Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Viva la muerte 死亡萬歲 (1971)

Writers: • Fernando Arrabal
Directors: • Fernando Arrabal

Viva La Muerte (Long live Death) centers on Fando (Mahdi Chaouch), a young boy whose father has been arrested for treason during the Spanish civil war. Fando struggles with his father's arrest, and in a shocking moment discovers a letter in which his mother admits to betraying his father. His mother convinces him that his father committed suicide in prison, but Fando doubts this and attempts to discover the true fate of his father.

The debut film of Spanish playwright Fernando Arrabal, Viva La Muerte is a surreal tour-de-force considered by many critics to be the pinnacle of Spanish avant-garde filmmaking. Fueled with surreal images of violence, sexuality and biting political commentary, the film posits Arrabal as one of the preeminent Spanish-language surrealists alongside Luis Bunuel and Alejandro Jodorowsky.

Le Plaisir (1962)

Directors: Max Ophuls

Roving with his dazzlingly mobile camera around the decadent ballrooms, bucolic countryside retreats, urban bordellos, and painter's studios of late nineteenth-century Parisian society, Max Ophuls brings his astonishing visual dexterity and storytelling bravura to this triptych of tales by Guy de Maupassant about the limits of spiritual and physical pleasure. Featuring a stunning cast of French stars (including Danielle Darrieux, Jean Gabin, and Simone Simon), Le plaisir pinpoints the cruel ironies and happy compromises of life with a charming and sophisticated breeziness.
















































































I Fidanzati (1962)









Actors: Anna Canzi • Carlo Cabrini
Producers: Curtis Tsui


Directors: Ermanno Olmi


Ermanno Olmi's masterful follow up to Il Posto is the tender story of two Milanese fiances whose strained relationship is tested when the man accepts a new job in Sicily. With the separation come loneliness, nostalgia, and perhaps, some new perspective to rejuvenate their love. Olmi's deep humanism charges this moving depiction of ordinary men and women, and the pitfalls of the human heart.











Il Posto (1961)









Actors: Loredana Detto • Sandro Panseri
Producers: Curtis Tsui

Directors: Ermanno Olmi


When young Domenico (Sandro Panseri) ventures from the small village of Meda to Milan in search of employment, he finds himself on the bottom rung of the bureaucratic ladder in a huge, faceless company. The prospects are daunting, but Domenico finds reason for hope in fetching new worker Antoinette (Loredana Detto). A tender coming-of-age story and a sharp observation of dehumanizing corporate enterprise, Ermanno Olmi's Il Posto is a touching and hilarious tale of one young man's stumbling entrance into the perils of modern adulthood.













A Slightly Pregnant Man (1973)




Actors: Catherine Deneuve • Marcello Mastroianni • Micheline Presle • Marisa Pavan
Writers: Jacques Demy

Directors: Jacques Demy





Nobody was expecting this!



In Jacques Demy's classic film, Marcello Mastroianni and Catherine Deneuve star as Marco and Irene, a modern unmarried couple who work and live to raise their son. After feeling a bit run down, Marco visits a doctor who makes the absurd discovery that he is not ill but actually four months pregnant.



Doctors and experts confirm this isolated discovery and announce that it will soon become a worldwide epidemic, changing societal roles, threatening a population explosion and sparking an international media frenzy. Marco and Irene come to embrace the situation as he has become and instant celebrity, modeling paternity clothes and appearing in commercials. As they plan for their wedding, they make another surprising discovery in this charming and deadpan farce featuring the music if Academy Award?winning composer Michel Legrand.









青樓紅杏 Belle de jour (1967)




Actors: Catherine Deneuve • Michel Piccoli • Jean Sorel
Writers: Luis Bunuel • Jean-Claude Carriere

Producers: Robert Hakim • Raymond Hakim

Directors: Luis Bunuel


瑟芙琳(嘉芙蓮丹露飾)是一位美艷年青中產貴婦,深愛丈夫、生活無憂卻苦於不無聊賴且性生活得不到滿足,轉而在夢中幻想自己被強暴。她從醫生丈夫的朋友口中得知某個妓院的地址。寂寞難耐的她上門應徵,由於只能在下午二時至五時工作,鴇母便以「Belle de Jour」(日間美人)作其藝名。在滿足客人各種要求的同時,瑟芙琳也滿足了自己的慾望。丈夫友人光顧妓院時意外發現表面端莊賢淑的朋友妻竟是紅杏出牆的蕩婦……而瑟芙琳更在工作中遇上黑道中人,展開一段青樓婚外情,豈料此人對她瘋狂迷戀,百般糾纏甚至闖入她的家中……



Britannia Hospital (1982)




Writers: David Sherwin

Producers: Davina Belling • Clive Parsons

Directors: Lindsay Anderson



The Savage Satire From The Director Of If andiO Lucky Man


Welcome to Britannia Hospital, an esteemed English institution marking its gala anniversary with a visit by the Queen Mother herself. But when investigative reporter Mick Travis (Malcolm McDowell) arrives to cover the celebration, he finds the hospital under siege by striking workers, ruthless unions, violent demonstrators, racist aristocrats, an African cannibal dictator and sinister human experiments financed by the Japanese. Can Mick survive one very strange day in these unhealthy halls or is the entire British Empire in critical condition?


Britannia Hospital is the final film in the acclaimed Mick Travis trilogy from director Lindsay Anderson and writer David Sherwin. Alan Bates, Robbie Coltrane, Richard Griffiths, Joan Plowright, Robin Askwith and Mark Hamill lead an eclectic all-star cast in this biting black comedy that also features original music by Alan Price.

