Commencing well-respected Nippon director Kazuo Kuroki's sixth decade behind the camera, "A Boy's Summer in 1945" (literally "A Beautiful Summer in Kirishima") is a lyric, novelistic drama set in the countryside in the last days before Japan's surrender ending WWII. Striking a welcome retro note in its languid pacing and delicate handling of seriocomic ensemble threads, handsome production is a natural for fests. It might also prove a cornerstone for retrospectives or ancillary releases of works by a helmer ("Preparation of the Festival," "Ronin-gai") who's long been appreciated at home but has won just limited attention abroad.
2002-12-14
5.3
Spanning the years 1945 to 1955, a chronicle of the fictional Italian-American Corleone crime family. When organized crime family patriarch, Vito Corleone barely survives an attempt on his life, his youngest son, Michael steps in to take care of the would-be killers, launching a campaign of bloody revenge.
The story of an old Jewish widow named Daisy Werthan and her relationship with her black chauffeur, Hoke. From an initial mere work relationship grew in 25 years a strong friendship between the two very different characters, in a time when those types of relationships were shunned.
In the 1930s, Count Almásy is a Hungarian map maker employed by the Royal Geographical Society to chart the vast expanses of the Sahara Desert along with several other prominent explorers. As World War II unfolds, Almásy enters into a world of love, betrayal, and politics.
The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.
The true story of how businessman Oskar Schindler saved over a thousand Jewish lives from the Nazis while they worked as slaves in his factory during World War II.
The Second World War is experienced through the journey of Private Cole, a dramatic study of the contrasting nature between the innocence of childhood and the reality of war, and the emotional struggle that accompanies it.
German-Jewish cabaret singer Nelly survived Auschwitz but had to undergo reconstructive surgery as her face was disfigured. Without recognizing Nelly, her former husband Johnny asks her to help him claim his wife’s inheritance. To see if he betrayed her, she agrees, becoming her own doppelganger.
Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.
Maria marries a young soldier in the last days of World War II, only for him to go missing in the war. She must rely on her beauty and ambition to navigate the difficult post-war years alone.
A dramatic history of Pu Yi, the last of the Emperors of China, from his lofty birth and brief reign in the Forbidden City, the object of worship by half a billion people; through his abdication, his decline and dissolute lifestyle; his exploitation by the invading Japanese, and finally to his obscure existence as just another peasant worker in the People's Republic.
In April of 1945, Germany stands at the brink of defeat with the Russian Army closing in from the east and the Allied Expeditionary Force attacking from the west. In Berlin, capital of the Third Reich, Adolf Hitler proclaims that Germany will still achieve victory and orders his generals and advisers to fight to the last man. When the end finally does come, and Hitler lies dead by his own hand, what is left of his military must find a way to end the killing that is the Battle of Berlin, and lay down their arms in surrender.
The lives of Erik Lanshof and five of his closest friends take different paths when the German army invades the Netherlands in 1940: fight and resistance, fear and resignation, collaboration and high treason.
A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.
In 1939, Charlotte Salomon leaves Berlin to seek refuge at her grandparents' villa in the south of France. A little later, war breaks out, and Charlotte must, besides forgetting all she left behind, deal with her grandmother's depression, and her mother's suicide. To fight despair, Charlotte starts to paint, producing over one thousand images. "Is my life real, or is it theater?" This is the title she gives her body of work, which highlights her former life in Berlin. She finds herself though her art, but in 1943 is deported to Germany and Auschwitz.
In the early years of the 20th century, Mohandas K. Gandhi, a British-trained lawyer, forsakes all worldly possessions to take up the cause of Indian independence. Faced with armed resistance from the British government, Gandhi adopts a policy of 'passive resistance', endeavouring to win freedom for his people without resorting to bloodshed.
At a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, this young man embarks on a journey of sexual awakening and self-discovery, encountering a universe of frustration, eroticism, and adventure within his sleepy backwater depot.
In 1947, four German judges who served on the bench during the Nazi regime face a military tribunal to answer charges of crimes against humanity. Chief Justice Haywood hears evidence and testimony not only from lead defendant Ernst Janning and his defense attorney Hans Rolfe, but also from the widow of a Nazi general, an idealistic U.S. Army captain and reluctant witness Irene Wallner.
The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson, the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.
A Russian and a German sniper play a game of cat-and-mouse during the Battle of Stalingrad in WWII.
As U.S. troops storm the beaches of Normandy, three brothers lie dead on the battlefield, with a fourth trapped behind enemy lines. Ranger captain John Miller and seven men are tasked with penetrating German-held territory and bringing the boy home.
Young man has his dreams come true when the sexy new maid seduces him. But she also has a secret that leads to trouble.
In a Russian coastal town, Kolya is forced to fight the corrupt mayor when he is told that his house will be demolished. He recruits a lawyer friend to help, but the man's arrival brings further misfortune for Kolya and his family.
When successful businessman Sam Treadwell finds that his android wife, Cherry model 2000 has blown a fuse, he hires sexy renegade tracker E. Johnson to find her exact duplicate. But as their journey to replace his perfect mate leads them into the treacherous and lawless region of 'The Zone', Treadwell learns the hard way that the perfect woman is made not of computer chips and diodes.
A lifetime of taking shots has ended Rocky’s career, and a crooked accountant has left him broke. Inspired by the memory of his trainer, however, Rocky finds glory in training and takes on an up-and-coming boxer.
Ingrid and Martha were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. Ingrid went on to become an autofiction novelist while Martha became a war reporter, and they were separated by the circumstances of life. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme but strangely sweet situation.
A queen sends the powerful and feared sorceress Gray Alys to the ghostly wilderness of the Lost Lands in search of a magical power, where she and her guide, the drifter Boyce, must outwit and outfight both man and demon.
A British crime novelist travels to her publisher's upmarket summer house in Southern France to seek solitude in order to work on her next book. However, the unexpected arrival of the publisher's daughter induces complications and a subsequent crime.
A theater director struggles with his work, and the women in his life, as he attempts to create a life-size replica of New York inside a warehouse as part of his new play.
Bad Grandpa .5 gives you a whole new perspective on the world of Irving Zisman with bonus scenes and pranks also featuring Spike Jonze as "Gloria" and Catherine Keener as Irving's wife "Ellie", plus a look at the evolution of Johnny Knoxville's naughty alter-ego, the makeup effects, and a behind-the-scenes peek at the idiocy it takes to make a hidden camera movie in public.
In the absence of Behzat Ç., a superintendent named Himmet gets replaced as the president of the murder Bureau. When the murder of minister of Interior makes a big impact, Himmet decides to take advantage of it and he makes his team help the fight against terrorism bureau.
Three macabre short stories about gambling, vengeance and homicide.
It's the end of the century at a corner of the city in a building riddled with crime - Everyone in the building has turned into zombies. After Jenny's boyfriend is killed in a zombie attack, she faces the challenge of surviving in the face of adversity. In order to stay alive, she struggles with Andy to flee danger.
Bridget Jones navigates life as a widow and single mum with the help of her family, friends, and former lover, Daniel. Back to work and on the apps, she's pursued by a younger man and maybe – just maybe – her son's science teacher.
Aurora Teagarden and her boyfriend Martin are thrilled when they get an unexpected visit from his niece and her new baby. Their excitement is short lived when his niece disappears and the baby is left behind. Once again, Aurora finds herself drawn into a deadly investigation as she risks it all to help Martin reunite with his family.
A wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his apartment window and becomes convinced one of them has committed murder.
The untold origin story of Optimus Prime and Megatron, better known as sworn enemies, but once were friends bonded like brothers who changed the fate of Cybertron forever.