mr-chianski's - Favourites List

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Based on Peter Rock's novel 'My Abandonment', 'Leave No Trace' revolves around a teenage girl (Thomasin McKenzie) and her father (Ben Foster) who have lived undetected for years in Forest Park, a vast wood on the edge of Portland, Oregon.

A chance encounter leads to their discovery and removal from the park and into the charge of a social service agency. They try to adapt to their new surroundings until a sudden decision sets them on a perilous journey into the wilderness seeking complete independence and forcing them to confront their conflicting desire to be part of a community or a fierce need to live apart.

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From Golden Globe Nominee Director Paul Schrader, 'First Reformed' is a brooding, thriller-drama centred around Ernst Toller (Ethan Hawke), a troubled priest of a small, historical church in upstate New York, who starts to spiral out of control after a soul-shaking encounter with Mary (Amanda

Seyfried) and her husband Michael, an unstable environmental activist. Consumed by thoughts that the world is in danger and motivated by the church's lack of action, Toller embarks on a perilous self-assigned undertaking with the hope that he may finally restore the faith and purpose he's been longing for in his mission to right the wrongs done to so many.

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"Lucky" follows the spiritual journey of Harry Dean Stanton's character 'Lucky', a cantankerous, self-reliant 90 year old atheist, and the quirky characters that inhabit the Arizona town where he lives.

Having out-lived and out-smoked all of his contemporaries, the fiercely independent Lucky finds himself at the precipice of life, thrust into a journey of self-exploration, leading towards that which is so often unattainable: enlightenment. Released in the US just days after Stanton's death at age 91, 'Lucky', is at once a love letter to the life and career of Harry Dean Stanton as well as a meditation on mortality, loneliness, spirituality, and human connection.

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From visionary filmmaker Spike Lee comes the incredible true story of an American hero. In the early 1970's, Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) becomes the first African-American detective in the Colorado Springs Police Department.

Determined to make a difference, he bravely sets out on a dangerous mission: infiltrate and expose the Ku Klux Klan. He recruits a seasoned colleague, Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver), into the undercover investigation. Together, they team up to take down the extremist organisation aiming to garner mainstream appeal. 'BlacKkKlansman' offers an unflinching, true-life examination of race relations in 1970's America that is just as relevant in today's tumultuous world.

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In the ruins of post-war Poland, Wiktor (Tomasz Kot) and Zula (Joanna Kulig) fall deeply, obsessively and destructively in love. As performing musicians forced to play into the Soviet propaganda machine, they dream of escaping to the creative freedom of the West.

But one day, as they spot their chance to make a break for Paris, both make a split decision that will mark their lives forever. Pawel Pawlikowski follows his Oscar-winning 'Ida' with the stunning 'Cold War', an epic romance set against the backdrop of Europe after World War II. Sumptuously shot in luminous black and white, it spans decades and nations to tell a love story that is as tragic as it is moving, and as transportive as it is honest.

A murdered girl's defiant mother (Frances McDormand) boldly paints three local billboards, each with a controversial message, igniting a furious battle with a volatile cop (Sam Rockwell) and the town's revered chief of police (Woody Harrelson).

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Thirty years after the events of the first film, a new blade runner, LAPD Officer K (Ryan Gosling), unearths a long-buried secret that has the potential to plunge what's left of society into chaos.

K's discovery leads him on a quest to find Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford), a former LAPD blade runner who has been missing for 30 years.

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The unbelievable but entirely true story of four friends (Evan Peters, Barry Keoghan, Blake Jenner and Jared Abrahamson) living a routine existence in Kentucky, who brazenly attempt one of the most audacious art heists in US history.

Determined to live lives that are out of the ordinary, they plan the brazen theft of some of the world's most valuable books from the special collections room of Transylvania University Library. But not everything is as it seems, and as the thrilling theft unfolds, each of them starts to question whether their attempts to inject excitement and purpose into their lives is simply a misguided attempt at achieving the American Dream.

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After a successful shoplifting spree, Osamu (Lily Franky) and his son rescue a little girl in the freezing cold and invite her home with them. Osamu's wife Nobuyo (Sakura Ando) reluctantly agrees to shelter her.

Although the family is poor, they live happily together until an unforeseen incident upsets the delicate balance they have created, revealing long-buried secrets...

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Oppressed by her family setting, dead-end school prospects and the boys law in the neighbourhood, Marieme starts a new life after meeting a group of three free-spirited girls. She changes her name, her style, and quits school to be accepted in the gang, hoping that this will be a way to freedom.

As she falls further under their gang lifestyle, she begins to make foolish choices that could impact her life forever.

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"Taxi Driver" provoked fierce controversy when it was released, running into censorship problems in America as some of the scenes of violence were described to be "as gory as Clockwork Orange and Straw Dogs".

In addition there was an outcry at a 13-year-old schoolgirl actress (Jodie Foster) co-starring as a prostitute. It won Best Picture at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival and received Academy Award Nominations for Best Film, Best Actor (Robert de Niro) and Best Supporting Actress (Foster).

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Francis Ford Coppola's stunning vision of man's heart of darkness revealed through the madness of the Vietnam War. Captain Willard (Martin Sheen) receives orders to seek out a renegade military outpost led by the mysterious Colonel Kurtz (Marlon Brando).

Willard's mission: "Terminate with extreme prejudice".

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If Beale Street Could Talk is the story of Tish (KiKi Layne), a newly engaged Harlem woman who races against the clock to prove her fiancee's innocence.

It is a celebration of love told through the story of a young couple, their families and their lives, trying to bring about justice through love, where passion and sadness are inevitably intertwined.

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Based on a short story by Haruki Murakami, this critically acclaimed South Korean film tells the story of Jongsu (Ah-in Yoo), a part-time worker who bumps into old neighbour Haemi (Jong-seo Jun).

She asks him to look after her cat while she's on a trip to Kenya, but when she returns, Haemi introduces Ben (Steven Yeun) to Jongsu. One day, Ben visits Jongsu with Haemi and confesses his own secret hobby.

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In early 18th-century England, a frail Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) occupies the throne, and her closest friend, Lady Sarah (Rachel Weisz), governs the country while tending to Anne's ill health and volatile temper.

When new servant Abigail (Emma Stone) arrives, Sarah takes Abigail under her wing as she cunningly schemes to return to her aristocratic roots, setting off an outrageous rivalry to become the Queen's favourite.