MOVIE - Mustang

Nominated for Best Foreign Film, 2016 Academy Awards
PG-13

Wide release 11/20/15

Viewed 1/19/16 at the Loft with Sheila

RT Critic: 97   Audience:  89
Critic's Consensus:  Mustang delivers a bracing -- and thoroughly timely -- message whose power is further bolstered by the efforts of a stellar ensemble cast.

Cag:  5/Loved it

Directed by Deniz Gamze Erguven (a female!)

CG Cinema (at the end of the credits it said FRANCE, GERMANY, TURKEY

In Turkish with subtitles

Actors were AMAZING!

My comments:  It took place in Turkey and was in Turkish.  It told a great (though sad) story.  The acting was superb.  Getting a chance to glimpse a little bit Turkey once again was fantastic.  Watching it with a friend: extra special.  Loved this movie!

RT Summary:  Early summer in a village in Northern Turkey. Five free-spirited teenaged sisters splash about on the beach with their male classmates. Though their games are merely innocent fun, a neighbor passes by and reports what she considers to be illicit behavior to the girls' family. The family overreacts, removing all "instruments of corruption," like cell phones and computers, and essentially imprisoning the girls, subjecting them to endless lessons in housework in preparation for them to become brides. As the eldest sisters are married off, the younger ones bond together to avoid the same fate. The fierce love between them empowers them to rebel and chase a future where they can determine their own lives in Deniz Gamze Ergüven's debut, a powerful portrait of female empowerment.

MOVIE - Leviathan

R (2:20)

Limited release 12/25/2014

The Loft with Sheila on March 5. 2015

RT Critic: 99 Audience: 81

Cag: 3.5 - I liked it but it was really bleak (as I say below) and depressing

Directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev

Sony Pictures Classics
In Russian, with subtitles

My comments:  A bleak, interesting story that takes place somewhere on the coast of Russia, in an economically deprived village that sports a fishery where most of the women seem to work.  The mayor is out to get the land of a hard-working mechanic who is incredibly down-on-his-luck.  This is the story of a family, a community, and sneaking in and snaking around it all is the Catholic Church. Corruption.  Sadness.  Bleak. (And it didn't really help that I didn't "click" with the protagonist.)

RT Summary:  The latest drama from Andrey Zvyagintsev, the acclaimed director of The Return (Venice Film Festival Golden Lion winner and Golden Globe nominee). Kolya (Alexeï Serebriakov) lives in a small fishing town near the stunning Barents Sea in Northern Russia. He owns an auto-repair shop that stands right next to the house where he lives with his young wife Lilya (Elena Liadova) and his son Roma (Sergueï Pokhodaev) from a previous marriage.

MOVIE - Two Days, One Night

PG-13 (1:35)
Limited release 12/24/2015

Viewed at the Loft with Sheila 2/9/15

RT Critic: 96   Audience: 79

Cag: 3.5 It kept my attention....

Directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne

IFC Films

In French, with subtitles

Actors: Marion Cotillard

My comments:  Yes, Cotillard did a superb job in this role.  The story was quite interesting, too.  But it was slow.  Really, really slow.  Too slow.  I loved listening to the French.  There really wasn't a whole lot of talking, so I could follow much of the conversation.

RT Summary:  Sandra (Cotillard) has just been released from the hospital to find that she no longer has a job. According to management, the only way Sandra can hope to regain her position at the factory is to convince her co-workers to sacrifice their much-needed yearly bonuses. Now, over the course of one weekend, Sandra must confront each co-worker individually in order to win a majority of their votes before time runs out. With TWO DAYS, ONE NIGHT, the Dardennes have turned a relevant social inquiry into a powerful statement on community solidarity, once again delivering a film that is simple on the surface but alive with both compassion and wisdom. 

MOVIE - Ida

PG-13 (1:20 - though it seemed longer)

Limited release 5/2/2014

Viewed Sunday, 6/15/2014 in Harrisburg at the Midtown Theater

RT Critic:  93 Audience:  79

Cag:  2/It was okay

Directed by Pawel Pawlikowski

Music Box Films

in Polish, with English subtitles

My comments:  The story was a good one, but could have been told in about 45 minutes. It was depressing.  And dark...literally.  Black & white and dark.  And although it ended exactly as I knew it would, it really pissed me off...probably because of my own personal religious bent, especially about the Catholic church.  However, the thing that bothered me most were the long silences.  L...o....n....g silences.  Way too long......

