mr-chianski's - Favourites List

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Painter Marianne (Noemie Merlant) is commissioned by an affluent countess to paint the wedding portrait of her sheltered but headstrong daughter Héloïse (Adele Haenel).

While posing as her hired companion, Marianne is instructed to complete the portrait in secret, observing Héloïse by day and painting her by night. However, as the two women grow closer, their intimacy and attraction begins to blossom, paving the way for a simmering, star-crossed romance.

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Wang Xiaoshuai's deeply moving and intimate drama traces the lives of two interconnected families over three decades of social and political upheaval in China.

The film charts the fortunes of factory workers Liyun (Yong Mei) and Yaojun (Wang Jingchun), a couple reeling from a devastating family tragedy during the tumultuous years between the 1980's and the 21st century. Constricted by the one-child national policy, their lives are gradually transformed under the impact of the country's changing identity, building to a heartbreaking revelation that exposes how political reality affects the fates of the family and the people around them. A cleverly poetic depiction of communist China, 'So Long, My Son' is a sprawling yet personal portrait of human resilience, featuring incredibly tender and award-winning performances from Mei and Jingchun.

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Writer-director Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird) has crafted a 'Little Women' that draws on both the classic novel and the writings of Louisa May Alcott, and unfolds as the author's alter ego, Jo March, reflects back and forth on her fictional life.

In Gerwig's take, the beloved story of the March sisters - four young women each determined to live life on their own terms - is both timeless and timely. Portraying Jo, Meg, Amy, and Beth March, the film stars Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, Eliza Scanlen, with Timothee Chalamet as their neighbour Laurie, Laura Dern as Marmee, and Meryl Streep as Aunt March.

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From Robert Eggers, the visionary filmmaker behind the modern horror masterpiece 'The Witch', comes this hypnotic and hallucinatory tale of two lighthouse keepers (Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) on a remote and mysterious New England island in the 1890's.

As an approaching storm threatens to sweep them from the rock and strange apparitions emerge from the fog, each man begins to suspect that the other has become dangerously unmoored.

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While on a forgettable first date together in Ohio, a black man (Daniel Kaluuya) and a black woman (Jodie Turner-Smith), are pulled over for a minor traffic infraction. The situation escalates, with sudden and tragic results, when the man kills the police officer in self-defense.

Terrified and in fear for their lives, the man, a retail employee, and the woman, a criminal defense lawyer, are forced to go on the run. But the incident is captured on video and goes viral, and the couple unwittingly become a symbol of trauma, terror, grief and pain for people across the country. As they drive, these two unlikely fugitives will discover themselves and each other in the most dire and desperate of circumstances and will forge a deep and powerful love that will reveal their shared humanity and shape the rest of their lives.

Starkly shot in black and white, capturing a Paris not seen on any tourist map, the film deals with France's intolerance towards outsiders, following Vinz (Vincent Cassel), Hubert (Hubert Kounde) and Said (Said Taghmaoui), three young men trapped in the Parisian economic, ethnic and social underclass.

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New York, 1941. Socially conscious scriptwriter Barton Fink (John Turturro) has made it big on Broadway. Now Tinsel Town is taking notice. Hired by Hollywood to write a wrestling picture, Barton quits the city smog for movie stardom. L.A. has got the Barton Fink feeling.

Barton Fink has got writer's block. Enlisting the help of able assistant Audrey (Judy Davis) and amiable neighbour Charlie Meadows (John Goodman), Fink finds the real-life inspiration he seeks comes from the most sinister of sources.

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Daniel Plainview and son are independent oil men, looking for prospects in California at the turn of the 20th century. They are challenged by a young preacher, Eli Sunday (Paul Dano), whose own ambition is matched by Plainview's.

Their battle forms the centre of a scary, darkly-comic historical journey into an abyss of madness.

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Hong Kong, 1962. Chow (Tony Leung) is a junior newspaper editor with an elusive wife. His new neighbour Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung) is a secretary whose husband seems to spend all his time on business trips. They become friends, making the lonely evenings more bearable.

As their relationship develops they make a discovery that changes their lives forever...

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Jerry (William H. Macy), a small-town Minnesota car salesman is bursting at the seams with debt... but he's got a plan. He's going to hire two thugs (Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare) to kidnap his wife in a scheme to collect a hefty ransom from his wealthy father-in-law.

It's going to be a snap and nobody's going to get hurt... until people start dying. Enter Police Chief Marge (Frances McDormand), a coffee-drinking, parka-wearing - and extremely pregnant -investigator who'll stop at nothing to get her man. And if you think her small-time investigative skills will give the crooks a run for their ransom... you betcha!

The epic yet intimate story follows the life journey of Jack O'Brien (played as an adult by Penn), the eldest son of a fractured Texas family. Pitt delivers a powerful performance as the cataclysmic force of nature in Jack's world, his complex and rigidly authoritarian father.

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Los Angeles, city of angels. Amnesiac and wounded, a mysterious femme fatale wanders on the sinuous road of Mulholland Drive. She finds a shelter at Betty's house (Naomi Watts). an aspiring actress just arrived from her hometown and in search of stardom in Hollywood.

First of all intrigued by the stranger who calls herself Rita (Laura Elena Harring), Betty discovers that her handbag is dull of dollar bundles. The two women get to know each other better and decide to investigate in order to discover Rita's true identity....

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Written and directed by Eliza Hittman, the film is an intimate portrayal of two teenage girls in rural Pennsylvania.

Faced with an unintended pregnancy and a lack of local support, Autumn (Sidney Flanigan) and her cousin Skylar (Talia Ryder) embark across state lines to New York City on a fraught journey of friendship, bravery and compassion.

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Jane (Julia Garner) is a recent college graduate and aspiring film producer, who has recently landed her dream job as a junior assistant to a powerful movie mogul.

Her day is much like any other assistant's, but as Jane follows her daily routine, she grows increasingly aware of the questionable behaviour of her boss toward her female peers. She decides to take a stand, only to discover the true insidious nature of the system into which she has entered.

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From director Todd Douglas Miller (Dinosaur 13) comes a cinematic event 50 years in the making.

Crafted from a newly discovered trove of 65mm footage, and more than 11,000 hours of uncatalogued audio recordings, 'Apollo 11' takes us straight to the heart of NASA's most celebrated mission - the one that first put men on the moon, and forever made Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin into household names. Immersed in the perspectives of the astronauts, the team in Mission Control, and the millions of spectators on the ground, we vividly experience those momentous days and hours in 1969 when humankind took a giant leap into the future.