matti's - Rented List
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Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953)Les Vacances De Monsieur Hulot / Monsieur Hulot's Holiday
The film that brought Jacques Tati international acclaim also launched his on-screen alter ego: the courteous, well-meaning, eternally accident-prone Monsieur Hulot with whom Tati would from now on be inseparably associated. As with Jour de fete, Vacances is set in a sleepy French coastal resort which is seasonally disrupted by holidaymakers in energetic pursuit of fun. At the centre of the chaos is the eccentric Hulot, struggling at all times to maintain appearances, but somehow entirely divorced from his immediate surroundings. There is little plot in Tati's beautifully orchestrated 'ballet' of comic action: it's a series of incidents, a seamless succession of gently studies of human absurdity. - Director:
- Jacques Tati
- Cast:
- Jacques Tati, Nathalie Pascaud, Louis Perrault
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The Shop on the High Street (1965)Obchod na korze
Small-town Slovakia 1942. Nazi concentration camp deportations have begun. Tono, a poor carpenter, is appointed 'Aryan controller' of the elderly and frail Jewish widow Rozalia's shop. Believing Tono is her new assistant, the two develop a friendship in which he maintains that illusion to try and protect her from the encroaching Nazi terror. Wonderfully written and performed, and with an extraordinary Zdenek Liska score, the film becomes a devastating examination of how minor compromises can finally lead to complicity in the horrors of tyranny. - Director:
- Ján Kadár
- Cast:
- Ida Kaminska, Jozef Króner, Hana Slivková
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Pan's Labyrinth (2006)El laberinto del fauno
Visionary director Guillermo del Toro creates a unique, richly imagined epic with Pan's Labyrinth, a gothic fairy tale set against the postwar era of Fanco's Spain. Pan's Labyrinth unfolds throught the eyes of Ofelia, a young girl uprooted to a remote military outpost commanded by her new stepfather. Powerless and lonely in a place of great danger, Ofelia lives out her own dark fable as she confronts monsters both otherworldly and human after she discovers a neglected labyrith behind the family home. There she meets Pan, a fantastical creature who challenges her with three tasts which he claims will reveal her true identity. - Director:
- Guillermo Del Toro
- Cast:
- Ivana Baquero, Pablo Adán, Ariadna Gil
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No Kidding (1960)Beware of Children
The premise involves a young couple, David and Catherine Robinson (Leslie Phillips and a young Geraldine McEwan), who have to turn their large country house into a money-making proposition. Their solution is to invite the kids of the rich and famous to spend a summer enjoying all the loving care and attention they miss at home. After the youngsters arrive, David quickly realizes what the offensive little punks need is some real discipline, and so the summer begins. An amiable British farce that has a semblance of the St. Trinian's series, 'No Kidding' is surprisingly sophisticated fare that also scores a number of interesting points about greed, privilege and class. - Director:
- Gerald Thomas
- Cast:
- Leslie Phillips, Geraldine McEwan, Julia Lockwood
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Intimate Strangers (2004)Confidences Trop Intimes
Walking into the wrong room, Anna (Sandrine Bonnaire) ends up confessing her marriage problems to a financial adviser named William Faber (Fabrice Luchini). Touched by her distress and somewhat excited by her presence, Faber does not have the courage to reveal to her that he is not actually a psychiatrist. As time progresses, a strange relationship ensues. William is moved by the young woman, and fascinated to hear her confess her deepest secrets. But who is Anna and is she really fooled by this little game? - Director:
- Patrice Leconte
- Cast:
- Sandrine Bonnaire, Fabrice Luchini, Michel Duchaussoy
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Quai des Orfèvres (1947)Jenny Lamour / Quay of the Goldsmiths
A marriage that has fallen on hard times is further tested by the couple's implication in a murder. Jenny Lamour (Suzy Delair) is a music hall chanteuse married to her pianist husband Maurice (Bernard Blier). Keen to get ahead, Jenny leaps at the chance when an ageing wealthy businessman (Charles Dullin) offers her the chance of some gigs. However, when she agrees to a meeting at his home and he is found dead later in the evening - Maurice's untamed jealousy is in the frame. A Maigret-esque detective, Antoine, played by Louis Jouvet leaves no stone unturned in his exceedingly private investigations of the down-at-heel showbiz couple's sad, tempestuous life. 'Quai des Orfevres' was Henri-Georges Clouzot's first film in four years. He had been banned from film making following the controversy surrounding the release Le Corbeau. - Director:
- Henri-Georges Clouzot
- Cast:
- Louis Jouvet, Simone Renant, Bernard Blier
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Two Women (1960)La Ciociara
"Two Women" tells the story of a young widow, Cesira (Sophia Loren) and her 12 year old daughter who flee war-ravaged Rome to Cesira's native village in Ciociaria. Yet, as the allied forces push back the German occupation, the two women fall victim to a devastatingly brutal act at the very hand of the country's liberators. - Director:
- Vittorio De Sica
- Cast:
- Sophia Loren, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Raf Vallone