RT Summary:  From acclaimed director Pawel Pawlikowski (Last Resort, My Summer of Love) comes IDA, a moving and intimate drama about a young novitiate nun in 1960s Poland who, on the verge of taking her vows, discovers a dark family secret dating from the terrible years of the Nazi occupation. 18-year old Anna (stunning newcomer Agata Trzebuchowska), a sheltered orphan raised in a convent, is preparing to become a nun when the Mother Superior insists she first visit her sole living relative. Naïve, innocent Anna soon finds herself in the presence of her aunt Wanda (Agata Kulesza), a worldly and cynical Communist Party insider, who shocks her with the declaration that her real name is Ida and her Jewish parents were murdered during the Nazi occupation. This revelation triggers a heart-wrenching journey into the countryside, to the family house and into the secrets of the repressed past, evoking the haunting legacy of the Holocaust and the realities of postwar Communism. In this beautifully directed film, Pawlikowski returns to his native Poland for the first time in his career to confront some of the more contentious issues in the history of his birthplace. Powerfully written and eloquently shot, IDA is a masterly evocation of a time, a dilemma, and a defining historical moment; IDA is also personal, intimate, and human. The weight of history is everywhere, but the scale falls within the scope of a young woman learning about the secrets of her own past. This intersection of the personal with momentous historic events makes for what is surely one of the most powerful and affecting films of the year.

MOVIE - Gloria

R (1:49)

Limited Release 1/24/14

Viewed 3/19/14 at the Loft with Fran

RT Critic: Audience: (can't bring this up on Rotten Tomatoes!)

Cag: 4-Liked it a lot

Directed by Sebastian Lelio

from CHILE - in Spanish with subtitles

Fandanago Review:  Gloria is a "woman of a certain age" but still feels young. Though lonely, she makes the best of her situation and fills her nights seeking love at social dance clubs for single adults. Her fragile happiness changes the day she meets Rodolfo. Their intense passion, to which Gloria gives her all, leaves her vacillating between hope and despair -- until she uncovers a new strength and realizes that, in her golden years, she can shine brighter than ever. GLORIA is Chile’s official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 86th Academy Awards®, and stars Paulina García in a tour de force performance that captured the Silver Bear Best Actress Award at this year's Berlin Film Festival.

My comments:  One of those movies that makes you think during ... and long after ... the movie is over.  What is loneliness?  Your kids are grown, your husband/partner is gone (I guess it doesn't matter if it's through divorce or death), but you're still very much alive.  What happens next?  THAT''S what this movie is about!

MOVIE - Omar

NR (1:38)

Limited release 2/21/14 (Nominated for an Academy Award)

Viewed at Loft with Sheila 3--5-14

RT Critic: 88 Audience: 83

Cag: 5: Outstanding film

Directed by Hany Abu-Assad

Adopt Films

In Arabic with subtitles

The actor who played Omar, Adam Bakri, was mesmerizing.

My comments:  What a story!  (And what an incredibly high wall).  I'm thinking this took place in Jerusalem/West Bank/Occupied Territories - will do a little more research now, which is usually the way of it, right?  This was the only tiny problem I had - I had to spend a little too much time figuring out the setting.  I could understand the language being spoken was Arabic, but so were all the police-types.  I had no pre-information, but now that I've read the review, I'm glad I didn't.  Watching this movie with no previous "clue" about its content was the best thing I could have done.  The ending fit perfectly with the character and personality of the protagonist.  Anything else would have been untrue to his innermost character.  Added note:  I can't imagine living like this.  On either side, Palestinian or Israeli.  Human beings are human beings.  How do I know what I'd do if I were put into non-human situations?

Reviews: A tense, gripping thriller about betrayal, suspected and real, in the Occupied Territories. Omar (Adam Bakri) is a Palestinian baker who routinely climbs over the separation wall to meet up with his girl Nadja (Leem Lubany). By night, he's either a freedom fighter or a terrorist-you decide-ready to risk his life to strike at the Israeli military with his childhood friends Tarek (Eyad Hourani) and Amjad (Samer Bisharat). Arrested after the killing of an Israeli soldier and tricked into an admission of guilt by association, he agrees to work as an informant. So begins a dangerous game-is he playing his Israeli handler (Waleed F. Zuaiter) or will he really betray his cause? And who can he trust on either side? Palestinian filmmaker Hany Abu-Assad (Paradise Now) has made a dynamic, action-packed drama about the insoluable moral dilemmas and tough choices facing those on the frontlines of a conflict that shows no sign of letting up. 

MOVIE - Instructions Not Included

PG-13 (1:40)

Limited Release 8/30/13

Went on opening day (8/30/13) to ElCon

RT Critic: (none yet)  Audience: 98

Cag:  5/Loved it

In Spanish with subtitles

Directed by Eugenio Derbez (who also played the lead!)

