The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie

Luis Buñuel, France, 1972 (8.6*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
#99, Top Ranked 1000 Films, 2011 Update, all polls.

Probably the most affable and accessible of the Spanish master’s films, as many are a bit serious or obscure for the average filmgoer. On the surface, this is a comedy about a suburban dinner party.

However, as you would expect from Buñuel, you don’t exactly plan then have a successful dinner party. This story begins innocently enough, but you soon find yourself once again in the mind of an inventive and creative filmmaker, the same one who in his The Exterminating Angel, has guests to a dinner enjoy the meal and the company then find they cannot leave the room.

The dinner party gets delayed by a series of random and spontaneous events that include the hosts having afternoon sex, and a military patrol on war game maneuvers uses the house for a field headquarters.

As usual in his films, what you get out of this is going to depend on what you bring into it, but I wouldn’t look for anything too deep here – I believe this film is more enjoyable than most of his because of that, and for the excellent cast led by Fernando Rey, and the award-winning Stéphane Audran.

Winner of the Foreign Language Film Oscar® for 1972, and six awards total out of 11 nominations

#16 on the Top Ranked Comedy Films of All-Time, 2011 Update

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In a Better World

Susanne Bier, Denmark, 2010 (8.6*)
Best Foreign Language Film (AA, GG)

Bier finally got a well-deserved Oscar® for foreign language film for this one about a doctor who shares his time between a refugee hospital in Africa and his family life in Denmark. Bier excels at paring away the surface of complex psychogical relationshiops between family members. Her earlier films After the Wedding,  (2006), which also had a Danish man volunteering to help the needy (in that case orphans in Mumbai, India), and Brothers (2004, about a husband that goes missing in the Afghanistan war and whose brother begins to take his place at home) were excellent works of art about intra-family relationships and self-discovery. I thought both deserved this long overdue award for her.

In this story, the horrors of Africa are at least partially offset by finding romance back in Denmark, when Anton, played by Mikael Persbrandt, newly separated, becomes interested in the divorced mother of one of his son’s schoolmates. The two boys become good friends first, when Anton’s son, new at school, comes to the aid of a boy targeted by bullies.

The film starts slowly but subtly escalates into some unforseeen territory, especially the story involving the boys. A little schoolyard bullying is just a prelude to more dramatic events. The adults in Bier’s films often have their lives shaped and affected by their children, and their own plans and designs become secondary to the immediate reality of being involved in the lives of others through being a parent. In most of her stories, the well-being of the group as a whole outweighs the desires of the individuals.

These are intelligent adult dramas in which there are no pat answers or typically ‘Hollywood’ solutions, which often means that two people agree they are in love then all the other problems magically disappear, film over. Bier is arguably the best woman director in the world right now (ok, I’ll say top three with India’s Deepa Mehta and Mira Nair), and her films never provide easy outs to complex stories, but rather require huge emotional commitment on the part of her characters to face life’s challenges head on.

In a Better World won 5 awards out of 13 nominations, not as many as her earlier films. For those who haven’t seen her work, I’d start with Brothers (13 awards), and the original not the U.S. remake, and then After the Wedding (9 awards), which I think is a masterpiece.

Susanne Bier

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Nights of Cabiria

Federico Fellini, Italy, 1957, bw (8.5*)
Cabiria is a wide-eyed, waifish street walker from a poor section of Rome, wonderfully played by Guilietta Masina. We can pretty much surmise her life from the few scenes shown to us by Fellini.

She only seeks true love, but is instead nearly drowned by her boyfriend, who also steals money from her. A movie star takes her home. An accountant says he saw her on the stage once, fate brought them together again. and so on.. In spite of all this, she still inhabits a sad and lonely world - after all, this is Italian realism. No "pretty woman", this is more like real life - the hookers in Hollywood (Klute, Pretty Woman, L.A. Confidential, with Oscars for those 3 actresses by the way) all seem to be only the high-class escort variety, not real streetwalkers.

This is a simple film, carried totally by the performance of Masina, who snares the audience early and then you're caught. To me, this is the best performance in all of Fellini's films. She seems resigned to her life, yet is also childishly hopeful. She still possesses a vitality that life should have drained by now. The fact that Fellini is her husband makes this perhaps the finest collaboration of spouses in Italian cinema. Thankfully, Fellini didn't fill this story with surrealism, it's more like La Strada than 8 ½.

Oscar winner for foreign language film, and a total of 15 awards, 4 for Giulietta Masina for best actress. No. 223 on the IMDB 250, No. 136 on our compendium of all net polls.

