This week, we watch either one of the best films of all time, or one of the most pretentious. This movie could define arthouse cinema. Thoughtful, shocking, and incomprehensible. Persona (1966), directed by Ingmar Bergman.
All in Foreign
Episode 192 - The Grand Budapest Hotel
This week, we watch the film that is not only largest box office success of Wes Anderson's career so far, but also received a fair number of Oscar nominations, including one for Best Picture. The cast is stacked, the shots are symmetrical, the effects are a combination of miniatures, stop motion, projected live action on matte paintings - all of the styles we've come to love from Wes. Its might not be the film to turn the nay-sayers, but it certainly gives fans a lot to enjoy. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), directed by Wes Anderson.
Episode 193 - Amores Perros
This week, we watch the first film of Inarritu's "Trilogy of Death", where three brutal stories are told before and after a car accident. Filled with extreme, realistic violence (most of it involving dogs), it is good knowing before going in that no animals were hurt during the making of this very effective drama. Amores Perros, directed by Alejandro Inarritu.
Episode 195 - Wild Tales
This week, we watch the film that took the country of Argentina by storm, smashing all of the box-office records, and earning a Best Foreign Picture nomination in the 2015 Oscars. Comprised of six stories that, according to the director, are "linked by violence, and nothing else", this film lets its characters go far beyond typical socially accepted behavior, and explore what might result if people acted solely on their instincts. Wild Tales (2014), directed by Damian Szifron.
Episode 201 - Nausicaa of the Vally of the Wind
This week, we watch the animated classic who's popularity lead to the founding of Studio Ghibli, which went on to make additional milestones in animation like Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and My Neighbor Totoro. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, directed by Hayao Miyazaki.
Episode 204 - Stalker
This week, we watch the Russian science fiction film where two men are lead into The Zone by a Stalker in hopes of entering a room that grants wishes. Come for the beautiful cinematography, stay for the inescapable atmosphere. Stalker (1979), directed by Andrei Tarkovsky.
Episode 207 - Memories of Murder
This week, we watch the the movie that captured a slot in Quentin Tarantino's list of the 20 best films since 1992 - a murder mystery that combines horror and comedy in a way that that leaves you not only guessing at who the killer is, but what tone the movie will take with the next scene. Also, the best jump-kicks in movie history. Memories of Murder (2003), directed by Bong Joon Ho.
Episode 211 - Diabolique
This week, we watch the classic thriller that inspired Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and Vertigo. The wife and the mistress of a boarding school headmaster plot to kill him. This movie contains all sorts of 1955 murder, drowning, poison, zombies, ghosts, and creepy private investigators. Diabolique (1955), directed by H. G. Clouzot.
Episode 214 - 8 1/2
This week, we try to make sense of the 1964 winner of the Best Foreign Film Academy Award, which is described a story of a director struggling to make a movie. Thats about as much of it as we understood. 8 1/2 (1963), directed by Federico Fellini.
Episode 224 - Infernal Affairs
This week, we watch a cat and mouse crime thriller based in Hong Kong, where two moles, working for opposite sides of a cop vs gang rivalry, race to find out the identity of the other (which Martin Scorsese later remade into a best picture winner, The Departed) - Infernal Affairs (2002). Directed by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak.
Episode 228 - La Haine
This week, we watch the film that kickstarted a renaissance in French cinema, which tells a story of a day in the life of three friends living in the projects one day after a night of violent riots of protest in the streets of Paris- La Haine (Hate, 1995). Directed by Mathieu Kassovitz.