Lionsgate Films

Eugenio Derbez

Rotten Tomatoes summary:  Valentin (Eugenio Derbez) is Acapulco's resident playboy-until a former fling leaves a baby on his doorstep and takes off without a trace. Valentin leaves Mexico for Los Angeles to find the baby's mother, but only ends up finding a new home for himself and his newfound daughter, Maggie (Loreto Peralta). An unlikely father figure, Valentin raises Maggie for six years, while also establishing himself as one of Hollywood's top stuntmen to pay the bills, with Maggie acting as his on-set coach. AsValentin raises Maggie, she forces him to grow up too. But their unique and offbeat family is threatened when Maggie's birth mom shows up out of the blue, and Valentin realizes he's in danger of losing his daughter- and his best friend.

My comments:  This movie was absolutely wonderful, from beginning to end.  F-U-N-N-Y.  Eugenio Derbez was fabulous. The little girl, Loreto Peralta, who played Maggie, reminded me, physically, so much of my own niece that it was uncanny.  What a terrific, bilingual actress she is.  This was a really special movie, highly recommended.

MOVIE - The Attack

R (1:42)

Limited release 6/21/2013

Viewed with Sheila at the Loft on 8/22/2013

RT Critic: 91 Audience:  79

Cag:   2/it was okay 

In Hebrew with subtitles

Based on the book of the same title by Yasmina Khadra

Directed by Zlad Doueiri

Cohen Media Group

Rotten Tomatoes summary:  Amin Jaafari (Ali Suliman, Paradise Now) is an Israeli Palestinian surgeon, fully assimilated into Tel Aviv society. He has a loving wife, an exemplary career, and many Jewish friends. But his picture perfect life is turned upside down after a suicide bombing in a restaurant leaves nineteen dead, and the Israeli police inform him that his wife, Sihem (Reymonde Amsellem, Lebanon) who also died in the explosion, was responsible. Convinced of her innocence, Amin abandons the relative security of his adopted homeland and enters the Palestinian territories in pursuit of the truth. Once there, he finds himself in ever more dangerous places and situations. Determined, he presses on seeking answers to questions he never thought he would be asking.

My comments:  I loved the book - I read it when it first came out.  The movie left me with a totally different feeling.  At the end of the book, I think I understood how Jaafari felt.  Not at the end of the movie.  I can't understand his lack of conscience, it left me feeling empty and bereft.  It was a really tough movie, anyways.  

MOVIE - The Double Hour

Good movie.  Good mystery.  Great storytelling.
in Italian, with subtitles
limited release 4-15-11
Unrated (1:35)
July 30 at the Loft, alone
RT  82% cag 91%
Director:  Giuseppe Capatondi

Guido, a handsome guy in Turin, Italy, has been part of the speed dating scene for awhile, hooking up for one-night stands.  But then he meets Sonia, a conscientious hotel chambermaid, and they instantly hit it off.  He takes her to his security job in the country, and while there, the huge country estate he guards is robbed and neither Guido or Sonia come out of it unscathed.  The rest of the movie is a mystery, billed as a psychological thriller, I would definitely agree.  As an onlooker you're trying to figure out what's going on and just as you have a glimmer, a real  twist is added , and then another, to keep you just enough off balance ..... in a great way.  A good one.

MOVIE - Queen to Play (Joueuse)

Wonderful lead actress!
in French with subtitles
Limited release 4-1-11 (made in 2008/2009)
unrated (1:41)
7-16-11 at The Loft by myself (not a seat left in the upstairs theater!)
RT:  67% cag 79%
Director:  Caroline Bottaro
Sandrine Bonnaire, Kevin Kline, Jennifer Beals

This was a very lovely movie.  The setting was the island of Corsica, and it was a bout a mom who discovers the game of chess.  She's a house cleaner, and she sees Jennifer Beals playing chess while sitting on the balcony of a b & b that overlooks the ocean.  It's a lovely, somewhat sexy scene, and Helene is mesmerized by the memory of it.  So much so that she buys her husband an electronic chess set for his birthday, even though neither of them have in any way encountered the game before.

Now...although the movie does not really focus on the actual game of chess, most of the rest of the movie revolves around learning it and playing it.  Got a little too much chess-y for me.  Kevin Kline plays the reclusive chess player that teachers her how to play - and who gives her the confidence in herself to go farther.  This is another movie about a woman who breaks free of her long-standing cocoon and emerges as a butterfly.  Sandrine Bonnaire plays the protagonist beautifully.  What a lovely smile she has!