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Bicycle Thieves

Ladri di biciclette
Vittorio De Sica, Italy, (1949) bw (9.2*)
Best Foreign Film (AA, GG)
Best Film (BAA)
In this hallmark film of Italian post-war realism, former actor Vittorio De Sica used all amateur actors and a street realism style with stunning results. De Sica presents probably the most uncompromising and least hopeful of film stories, the film is so depressing that I've had a hard time recommending it here.

The story is a simple one, a poor Italian man, played by factory worker Lamberto Maggiorani, with a young boy gets a job posting film signs only because he has a bicycle. But like most material objects in harsh economic conditions, it gets stolen. Now the man has no bicycle to get to his job, therefore it threatens his job as well. This bicycle becomes the holy grail of this man's life and of this film.

De Sica and the other post-war realists didn't believe in the make-believe world presented by films prior to the war. Rather than escape from reality, they sought to bring the harsh reality of everyday life to the filmgoing public, perhaps with the hope that by raising awareness of the plight of some, people will be angered enough to work to make those conditions more dignified.

It's hard not to be moved by this film. Considered by many one of the finest films ever made, it certainly should be near the top of most polls. No. 85 on the IMDB 250, No. 16 on our compendium of all film polls so it's apparent that critics rank this film a much higher than the general public.

Winner of 16 awards (out of 17 nominations), including an Oscar® and Golden Globe for best foreign language film, and a British academy award (BAFTA) for best overall film.

Note: growing up, this film was always "The Bicycle Thief" - I'm not sure when or why it became plural, but I'm using the title used at IMDB

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Departures

Yôjirô Takita, 2008, Japan (10.0*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
This is quite simply one of the most graceful, elegant, and lyrical films I've ever seen, and one of the most beautiful to watch. It's also one of the most emotionally moving and poignant ever made.

A young married cellist, Daigo (Masahiro Motoki) plays for a small orchestra that is not making enough money to survive, so its owner dissolves the group. Daigo and his wife (Ryôko Hirosue) decide to go back to the small town he grew up in because they can live in his mother's small house that he inherited.

When he arrives, he needs work, and he sees an ad that simply says immediate help needed, with no further information. It turns out that a corpse preparer, Ikuei Sasaki, needs an assistant, and has trouble keeping people. Apprehensive at first, he quickly adapts to the ritualistic and graceful tasks, and the respect shown for the departed as his own mother is dead, and his father left the family when he was six.

The screenplay is full of metaphors. Water is constantly in use, both in a ritual purification before burial, and as a healing cleanser for the living; a local public bathhouse and its proprietor are used prominently, for spiritual as well as physical healing. Snow is also used, for the pristine cleanliness and beauty of the natural world. Swans are shown landing and swimming on lakes. Along with snow, in the springtime there are flurries of cherry blossums. Both the interiors and exteriors are shown for the beauty inherent in each.

Stones are another metaphor - they are used to send messages to another by the type of stone given from person-to-person, something done in ancient times before letters. A rough stone meant the giver was worried about the recipient; a small, smooth one just the opposite. They also imply a permanence seldom found in the world of the living.

Food is also used to symbolize life; as the director (in a dvd interview) and a character says, "to eat is to live, life is impossible without eating". Also that most food is something dead, so the dead provide nourishment for the living. This is one of the more literary screenplays you will ever see.

This was a 15-year project for director Yôjirô Takita, after the idea was brought to him by one of the actors, Masahiro Motoki. Though screenplay credit goes solely to Kundô Koyama, in an interview Takita said that he did the first rough draft, then it was completed by himself and the actors together.

Overall, the film won 33 awards (out of just 39 nominations), including 10 of 13 Japanese academy awards for film, director, actor, cinematography, editing, screenplay, sound, lighting, supporting actor, and supporting actress. The only 3 it lost were actress, art direction, and score.

Departures won many other best films awards: Oscar® for foreign language film, Hawaii Int'l Film fest, Hochi film awards, Kinema Junpo awards, Mainichi Film Concours, Montreal World Film fest, Nikkon Sports Film awards, Palm Springs Int'l Film fest, Udine Far East film fest, Wisconsin film fest, Yokohama Film fest. The only awards missing seem to be BAFTA, Cannes, and Sundance. Masahiro Motoki won 5 best actors awards for his lead performance.

Awards (15) for director Takita, who said he was most pleased that such a personal and such a Japanese film meant something to viewers in other nations around the world.

Director Yôjirô Takita,

accepting his Oscar®

This is an instant classic, one of the best Japanese films of all time, and one of the best films about life and death ever made. Easily an all-time top 100 film for me, and I think for many others as well. This film more than any other captures the solemn, respectful Japanese ritualistic culture like no other.

