telling the truth? Who is insane? Who is about to die?
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Fleisch / Spare Parts (1979) Rainer Erler, Jutta Speidel, Wolf Roth, Herbert Herrmann, Horror, Thriller

fleisch-1979
A honeymooning couple (Jutta Speidel and Wolf Roth) are hunted down by mysterious kidnappers in cahoots with the evil landlady who runs a hotel. The woman manages to escape, but the man is whisked away by two medics in an ambulance. The bride enlists the help of a truck driver with a CB radio and uncovers a fiendish international plot to provide black-market organs. The ghouls take parts from the bodies of healthy young and extremely unwilling human victims.
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Tears for Sale / Carlston za Ognjenku (2008) Uros Stojanovic, Katarina Radivojevic, Sonja Kolacaric, Stefan Kapicic, Comedy, Drama, Fantasy

tears-for-sale-aka-carlston-za-ognjenku-2008
Story of two sisters that grew up in a small Serbian village in the beginning of the 1930s. The village is torn up by wars and years long blood oath. There are no men left in the village. Our heroines, Ognjenka and Mala Boginja decide to go to the city, kidnap men and return life to their village. The lights of the metropolis dazzle them and there starts this little amusing and sentimental adventure.
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