The scene is a pre-French Revolution Bastille, where various political prisoners are being held: a woman who was raped and impregnated by the king, a police chief who was accused of selling bad pork, and the Marquis, who was unjustly accused of working for the overthrow of the king. The Marquis is only interested in writing his deviant stories, while his penis yearns for a little action (they argue about this frequently), the prime candidate being the jailer who likes to be buggered. The corrupt priest arranges to have the pregnant woman raped by the Marquis so they can claim the king had nothing to do with it. The priest also steals the Marquis’ manuscripts and publishes them for his own profit. Things come to a head as the people rise up against the tyranny.
Tag: 1980s
Don Pedro, a widowed poet, makes his living penning love letters for those who are too hesitant or tongue-tied to express their heart’s devotion. However, trouble arises when he is hired to scribe sweet nothings to the beautiful Maria, the lady love of a besotted but blundering hot air balloonist named Juan. Before long, the writer falls for the deceived Maria, which results in a troubling love triangle.
In ancient Pompeii, slaves are bought and sold for household chores and sex. A mysterious queen moves among the elite, meantime secretly helping the slaves to escape. Eventually her life is also in jeopardy, and as the volcano erupts she and the slaves attempt to escape while being chased by the military…
An aspiring science-fiction author discovers that his girlfriend’s father is his writer-idol. He finds it difficult to carry on his romance without exploiting the situation.
Badly scarred in a childhood accident, Violet boards a bus in North Carolina on a pilgrimage to Oklahoma to visit a TV preacher, the one that heals. On the bus, she meets two soldiers on their way to Fort Smith.
Jeanne, a young woman, born and raised in Northern France, is visiting the Mediterranean city of Toulon for the first time. She is prompted by two events: the wedding of her sister, and the disappearance of her brother. He is a deaf-mute who supports himself as a pickpocket under the tutelage of a young Arab and an older bisexual married man with a weakness for young Arabs. The girl meets them and finds herself attracted to the young Arab and the older man’s son, who is also bisexual like his father. She is soon torn between the two in a romantic and sexual dilemma that mirrors France’s political turmoil regarding the nation’s growing Arab population.
Li Chun is sent to be re-educated on a commune in Yunnan, near the Burmese border, where she has a hard time of it at first, as she’s willing to work her fingers to the bone, but no one is willing to accept her.
——UPGRADED——
Through the experiences of two women in Paris and London, Ghost Dance offers a stunning analysis of the complexity of our conceptions of ghosts, memory and the past… The film focuses on philosopher Jacques Derrida who considers ghosts to be the memory of something which has never been present but which takes us by surprise.