Departures joins these other four Oscar winners from Japan:
1951: Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa)
1954: Gate of Hell (Teinosuke Kinugasa)
1955: Samurai 1: Musashi Miyamoto (Hiroshi Inagaki)
1975: Dersu Uzala (Soviet Union/Japan - Akira Kurosawa)

Note: I apologize for such a long review, I normally write capsule reviews that can be read quickly, but I was obviously very much impressed with this film, as was the film-viewing world. This  is only the 40th perfect 10 rating I've given out.

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The Garden of the Finzi-Continis

Vittorio De Sica, Italy, 1970 (8.4*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
The Finzi-Continis are a family of wealthy, aristocratic Jews living in Italy during the 1920's. They routinely open up their spacious gardens to the public so everyone can enjoy nature's beauty. Part of that beauty is Dominique Sanda, who is exquisite as Micol, who seems to enjoy toying with the emotions of her suitors between rounds of tennis and parties. The tranquility of the garden and serenity of the estate isolate the family from the growing current of fascism that will lead to the war and the holocaust.

De Sica, unlike his early films, fills Garden with lush, romantic images, in a kind of hazy, painterly color palette, almost as if seeing a film of a dream of an idyllic lifestyle that only exists briefly, if at all. Though it does not rank with De Sica's best (The Bicycle Thief, Umberto D.), it's still another classic Italian film, and well worth seeing for its own merits.

Winner of eight awards overall, including the Oscar® for foreign language film

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The Shop On Main St.

Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos, 1965, Czechoslovakia, bw (9.0*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
A terrific film on a little known subject, the 'Aryanization' of Jewish businesses in Europe, in which the Nazis sent in those of pure, Aryan race to basically take over Jewish businesses when Jews were banned from owning or operating any. This story takes place in occupied Czechoslavakia, when an Aryan male is sent to run a tiny button shop on Main St. in a small Czech village.

Ida Kaminska plays the shopkeeper, in a performance that garnered an Oscar® nomination for lead actress; it's one of the more believable in Oscar® history as she's so wonderfully understated that you never suspect she's acting. Jozef Króner is the man (Tono) sent to take over her shop, and he's in for a real education, as he discovers a huge Jewish support network that actually pays salary to small shopkeepers who would be out of business otherwise.

This is an eye-opening story that looks at anti-Semitism literally at street level, how it affects the daily lives of small villagers. It's an important film in the pantheon of holocaust films, and one of the best films to ever come out of the Czech Republic. The film won four awards for foreign language film, including the Oscar® in 1966.

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The Secret in Their Eyes

(El secreto de sus ojos)
Juan José Campanella, Argentina, 2009 (9.5*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
A retired couselor, played by Ricardo Darín, who worked for the court system in Argentina, is writing a novel about a homicide case that haunted his career. He goes to visit a former female colleague, Soledad Villamil, to discuss the case and get some input for shaping the story for his novel - he wants credibility, he's not just writing a memoir. The original homicide case, as well as the couple's work history, is then shown in flashbacks, from the time the politically connected Irene is newly hired into the office of a court judge where Benjamin is a dedicated and determined mid-level bureaucrat.

What follows is a complex and sophisticated crime story, which takes the viewers on a serpentine path that wanders from past to present. At times this is a mentally engrossing puzzle, but at others can be a brutal, conscience churning exercise in trying to understand the will and methods of governments, especially one controlled by police state fascists.

Mixed with the homicide investigation is an undercurrent of romantic intrigue, as the older bachelor, mired in a anonymous obscurity, has an obvious attraction for the younger, attractive, but engaged Irene. This is understated but to some may seem an unnecessary sub-plot that detracts from the crime story; it's for this reason that I didn't rate this a 10. Still, the screenplay, from a novel by Eduardo Sacheri, is terrific, as are the cinematography, editing, and Campanella's superb directing. This is one of the best crime films of the first decade of the new millenium, some are saying 'of all time'.

Including the Oscar® for Foreign Language Film, Secret won 34 international awards, and had another 19 nominations (awards page at IMDB). It's currently ranked #170 on the IMDB top 250, as rated by regular reviewers. It won 13 Argentinian academy awards with another 4 nominations.

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No Man’s Land

Danis Tanovic, 2001, Bosnia (8.7*)
Best Foreign Film (AA,GG)
This is a riveting story about the futility of war and how politics can sometimes reach unbelievable absurdities, using a really simple story on the surface. A couple of soldiers in the Bosnian-Herzegovinian conflict wander into the no man’s land between the two artificially and diplomatically drawn lines. Pretty soon one from the other side becomes trapped with them in an odd sort of stalemate involving a bomb placed under one while he was unconscious.

