
The film starts in the rural town of Shinshu in 1923. A widow, Tsune (O-Tsune) Nonomiya (Choko Iida), works hard at a silk production factory to provide for her only son, Ryosuke. When Ryosuke’s teacher Okubo (Chishu Ryu) persuades her to let her son continue to study beyond elementary school, she decides to support her son’s education even until college. Her son promises to become a great man…
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Tag Archives: french subtitles
The Savage Eye (1960) Ben Maddow, Sidney Meyers, Barbara Baxley, Gary Merrill, Herschel Bernardi, Drama

This drama takes the form of a story told using documentary material as an intrinsic part of the narrative. In this journey through the dark side of 1950s urban life, the camera follows Judith – a newly divorced woman looking for a fresh start – through the streets of Los Angeles as she encounters the strange denizens of the city, ranging from trendsetters to religious fanatics. All the tawdry and desperate faces of this world become a mirror for Judith’s personal failures and struggles to claim her new life.
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Uma Abelha na Chuva / A Bee in the Rain (1972) Fernando Lopes, Laura Soveral, João Guedes, Zita Duarte, Drama

This Portuguese drama examines the daily life minutiae and intrigues of two scions of society in the rural village where they live. One is a wealthy landowner, the other a widowed aristocrat who lives in a world of her own. “Starting off from a fine novel by Carlos de Oliveira, Fernando Lopes doesn’t so mush reconstitute a story, but rather defines an atmosphere parallel to that which exists in the literary work. The erosion of time, the crumbling of an epoch, the decline of a stately home, the disintegration of emotions: the film version of A Bee in the Rain talks about all these things, using a language that is sparse and unpolished, fascinating and at the same time repulsive in its disturbing silence” (Lauro Antonio).
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Entre os Dedos / Noise (2008) Tiago Guedes, Frederico Serra, Isabel Abreu, Ivo Alexandre, Filipe Duarte, Drama

After the structural collapse at a construction site, Paulo loses his job because he denounces the situation to the authorities. His relationship with his wife deteriorates more every day. Anabela, Paulo’s sister, lives with their father, who suffers from post-war syndrome from his involvement in the Colonial Wars. Bela is his nurse, and the only comfort for a terminally ill patient.
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A Cara que Mereces / The Face You Deserve (2004) Miguel Gomes, José Airosa, Gracinda Nave, Sara Graça, Comedy, Fantasy

Until you turn 30, you have the face God gave you. After that, you have the face you deserve.” The estranged musical comedy that is Gomes’ first feature film seeks to convince its protagonist, Francisco, of that saying/dogma; precisely, during his thirtieth birthday. Or maybe it’s the complete opposite, and that Francisco who dresses up as a cowboy for the school play at the school where he teaches the children he detests, seeks to convince A cara que mereces of the fatality of the little phrase. But Francisco is a trick: he knows he deserves his face and his body because of him being intolerable. And A cara que mereces, hunted hunter, becomes a claustrophobic film that seeks to run away from Francisco using cinephilia as a way of escape; boarding, as Mark Peranson has observed, to the heart of Rivette, to the train (of dreams) of the recent Godard and, finally, to an impossible (but well-deserved) version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
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Os Imortais / The Imortals (2003) António-Pedro Vasconcelos, Joaquim de Almeida, Emmanuelle Seigner, Nicolau Breyner, Action, Crime, Drama

Every year, four ex-soldiers who call themselves “Os Imortais” (“The Immortals”), get together with four women to celebrate their war deeds and remember the old days, back in the war. On the summer of 1985, tired of their monotonous lives, they decide to rob a bank. Joaquim Malarranha, a chief inspector from the local police force who is about to retire, crosses their path and chooses to spend his last days of duty trying to solve the robbery. But as he carries on with his investigation, he discovers more than he could have ever imagined…
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Man Hunt / Chasse à l’Homme (1941) Fritz Lang, Walter Pidgeon, Joan Bennett, George Sanders, Drama, Thriller, War

On July 29, 1939, renowned British big game hunter Captain Alan Thorndike (Walter Pidgeon) slips through the forest undetected near the Berghof, Adolf Hitler’s residence near Berchtesgaden. Getting the dictator in his telescopic sight, he pulls the trigger on his unloaded rifle and gives a wave. He ponders a moment, then loads a live round, but is discovered at the last second by a guard, and the shot goes wild…
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Leila (1997) Dariush Mehrjui, Leila Hatami, Ali Mosaffa, Jamileh Sheikhi, Drama, Romance

Leila and Reza meet in a kind of celebration and fall for each other. Having discovered their love, they get married soon only to find out the infertility of Leila. That’s when Reza’s authoritative mother starts wheedling Leila to persuade Reza into second marriage for the sake of having a grandchild. Leila accepts at first but is unaware of her own strain threshold.
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L’Ora di Religione / Le Sourire de ma Mère (2002) Marco Bellocchio, Sergio Castellitto, Jacqueline Lustig, Chiara Conti, Drama

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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The Demon of Mount Oe / Ooe-yama Shuten-dôji (1960) Tokuzô Tanaka, Kazuo Hasegawa, Raizô Ichikawa, Shintarô Katsu, Fantasy, Horror

A demon-faced monster seeking revenge appears in the forms of a gigantic ox and a huge spider! The young Genji warrior protects the Fujiwara Clan and the beautiful lady in tragic love! A grand visual epic told with mesmerizing extravagance!
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