Tag: HD

February 24, 2022 / Arthouse

Mani Kaul’s film was funded by the Film Finance Corporation and an independent multi-arts co-operation led by noted painter Akbar Padamsee. Derived from a Rajasthani folk tale, it tells of a merchant’s son who returns home with his new wife only to be sent away on family business. A ghost witnesses the brides’ arrival and falls in love with her. He takes on the absent husband’s form an lives with her. She has his child, which becomes a problem when the real husband returns home. The film focusses on the wife’s life and dispenses with almost any dialogue developing the characters through parallel, historically uneven or even contradictory narratives.

February 24, 2022 / Drama

Arriving in Taiwan in the 1950s, Kuei-mei makes a disadvantageous marriage to a widower with three unruly kids and a bad gambling habit. Beautifully portrayed by celebrated actress Yang, she weathers pregnancies, her husband’s infidelity, her daughter’s resentment, a stint as servant in Japan, divorce, and illness while struggling to keep the family restaurant business afloat.

February 24, 2022 / Silent

Orlac is a world famous pianist. One day he is badly hurt in a big train wreck. He is in danger of losing both his hands so his wife begs the doctors to save them. They eventually manage to transplant his hands with those of another deceased person. After his recovery Orlac discovers that there is something seriously wrong with his new pair of hands — it is as if they had a will of their own. But Orlac doesn’t know that they actually belonged to a dangerous murderer.

February 24, 2022 / Documentary
February 24, 2022 / Biography

Jean Stapleton stars as Eleanor Roosevelt in this made-for-TV biography, first telecast May 12, 1982. The film recounts Mrs. Roosevelt’s life after the 1945 death of her husband, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. At the request of new president Truman, Eleanor serves as a United Nations delegate, spending much of her time tilting with dedicated anti-FDR politico John Foster Dulles. She goes on to spearhead the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, proving to Dulles–and to Soviet delegate Freddie Jones–that she’s anything but soft on Communism.

February 16, 2022 / Drama

This Weimar Germany film classic uses an avant-garde, fragmented narrative to tell the story of a working-class family in Berlin in 1931. Survival is difficult, with massive unemployment in the wake of the Great Depression. After Anni’s brother commits suicide in despair, her family finds itself forced to move to Kuhle Wampe, a lakeside camp on the outskirts of Berlin, now home to increasing numbers of unemployed. When Anni’s relationship with Franz ends, she moves back to Berlin and gets involved in the workers’ youth movement. Already censored in March 1932, the film was then banned by the Nazis in 1933 for having “communist tendencies.”

February 16, 2022 / Film Noir

Marcos is a professional jai alai player undefeated on the court in 26 matches. The super confident Marcos has acquired a Trumpian disdain for weak losers, including a fellow player who suffers a fracture as a result of Marcos’ carelessness. When he’s not dominating his opponents, he’s trying to balance his relationships with several women, including recently widowed old flame Sara, nightclub thrush Lucrecia, and mother-to-be Rebeca. Marcos promises to wed Rebeca without telling her he’s about to leave Mexico permanently, setting in motion a plot by Rebeca’s brother Armando to blackmail the first class heel while also getting out of his debt to gambler Marcial.

February 16, 2022 / Documentary

A documentary profiling a Japanese taiko drumming group based in the remote Sado Island, Japan. The film blurs the line between real-life documentary footage of the troupe’s training and practice regimes, and staged performances of their varied musical acts, with sets designed by artist Tadanori Yokoo and an additional experimental electronic music score by Toshi Ichiyanagi.