By the time they done little or nothing the whole event has been sniffed out by the media and becomes a major news event, threatening to have international consequences. More cerebral than action, director Danis Tanovic’s film deservedly won an Oscar® and a Golden Globe for Foreign Language Film, and numerous other small festival awards.

Awards page at IMDB: No Man's Land Awards

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The Barbarian Invasions

Denys Arcand, 2003 (8.4*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
This touching and poignant film is about the last days of a middle-aged Canadian man with cancer. Remy gathers his family and close friends around, and after abusing the healthcare system by occupying an entire unused hospital floor, the whole group moves to a peaceful country cottage on a lake for his final days. Instead of being morose and gloomy, Arcand manages to make us feel joy along with Remy to be so surrounded by loving companions and family for his final days. This is a tough subject to pull of, and the film bears similarities to both The Big Chill and Bergman's Cries and Whispers, but manages to make us feel better than either of those. This was made for Canadian TV as a sequel to Arcand's Decline and Fall of the American Empire, but won a well-deserved Oscar for Foreign Language film.

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Nowhere in Africa

Caroline Link, Germany, 2001 (9.0*)

Best Foreign Film (AA)

Terrific story of a Jewish family who decides to move to Kenya from Germany to escape the Nazis just before World War 2. This is a riveting and very personal story, perfectly acted and constructed.

The majority of the story involves the wife, brilliantly played by Juliane Kohler, and her only child, a daughter. The film spans years, we get to see the effect of being far removed from a homeland has on the parents, and the effect of being raised in Africa on the daughter.

African actor Merab Ninidze is terrific and extremely likeable as the family's cook, who quietly helps them all cope with life in Africa. This film was everything Out of Africa should have been, it's much more real and believable, and more humane. This is a film I can watch again and again. One Oscar - Caroline Link becoming just the 2nd woman to win an Oscar® for directing a foreign language film. Marlene Gorris (Netherlands) was the first, in 1996 for Antonia's Line.

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Samurai 1: Musashi Miyamoto

Dir: Hiroshi Inagaki, Japan, 1954 (8.4*)

Best Foreign Film (AA)

This samurai epic has some breathtaking cinematography, that alone elevating it a class above the average Japanese film, deservedly got an Oscar for Foreign Film... the director Hiroshi Inagaki is the star here, the actors, including the famous Tishiro Mifune, are truly just pieces of his vision which includes the poetic, yet overwhelming landscape. The only drawback, other than slowish pacing, is that the film (from Criterion) is in fullscreen, not wide. The first part of a trilogy by Inagaki, it comes as a set also.

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Closely Watched Trains

Jirí Menzell, Czechoslovakia, 1966, bw (7.7*)

Best Foreign Film (AA)

This offbeat film is about a young, bumbling apprentice train dispatcher in a small Czech town during the Nazi occupation. It's an odd time frame for a romantic comedy about losing one's virginity, while being surrounded by others also more interested in amorous activities than some silly world war. It's almost as if the war inside everyone's pants takes precedence, one hardly notices the real war, just some occasional German train officials who come around to talk about "watching the trains closely".

There's not a lot of substance here, but some tasteful comedy about virginity and lust, and mildly erotic scenes done in good taste, especially a famous one involving rubber-stamping a flirtatious teenage girl inside the dispatcher's station. One Oscar

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All About My Mother

Pedro Almodovar, 1999, Spain (7.8*)

Best Foreign Film (AA, BAA)

Almodovar's cinematic homage to women reaches new heights in this Oscar® winner, he even dedicates it to: "All women who play actresses, all women, and all those who want to be women", so aside from real women, the cast also includes some gender-benders. The film begins with people watching Bette Davis in All About Eve, so the connection to 50's dramas about women is made immediately by Almodovar.

It's a fictionalized account of the mother of a teenager who wants to be a screenwriter, a mother who once was an actress apparently, but nothing big. Her life connects with some real stage actresses (doing Tennessee Williams' "Streecar Named Desire"), and the stories of each individual is really what Almodovar's films are all about: the unique, creative people all around who inspire his films, especially women. The Argentinian actress, Cecelia Roth, who plays the mother, was riveting - soapy, yet sincere and believable. The music, I believe by Antonio Inglesias, is very good in all Almodovar's films, and it never intrudes on the scene.

One Oscar® and one of just five films (The Lives of Others, Babette's Feast, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Cinema Paradiso) to win both the U.S. and British academy awards for foreign language film.

