The Wars focuses on rebellious Robert Ross, who battles against the uptight, upper-crust Rosedale society he was born into; when war is declared in 1914, he enlists in the Canadian army to escape from personal tragedy. Though it recreates the horrors of WWI trench warfare with harrowing realism, the film is more interested in how war replicates, and even amplifies, the class divisions of the homefront; in one of many telling details, Robert is the only man in his unit with a handgun because he is the only man wealthy enough to afford one.
Tag: 1980s
Set in the backyard of a blue-collar South Philadelphia neighborhood early in the summer of 1973, the comedy-drama focuses on the 21st birthday celebration of Harvard student Francis Geminiani. In attendance are his divorced blue collar father Fran and Fran’s widowed girlfriend Lucille, next-door neighbor Bunny Weinberger and her overweight son Herschel, and Francis’ classmates, the wealthy WASP Hastings siblings; Judith (who seeks romance with Francis) and Randy (the object of Francis’ unexpressed affection), who have arrived unexpectedly, much to their friend’s dismay. All are dysfunctional to varying degrees, and the interactions among them provide the play with its comic and dramatic moments.
The story opens in 1911 at Dr. Seward’s sanitarium. A sensual and charismatic vampire known as Count Dracula has already slain several girls on the English countryside. Abraham Van Helsing, with the help of Dr. Cedric Seward, Lord Gordon Godalming, Jonathan Harker, Freudian psychologist Helga Van Zandt and the reluctant Renfield try to stop Count Dracula from making the lovely Wilhelmina his next willing victim.
A slaughterhouse worker appears to be romantically involved with his boss’s wife. They plan to leave the country together, but at the airport she waits for him in vain. Slowly but surely the three of them get entangled in a fateful web of betrayal, jealousy, and revenge.
The story of how Norma Jean, once an orphan in Hollywood, becomes Marilyn Monroe, the movie star and celebrity. The movie begins with her as a child and ends with the mysterious way she dies. Throughout the movie, we see the highlights and lowlights of her career, including the parts of her private life not so widely known. Based loosely on Norman Mailer’s highly suspect biography of the actress, Marilyn: The Untold Story premiered on September 28, 1980.
This feature-length documentary introduces viewers to Ken Carter, a Montreal-born stunt driver who made a living by risking his life. The film shines a light on the intense preparation that led to Carter’s first attempt to jump a car across a mile-wide stretch of the St. Lawrence River – a 5-year period during which the dare-devil raised a million dollars, erected a 10-storey take-off ramp and built a rocket-powered car.
11-year-old Nick moves into a large old house with his sisters Jennie and Clare, left in the care of Helga the Swedish au pair while their parents are away in America. Nick is unhappy at his new school, where he is befriended by a boy named Sam and intimidated by scripture teacher Mr. Crabb, who is interested in the occult and demonology. Nick hears voices in the house and receives messages on his computer screen; he also suffers inexplicable blisters on his feet and grazes on his elbows and knees. When he dreams of burning and wakes up in a bed full of ashes, Nick tells a psychiatrist that he feels he is possessed by a demon.
It is 1987 at the middle of the Iran-Iraq War, Bashu, a young boy loses his house and all his family. Scared, he sneaks into a truck that is leaving the area. He gets off the truck in the Northern part of the country, where everything from landscape to language is different. He meets Naii, who is trying to raise her two young children on a farm, while her husband is away. Despite cultural differences, and the fact that they do not speak the same language, Bashu and Naii slowly form a strong bond.