Initially banned in some parts of America on its original release (mostly due to its carefree, racy and humorous attitude towards sex) Viva Maria tells the story of Maria, a circus entertainer, and Maria, the daughter of an LR.A operative, brought together by fate during the heady days of 1907 and the Mexican revolution. After inadvertently inventing the striptease, the two Marias decide to pursue other revolutionary activities and join forces with a group of uprising peasants to free San Miguel from capitalists, Spanish dictators and the church, all in the name of land, liberty and good old fashioned fun.
Written and Directed by John Sayles this 1920's set drama based on real events, details the brutal battle between miners, strikebreakers and a corrupt coal mining company in a tense and emotional story of small-town poverty, bitterness and exploitation. When union man Joe Kenehan (Chris Cooper) arrives in the backwater town of Matewan, West Virginia to organise a workforce to stand up against the Stone Mountain Coal company, he finds that instead of the men presenting a united force against their real enemy, they are embroiled in disputes between themselves as tensions rise between white miners and black workers. Despite all good intentions, the situation spirals out of all control and a bloody fight for livelihoods and dignity ensues.
In an alternate reality of present-day Oakland, California, telemarketer Cassius Green (LaKeith Stanfield), finds himself in a macabre universe after he discovers a magical key that leads to material glory. As Green's career begins to take off, his friends and co-workers organise a protest against corporate oppression. Cassius soon falls under the spell of Steve Lift (Armie Hammer), a cocaine-snorting CEO who offers him a salary beyond his wildest dreams.
Franz Woyzeck is a hapless, hopeless soldier, alone and powerless in society, assaulted from all sides by forces he cannot control. Abused and tortured, both physically and psychologically by commanding officers, doctors and his unfaithful wife, Marie, Woyzeck struggles to hold on to his humanity and his fragile sanity. In the film's shattering climax, he is finnaly driven over the brink into madness and murder.
"Come and See" is one of the greatest war films ever made and one of the finest achievements of Soviet cinema. A devastating account of the Nazi occupation of Belarussia during World War II, it tells the story of a young boy's abrupt loss of innocence when he joins the Soviet resistance and is thrust headlong into the brutal horrors of combat. Featuring terrifyingly authentic battle scenes and poetic, almost surreal imagery, director Elem Klimov has fashioned a vivid and unforgettably powerful portrait of the terrible atrocities committed by men in the name of war.
Michael Kitchen stars as the thoughtful and enigmatic Detective Chief Superintendent Foyle. England is in the grip of the Second World War and Foyle, anxious to join the war effort, has repeatedly had his applications turned down. He returns to the South Coast sidelined and frustrated, but it soon becomes apparent that his detective skills are vitally needed on the Home Front.
Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood visits 1969 Los Angeles, where everything is changing, as TV star Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) make their way around an industry they hardly recognize anymore. The ninth film from the writer-director features a large ensemble cast and multiple storylines in a tribute to the final moments of Hollywood's golden age.
Filip (Jerzy Stuhr), a clerk in a small Polish town, buys an 8mm camera to film the baby his wife (Malgorzata Zabkowska) is expecting. His bosses take an interest in it and commision him to film the company's 25th anniversary celebrations. When the result wins a prize at an amateur film festival, Filip, encouraged by his success, becomes consumed by his new found passion. But, as he develops his creative skills, Filip soon discovers that his devotion to making films has unexpected consequences as tensions arise in his marriage, his managers impose censorship upon him and his films inadvertently lead to the sacking of a colleague. Featuring a superb performance from Jerzy Stuhr, 'Camera Buff' is a compelling exploration of the power and responsibility of the filmmaker.
Modern-day Cornish fisherman Martin (Edward Rowe) is struggling to buy a boat while coping with family rivalry and the influx of London money, Airbnb and stag parties to his harbour village. The summer season brings simmering tensions between the locals and newcomers to boiling point, with tragic consequences.
In the brutal Civil War which took place, Hungarian volunteers supported the 'Red' revolutionaries in a war against the 'White' counter-revolutionaries who were seeking to restore the old Czarist order. through its stylistic virtuosity, ritualistic power and sheer beauty, Jancso invites us to study the mechanisms of power almost abstractly and with a cold eroticism that clearly portrays the utter futility of war. Although the film was an Hungarian-Russian co-production, the Russian authorities banned it from being shown anywhere in the Soviet Union.
Revolutionary in form as well as content, "Electra, My Love" is one of the great Miklós Jancsó's finest works. Set amidst the open plains and grasslands of Hungary, and shot in twelve long, beautiful, intricately choreographed takes by cinematographer János Kende, it is a provocative call to arms against any system that rules without justice. An expert in the symbolic expression of forbidden political ideas, Jancsó here radically reworks the ancient Greek myth as a philosophical reflection on the dialectics of power and oppression. Electra (seeking revenge for the murder of her father, the former king) attempts to rouse a cowardly and apathetic population against the rule of usurper tyrant Aegisthus. Jancsó's film examines issues of law, justice and power; the deliberate distortion of myth and reality reflecting the real horrors that Hungary had endured and was at that time still enduring. It s relevance for contemporary society is still potent and clear today.
Rosa Luxemburg (Barbara Sukowa), a dedicated Marxist and pacifist, is arrested in 1905 for her political activities. Determined to stick to her principles, she goes on to be repeatedly convicted and imprisoned for her protests and speeches. In 1915, growing disillusioned with the German Social Democrats when they endorse World War I, she founds the Spartacist League, later the Communist Party of Germany. Despite the many men in her life, Rosa remains focused on social justice.
Miklos Jancso is one of cinema's greatest visionaries and his Red Psalm is a formidable work of art from a master filmmaker at the peak of his powers. Depicting a series of peasant uprisings in Hungary in the late 19th century, the film celebrates the cause of revolutionary struggle. Inspired by folklore and song, Jancso's camera travels amongst groups of moving figures in an elaborate cinematic ballet and his singular use of film form achieves a resonance and beauty that is extraordinary. Radical in execution and poetic in its achievement, Red Psalm reaches beyond political dogma to expose a more universal, and deeper, truth that remains relevant today.
Ishmael (Charlie Cox) sees his dream of a whaling voyage come true when he joins the crew of the Pequod, a whaling boat leaving port in Nantucket. The commander of the whale boat is the charismatic, some would say despotic, Captain Ahab (William Hurt), an experienced seaman and whale hunter who lost his leg several years earlier in a struggle with the gigantic white sperm whale Moby Dick. Now he is obsessed with taking revenge on the legendary creature. Neither his long-suffering wife (Gillian Anderson) nor his crew suspect the true extent of his obsessive thirst for vengeance. Only Starbuck (Ethan Hawke), the First Mate of the Pequod, a very religious and level-headed man, fears that this journey will not be a regular whale-catching expedition. As Ahab unswervingly pursues his goal, an apocalyptic struggle between man and animal unfolds on the high seas...
Experience Orson Welles' timeless masterpiece, 'Touch of Evil', complete and uncut with restored footage for the first time ever! This exceptional film noir portrait of corruption and morally-compromised obsessions stars Welles as Hank Quinlan, a crooked police chief who frames a Mexican youth as part of an intricate criminal plot. Charlton Heston plays an honorable Mexican narcotics investigator who clashes with the bigoted Quinlan after probing into his dark past. A memorable supporting cast including Janet Leigh as Heston's inquisitive wife, Akim Tamiroff as a seedy underworld leader, Zsa Zsa Gabor and Marlene Dietrich as an enigmatic gypsy complete this fascinating drama engulfed in haunting cinematography and a magnificently eerie score by Henry Mancini.
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