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The Counterfeiters

Stefan Ruzowitzsky, 2007, Austria (7.8*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
Engrossing story of a true Nazi plot to counterfeit so many British pounds and U.S. dollars as to affect those economies by flooding the market with bogus money, inflating the currencies. This was possible due to master forger Salomon Sorowitsch, brilliantly played by Karl Marcovichs, being caught by a Nazi officer who knew his skills, and when promoted to head of the secret counterfeiting operation, he brings Salomon onto the team of the best printers, engravers, and forgers the Nazis could round up.

This film is immaculate in its details, and becomes a film about honor vs. survival as do many WW2 stories. Won the Oscar in 2008 for Foreign Language Film.

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War and Peace

Sergei Bondarchuk, 1968, Russia (8.5*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)
This won’t be for all tastes, as it runs over six hours, but as epics go, it is the "most epic" of all, featuring over 250,000 extras (the Red Army), and costing at the time, a record 100 million dollars. They actually made the definitive film of Leo Tolstoy’s novel, maybe a little Hollywood influenced, but still far better than any other attempt at this novel yet.

If you haven’t read the novel, this film should suffice, it’s actually a little long and tedious so this shortens the effort by a few dozen hours, and you won’t miss anything! It is, of course, based on Napoleon’s invasion of Russia intertwined with the personal stories of some Russian aristocrats.

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Amarcord

Dir: Federico Fellini, 1974, Italy (8.4*)

Best Foreign Film (AA)

This is probably Fellini’s most accessible film, as he fondly recalls his childhood through cinema, perhaps rose-colored by time and distance, but enjoyable nonetheless. Here he paints a vivid picture of rural Italy, or more accurately 'village life', how one’s life is shaped by religion, family, school, early friends, and adolescent fantasies and dreams. Here, Fellini’s fantasies and artistic style make a more universal connection as he avoids the fantastical surrealism and religious allegory that pervades his most famous film, 8½, and some others, making them too abstract and difficult for the mainstream filmgoer.

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Mephisto

Dir: Istvan Szabo, Hungary, 1981 (8.8*)
Best Foreign Film (AA)

This disturbing film about an actor in Nazi Germany put Klaus Maria Brandauer on the map, with a great performance as a man who "sells his soul" in order to remain an actor, basically by doing plays that the Nazi establishment choose for him to perform in Berlin, the most popular being Mephisto in Faust’s play. The ultimate statement concerns whether one remains true to his career or true to his heart. The novel my Thomas Mann's son Klaus, is based on the life story of his brother-in-law, an actor in Berlin. You may be also interested in Szabo's other film that covers this period in history, Sunshine, a multi-generational history of a Jewish family in Austria. Oscar® for foreign language film.

Quote: I’m just an actor, what do you want from me? (Brandauer)

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Kolya

Dir: Jan Sverak, 1996 (10*)

Best Foreign Film (AA, GG)

This small and beautiful film from the Czech Republic is one of the more touching and uplifting in recent decades. The story concerns a cellist and avowed bachelor, brilliantly played the director's father, and script co-author Zdenak Sverak. His character can't find enough work as a classical cellist, and augments his paltry income by playing funeral music at church services. Needing money, he answers an ad, and marries a Russian woman with a young son for a fee (of a few thousand), so she can become a Czech citizen and get out of Russia.

She immediately disappears and the musician is stuck with her little boy, Kolya - and he grudgingly puts up with the situation. Young Andrej Shalimon is a delight, and was found in Moscow at the last minute after the director had rejected all other (thousands) auditioners. This is a wonderful film, with a beautiful story and shot that way with an uncanny eye for clarity. Young Andrej is one of the more lovable characters in the history of cinema, and I'm sure part of his magnetism is that he's not an actor, this is just how kids are.

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Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Ang Lee, Yuen Woo-Ping, 2000, China (10*)

Best Foreign Film (AA, BAA)

A poetic and mythical masterpiece from China, an epic about a stolen sword. Chow Yung-Fat is perfect as the martial arts master who has the sword stolen, and dimunitive Ziyi Zhang (the world's most popular actress) is the likely suspect, only she remains an elusive quarry.

Many magical cinematic moments and acrobatic martial arts make this a visual treat, as master Taiwanese director Ang Lee (Sense and Sensibility, Brokeback Mountain, Eat Drink Man Woman) got directorial help for the martial arts from action director Yuen Woo-Ping. Classical cellist Yo-Yo Ma provided a beautiful soundtrack score, which won an Oscar®. 5 Oscars® overall, second only to Gladiator's 6 that year.

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