MOVIE - Amreeka

Another good one!
Released in theaters 9-4-09
This was a free presentation as part of a special 10-city tour
PG-13 (1:32)
6-9-11 at the Loft with Sheila, Kate, Ronnie
RT:  87  cag:  90
Written and directed by Dherien Dabis
in English and Arabic with subtitles when needed

A Palestinian banker and her teenage son move to Illinois after it becomes more and more dangerous to live in Palestine.  Because of two checkpoints and huge walls, her 15 minute drive from their home in Bethlehem to work now takes 2 hours. They will live with her sister and brother-in-law, a doctor, and their three daughters.

Of course, it's not easy.  Bullies make fun of Fadi and confrontations escalate.  Muna can't find an administrative job, so takes a job at the local burger joint, pretending to her family that she is working at a bank.  But even as awful, unforeseen things happen to them, they make friends.  She is a bit overwieght but clever and has a sense of humor, so nothing that is thrown at her keeps her down for long.  And there are even some laughs along the way.

The families still miss Palestine.  They miss Arab food.  They are a family.  Good movie.

MOVIE - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest

A bit disappointing, left me wanting more...what?
Limited release 10-29-10
R (2:28)
RT 52% cag 69%
2-13-11at Crossroads, alone (saw the first two at the Loft, I waited too long for this one)
Director: Dan Alfredson
in Swedish, with sbutitles
From the book by Sven Larsen

Lisbeth Salander is accused of murdering her father (she did), but it was self-defense, which has to be proved. Usual chip on her shoulder, spiked hair, makeup, and multiple piercings are really dominant. Reaches way down to your gut and helps you realize she's been through some real crapola in her life. Mikael has to work to prove her innocence. It isn't easy. His sister takes on the case as Lisbeth's lawyer. It's so hard to understand....and like....this girl. But you do.

Movie - Secret in Their Eyes (El Secreto de Sus Ojos)

Amazing movie-an Argentinian murder mystery
Released in Argentina 8-13-09, in US 4-16-10
Rating: R (2:09)
9-23-10 at Crossroads, by myself
RT: 92 cag:
Director: Juan Jose Campanella
2010 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film

In Spanish with English subtitles

Ricardo Darin plays Benjamin Esposito, a man who works as an investigator for lawyers and judges in Buenes Aires. He has recently retired and is writing a novel about one of his cases, a case that started 25 years before and has never been truly solved. It still iggles at him. Also iggling at him is the love he feels, and has always felt, for his boss, a beautiful woman who is also his friend.

The time period switches from the past, telling its part of the story, and to the present, watching as they put more clues together. The cast is superb. Fantastic. I didn't even realize I was reading their words. (Though I was speaking with the owner of Clues Unlimited the very next day. She can speak Spanish and says that they did not translate much of the foul language that was being used. She says it was outrageous, and sometimes really funny. The translated words worked perfectly for me!)

As more and more is revealed, the story becomes more and more engrossing. What a splendid piece of storytelling! I can understand why it received an academy award. It was brilliant!

MOVIE - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Wow. An incredible, topnotch movie.
Released 3-19-2010
R (2:34)
6-13-10 at the Loft
RT: 86% cag: Do I Dare Rate This as My Highest? 97%
Director: Niels Arden Oplev
In Swedish, with subtitles
From the book by Stieg Larsson

NOTE: There was some incredibly graphic violence in this movie that was extremely disburbing.

But, WHAT A MOVIE! Incredbile storytelling, fantastic acting, setting and tone and mood that just worked perfectly together. Within ten minutes I wasn't even realizing that I was reading subtitles. And since I come from a Swedish background, hearing the lilting accents, checking out the countryside, and even having one of the small towns included that are part of my own family history was pretty cool.

Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist, was set up, charged with libel, and as the film begins, has been sentenced to six months incarceration. He has six months before he has to submit to this. So when a wealthy industrialist and CEO of a powerful family conglomerate hires him to investigate the 40-year-old disappearance of his much-loved niece, Harriet, he takes on the job and moves to a cottage on the Vanger property in northern Sweden, away from the craziness of Stockholm.

Lisbeth Salander is a 24 year old computer hacker with lots of baggage, a trouble past, and a dozen reasons to be sullen. She has dozens of piercings, a huge tattoo on her back, and a cigarette constantly between her lips. Her new probation officer is a sexual predator that is one of the nastiest I've ever seen portrayed. But Lisbeth is smart. She retaliates. And since she was the researcher that helped put Mikael away, she realizes that he's innocent and keeps hacking into his harddrive to see what he's up to.

Well, the two stories come together when she joins him to help him investigate.

So we are really examing two scenarios - hers, and their investigation. What a story, so well told. This movie does it justice. I've heard talk they're going to do an American edition. Why? I don't think they could top this one.

I'm really glad I didn't read the book before I saw the movie. The suspense was wonderful. But NOW....I wanna read the book!