In the 1920s in China, Songlian (Gong Li), an educated 19-year-old beauty, is forced into marriage as the fourth wife of a wealthy and powerful old man. She soon discovers that each wife has her own separate quarters and servants, and spends most of her time battling to attract her husband's attention. (A red lantern is placed outside the door of the wife the old man ch…
In contemporary Tunisia, a young woman (Leila Schenna) attempts to reconcile her village's traditional way of life with what she learns of the outside world following a strike by the villagers against a powerful corporation. A tale of the enormous psychological and economic consequences of independence from colonialism, Jean-Louis Bertucelli's Ramparts of Clay is a magn…
Medieval warlord Hidetora Ichimonji (Tatsuya Nakadai) cedes power over his empire to the oldest of his three sons, setting off a chain of tragic events fueled by greed, ambition, anger, and betrayal. With the 1985 release of his epic adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear, Akira Kurosawa achieved considerably more than a mere resuscitation of his career. Ran is an emotionally w…
In the Woods It's happened to you. You've gone to a movie with someone, either loved or hated what you saw on the screen, and as you leave the theatre together, you realize that you've each had the exact opposite response. Then one of you pops the inevitable, rhetorical question: “Did we see the same movie?” The answer, of course, is no. You both looked at the sa…
Little Pascal (Pascal Lamorisse) is a lonely French boy who befriends a wondrous red balloon that follows him everywhere. When catastrophe in the form of bullying, jealous children causes the balloon's demise, every other balloon in Paris comes flying to the aid and comfort of the devastated Pascal. Directed by the resourceful and inventive Albert Lamorisse (Pascal�…
Akahige Akira Kurosawa's engrossing epic is the story of a tough but compassionate physician (Toshiro Mifune) in 19th-century Japan who does his best to treat patients from every walk of life, while simultaneously training a young intern. Red Beard was mistakenly dismissed by some upon its release as a soap opera in disguise. While it may share some of the plot elements of an …
Il Deserto Rosso Michelangelo Antonioni went for broke in designing the images of his first color film, the story of an alienated woman (Monica Vitti) who searches for meaning and purpose in the industrial, lunar-like landscape of northern Italy. Antonioni uses settings and carefully controlled colors to represent Vitti's deteriorating, increasingly fractured mental state. His…
A masterpiece. Though it was inspired by a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, The Red Shoes is an absolute original, and the quintessential film from writers/producers/directors Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, known together as the Archers. It's the story of a talented young ballerina named Victoria Page, (Moira Shearer) who studies under the unforgiving,…
A stunning visual and narrative achievement, this extraordinary film from China—the directorial debut of the gifted Zhang Yimou—succeeds on every level. Set in rural China in the 1920s, the sweeping plot—comprised of equal parts romance, comedy, drama, and horror—is the story of a beautiful young woman (Gong Li) who arrives at a provincial winery betrothed…
Les Rendez-vous de Paris The three tales of young love that comprise Eric Rohmer's twentieth feature are engaging, wise, revealing, and deeply funny, demonstrating anew that at age 75, Rohmer may well be the most perceptive chronicler of young people in all cinema. The first story tells of a trusting woman whose refusal to believe the rumors about her boyfriend's alleged infidelities…
Above all, there's the rabbit. Movie history is littered with symbols of characters’ madness and gradual descent into insanity, but the dish containing the unrefrigerated, rotting rabbit in Roman Polanski's great thriller Repulsion will have to be given a place of honor at the entrance to the Psycho Killer Hall of Fame. Catherine Deneuve is the manicurist whose unresolved sexu…
Le Retour de Martin Guerre In this intriguing, well-written fable set in 16th-century France, a dissolute village husband disappears soon after his marriage. Years later, someone who appears to be Martin Guerre returns (Gérard Depardieu), allegedly from war, and appears kinder, more educated, and far more sympathetic than the man that most of the village (including his …
Hachigatsu no Kyoshikyoku This 1992 Kurosawa film was regarded as minor and uncharacteristic by some, yet I find it to be one of the most moving and heartfelt pictures of his career. The basic story is contemporary; a group of teenagers take a trip to Nagasaki to see their aging grandmother, whose husband died in the atomic bombing of the city. As her story is gradually and tenderly revealed, Kuro…
In 1783, a young French engineer (Charles Berling) is determined to drain the dangerous, disease-infested swamps he lives near, and which are causing illness and death among the area's children. He finds, however, that to have his case even heard at the Versailles court of Louis XVI requires the manipulative skills of a politician, the clarity of thought of a philosopher and t…
La Prise de Pouvoir par Louis XIV Roberto Rossellini's masterful and remarkably intimate “docudrama” details the life and court intrigues of the 17th century's Sun King. The best and most frequently screened of a series of historical portraits Rossellini created for French television, The Rise of Louis XIV is disorienting at first because of its straightforward, workman…
Rocco et Ses Freres Rocco e I Suoi Fratelli A classic film from Italy's Luchino Visconti, about the impact on the lives of four brothers when they move with their widowed mother (Katina Paxinou) from the Italian countryside to a very different lifestyle in Milan. The fate of each of the sons is chronicled in marvelous detail over the course of the film's three hours, an…
Szegenylegenyek Nehezeletuck The Hopeless Ones The Poor Outlaws In a 19th-century prison camp, Hungarian peasants and herdsman are rounded up, terrorized, and brutally tortured by the Austrian Army following their suspected participation in a popular uprising. Miklós Jancsó's grim and incendiary historical epic was made in 1965, and was clearly intended—despite the peri…