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November 2007
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Forei gn Films
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New to View
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Vol. 1, No. 8 |
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The Foreign Films New to View newsletter is a monthly publication designed to keep you up to date on some of HCPL's latest foreign films on DVD. The selections in this newsletter are just a sample of the rich variety of films available to you through your library. Use the sign-up box to have this newsletter sent directly to your e-mail every month, with new, recommended movies for you to view. See Foreign Films Archive.
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12:08 East of Bucharest, directed by Corneliu Porumboiu
(in Romanian, with English subtitles)
Sixteen years have passed since the fall of the notorious Nicolae Ceausescu and his hated wife Elena. An anchorman in a provincial town invites two acquaintances to relive those fateful revolutionary moments in their town, when Romania was finally liberated from the tyranny of Communism. But the drunken school teacher and the retiree, known also as the local Santa Claus at Christmas time, are not entirely clear in their memories of just what happened that day. Did the school teacher really lead a cadre of compatriots into the town square to stage their own revolution, or is this all part of his imagination? Whether as tragedy or farce, history, as recounted by these broadcast guests, emerges in all its ironically parodic glory.
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Andrei Rublev, directed by Andrei Tarkovskij
(in Russian, with English subtitles)
Russia in the 15th Century was a turbulent time of Tatar invasions and infighting amoung Russian princes. Rublev, a monk and an icon painter, witnessed the horrors of his day and took a vow of silence in response. Originally made in 1965, this film was suppressed until 1971. It explores the artist's responsibility to participate in rather than just witness and chronicle history.
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Best of Youth, directed by Marco Tullio Giordana
(in Italian, with English subtitles)
This DVD is not new to HCPL, but it is one that you may want to view. Originally released as a miniseries for Italian TV, The Best of Youth focuses on a family over several decades in modern-day Italy. Nicola and Matteo are brothers who may not always agree on politics, but they both share a deep compassion for humankind. While the saga explores some of the most dramatic and tumultuous times of modern Italy - the tragic flooding of Florence, the de-institutionalization of the mentally ill, the rise of the Red Brigade - it also brings forward the everyday drama of a family through more than three decades of love and sorrow.
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Hiroshima Mon Amour, directed by Alain Resnais
(in French, with English subtitles)
A Japanese architect and a French actress engage in a brief but intense affair in Hiroshima several years after the end of World War II. Both share their personal memories of the war - he by revealing his first-hand experience with nuclear disaster and she by recalling her traumatic affair with a German soldier.
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Waiting for Happiness, directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
(in French, Hassanya, and Japanese, with English subtitles)
Abdallah has been away from his West African village long enough for him to feel adrift. He can no longer connect, in fact, to the land of his birth. Sissako takes us on a calm, poetic exploration of the lives of the inhabitants of the village and Adballah's interaction with them. |
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June 2007
July 2007
August 2007
September 2007
October 2007
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