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Eve (Natasha Parry), Carole (Diana Dors), Georgie (Petula Clarke) and Mary (Jane Hylton) all work in the same local factory. Their only means of escape from the daily grind are the Saturday nights they spend at the Chiswick Palais, dancing to big band jazz. Eve is just looking for a good time, enjoying the attention from her many male admirers, Carole is searching for a future husband, Georgie dreams of one day dancing professionally, and Mary has seen it all before. Together they share their hopes and aspirations leading up to the biggest event on their calendar, the Chiswick Palais dance contest. - Director:
- Charles Crichton
- Cast:
- Donald Houston, Bonar Colleano, Petula Clark
- Formats:
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The South (1983)El Sur
Recalling her youth in 1950s northern Spain, Estrella revisits her relationship with her beloved father Agustin, raised in the south, and realises how little she knew of him and his secrets. Victor Erice's delicate and mysterious film reveals his abiding fascination with memory and loss, missed opportunities and the links between private dreams and political realities. The performances, like the meticulously lit compositions and evocative soundtrack, are superb; Omero Antonutti is a charismatic Agustin, while Sonsoles Aranguren and Iciar Bollain shine as, respectively, the young and teenaged Estrella. Exquisitely beautiful, profoundly moving. - Director:
- Víctor Erice
- Cast:
- Omero Antonutti, María Massip, Sonsoles Aranguren
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At the southern border of Europe, just sixteen kilometres separate Africa from Spain: The Straits of Gibraltar. Risk, adrenaline and money are available to anyone able to cross that distance in a boat loaded with hashish, flying over the waves and with the police in tow. El Niño and his friend El Compi want to enter the world of drug trafficking to make some quick cash to try kickstart their way to a better life. Watching their every move are police officers Jesús and Eva, who have spent years trying to prove that the hashish trail is now one of the main cocaine entry routes in Europe. Their target is El Inglés (Ian McShane), the man who pulls the strings from his base of operations in Gibraltar, safe from Spanish jurisdiction. But El Inglés is watching them too, and as the warnings they receive become more violent, they know that they are on the right track... The fates of these characters on both sides of the law eventually cross over to reveal that the confrontations in the drug trafficking world are more dangerous, complex and morally ambiguous than they would have imagined. - Director:
- Daniel Monzón
- Cast:
- Ian McShane, Luis Tosar, Sergi López
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Get Nick! Big shot Steve Case knows only one man can shape up his troubled banana-republic plantation - fireball foreman Nick Butler. But Nick may be a little distracted. He's just met stranded American Lee Donley, a chanteuse who can hold her own at a card table. Especially if she's dealing. Off-screen pals James Cagney and Pat O'Brien team for the eighth time in this snappy action comedy. In a role widely cited as putting her on the movie fan's map, Hollywood's "Oomph Girl" Ann Sheridan portrays wisecracking Lee. Now add superb support, zippy repartee, plus 950 banana trees planted over 5 backlot acres and the heat is on. "You and your 14-carat oomph", Cagney says in the film's final clinch. - Director:
- William Keighley
- Cast:
- James Cagney, Ann Sheridan, Pat O'Brien
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Joe Scot (Daniel Craig) is a washed-up Hollywood star whose hedonistic lifestyle of sex, drugs and celebrity has taken its toll. Flashback to his childhood and small-town English seaside life set to the beat of Roxy music and Bowie. Joe's rites of passage as a young man lay the foundations for the Hollywood dream he goes on to experience. Confronted by tragedy, he is forced to flee in search of a new life, and only now does he finally face up to the ghost of his past. - Director:
- Baillie Walsh
- Cast:
- Daniel Craig, Erich Conrad, Harry Eden
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Stromboli, Land of God (1950)Stromboli, terra di Dio
"Stromboli, Land of God" follows Karin (Ingrid Bergman), a young Lithuanian woman who, eager to escape from a refugee camp, marries Antonio (Mario Vitale), a simple Italian fisherman, after he promises a great life on his home island of Stromboli. Karin soon discovers the island is harsh and unforgiving, with the locals acting in a hostile manner towards her, a strange, foreign woman. Her despondency increasing, she starts looking for ways to escape the desolation of this new life. - Director:
- Roberto Rossellini
- Cast:
- Ingrid Bergman, Mario Vitale, Renzo Cesana
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Potiche (2010)Potiche (Trophy Wife)
Suzanne (Deneuve) is a "Potiche"; a beautiful, subservient wife dedicated to serving the selfish whims of her tyrannical husband. But after the exploited workers of his umbrella factory decide to strike, Suzanne takes on the role as head of the company to great success. Although business and personal politics are about to collide with the arrival of Maurice (Depardieu), a charming union leader and a former lover of Suzanne's. - Director:
- François Ozon
- Cast:
- Catherine Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu, Fabrice Luchini
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Private Vices Public Virtues (1976)Vizi privati, pubbliche virtù
The setting is a Central European kingdom, near the turn of the century. Bored by his very proper wife, the youthful heir to the throne spends his time in amorous dalliances at a sprawling country estate. His wife departs at the arrival of his friends, and they organize a celebration which becomes a wild orgy and culminates in death and tragedy. - Director:
- Miklós Jancsó
- Cast:
- Lajos Balázsovits, Pamela Villoresi, Franco Branciaroli
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