Hera Purple : Devil Goddess (2002)


Actors: Hong Suk-Chon • Kim Chung • Lee Se-Chang
Writers: Chung Gil-Chae
Producers: Chung Gil-Chae
Directors: Chung Gil-Chae
Beware of her spell!
It is a race against time as a group of detectives must unlock the secret behind a series of bizarre murders being committed by a beautiful woman who is possessed by the spirit of the mythical goddess, Hera, a nymph who seduces men and kills them during the moment of ecstasy. Beware of her spell!

Mein liebster Feind 我的魔鬼 (1999)







Producers: Lucki Stipetic

Directors: Werner Herzog



A film about theitempestuous yet legendary working relationship between two creative giants of theifilm industry -- Werner Herzog andiKlaus Kinski.


A chain of coincidences brings the 13-year-old schoolboy Werner Herzog together with Klaus Kinski to the same apartment in Munich. In an unabated, 48-hour fit of rage Kinski immediately proceeds to lay waste to all the furniture, only one of such fits to come. Herzog therefore knows what awaits him when, some years later, he engages Kinski to work with him on Aguirre, The Wrath of God, their first film together. Four more films would follow.

My Best Fiend is a film about the love-hate relationship between director Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski -- utterly puzzling to others. It reveals the deep trust between two exceptional artists and their independently and simultaneously hatched plans to murder one another.



The 10th Victim (1965)





Writers: Tonino Guerra • Ennio Flaiano • Elio Petri • Giorgio Salvioni

Producers: Carlo Ponti

Directors: Elio Petri



It is the 21st Century, and society's lust for violence is satisfied by "The Big Hunt," an international game of legalized murder. But when the sport's two top assassins (Marcello Mastroianni and Ursula Andress) are pitted against each other, they find that love is the most dangerous game of all. As the world watches, the hunt is on. Who will become The 10th Victim?


The 10th Victim is the international cult classic whose wild action and sexy style has influenced a generation of movies, from The Running Man to the Austin Powers series.





The Headless Woman (2008)

Directors: Lucrecia Martel
A mysterious and intriguing tale of a woman who may have killed someone or something while driving on a dirt road. Dazed and confused, she tries to piece together what happened, while her husband systematically tries to erase her tracks. From the acclaimed director of The Holy Grail, Lucrecia Martel's third feature explores the intricacies of class in a male dominated society. This official selection of the Cannes and New York Film Festival has been declared, "One of the great films of the decade" by Artforum Magazine, while Village Voice says "Martel's strongest to date!" and the New York Times says, "The exacting formalism and beauty of The Headless Woman is undeniable."

The Holy Girl (2004)





Writers: Lucrecia Martel


Producers: Lita Stantic


Directors: Lucrecia Martel





少女愛瑪的世界,就是母親經營的一家失修的酒店。一群耳鼻喉專科醫生來到開交流會,其中一個竟在圍觀街頭表演時用下體湊近愛瑪。愛瑪認定這是天主感召,要打救沉淪的醫生。她的虔诚與無知,令拯救者與被拯救者陷落更騷動的境地。近距隱晦的近鏡,環境與耳語的敏感重疊聲效,令全片氣氛肉慾頹廢,幽閉得近乎窒息,配合緊扣心弦的剪接與故事發展,令觀影猶如坐上過山車,眼望七色金魚缸。








The Final Programme (1973)



The Final Programme / The Last Days of Man on Earth (1973)

Writers: Robert Fuest
Producers: Sandy Lieberson • John Goldstone
Directors: Robert Fuest

The Future Is Cancelled!

As the world teeters on the brink of nuclear anarchy, swinging London scientific genius Jerry Cornelius (John Finch of The Horror of Frankenstein and Frenzy) discovers that the microfilm formula for a self-replicating human being is missing. With the help of the beautiful and voraciously bisexual computer expert Miss Brunner (Jenny Runacre), the pair must race through a wasteland by murder and madness to recover The Final Programme and trigger the creation of a startling new messiah.

Also known as The Last Days of Man on Earth, this bizarre blend of stylish action, dark satire and wild sci-fi co-stars Patrick Magee (A Clockwork Orange), Sterling Hayden (Dr. Strangelove) and Sarah Douglas (Superman II), and features a ground-breaking score by Moog pioneers Beaver & Krause with jazz legend Gerry Mulligan.



La Ciénaga (2001)

Chekhov in contemporary Argentina. Mecha and Gregorio are at their rundown country place near La Ciénaga with their teen children. It's hot. The adults drink constantly; Mecha cuts herself, engendering a trip to the hospital and a visit from her son José. A cousin, Tali, brings her children. The kids are on their own, sunbathing by the filthy pool, dancing in town, running in the hills with shotguns, driving cars without licenses. One of the teen girls loves Isabel, a family servant constantly accused of stealing. Mother and son, son and sisters, teen and Isabel are in each other's beds and bathrooms with a creepy intimacy. With no adults paying attention, who's at risk?

La prisonniere 女囚犯 (1968)





有「法國的希治閣」之稱的著名導演亨利-喬治·克魯佐(Henri Georges Clouzot,《恐懼的代價》,《孽迷宮》)全盛時期的代表作。


影片簡介:斯坦尼斯公開宣佈在自己的畫廊舉辦現代藝術展,展出的都是些形狀、顏色和質地讓人吃驚的作品,也成為了媒體關注的焦點。藝術家吉爾伯特的雕塑品在其中展覽。他妻子喬西被作風嚴厲的斯坦尼斯給迷住了,因為他把自己的閒餘時間都花在了那個藝術品位獨特的公寓裡搞攝影。但除了那些放大的書法字帖外,斯坦尼斯還收集了一大堆關於一個心理失常的人物的照片。那麼,為何喬西要冒著與丈夫鬧矛盾的險去病態地探究斯坦尼斯的神秘面目呢? ...