Inspired by Leos Janacek’s Sinfonietta, The Queen’s Monastery is about a woman whose lover, a former acrobat, has returned to her from war a changed man. Using a highly individual watercolour technique the narrative explores themes of love, escapist fantasy, obsession and guilt.
Tag: 1980s
The Polish city of Lodz was under Nazi occupation for nearly the entire duration of WWII. The segregation of the Jewish population into the ghetto, and the subsequent horrors of the occupation are vividly chronicled through newsreels and photographs. The narration is taken almost entirely from journals and diaries of those who lived–and died–through the course of the occupation, with the number of different narrators diminishing over the course of the film, symbolic of the death of each narrator.
A terrifying look into the mind of mass murderer Kenneth Bianchi, who killed two women in Bellingham, Washington, and was one of the Hillside Strangler murderers in Los Angeles. Yet, he almost escaped punishment for these crimes because he convinced a group of experts that he had multiple personalities and was not mentally competent to stand trial.
Over the course of one day in August 1912, the family of retired actor James Tyrone grapples with the morphine addiction of his wife Mary, the illness of their youngest son Edmund and the alcoholism and debauchery of their older son Jamie. As day turns into night, guilt, anger, despair, and regret threaten to destroy the family.
John has a happy life as a composer and family man which suddenly collapses when his wife Helen leaves him; she is having an affair with one of his friends. John soon comes to realise this is only a symptom of long-ignored problems in their marriage and is forced to confront some truths about his inner self.
In 1930s, hard-working girl Betty Boop sings at nights at her uncle Mischa’s popular NY nightclub and dreams of marrying a posh rich playboy, Waldo. Gangster Johnny “Throat” and a nice hard-working ice-seller, Freddy, also woo her.
The residents of an old people’s home anxiously watch television weather forecasts that predict a hard winter. When a huge transport of coffins arrives in the same night, the old people start to suspect that someone is preparing a mass death for them. In solidarity, they decide to escape and… go out to the country. They are followed by a police chase, which at times resembles a manhunt. The film, made in 1981/82 but released a year later, unexpectedly became a metaphor for the Polish history of the time.
Csaba has just come out of doing a stint in prison because he stabbed a man while drunk, and when he goes home he discovers that his wife is now living with someone else in their apartment. Csaba quickly divorces his wife but he still has to move in and share a kitchen and bathroom with her and her new mate, suffering because he still loves her. This untenable situation is complicated by visits from Csaba’s mother, and by various women he starts seeing, as well as by a busy-body neighbor. The three main roles of Csaba, his wife, and her lover are excellently interpreted in this satire on social morés and economic realities.