Film Reviews

A modern love story set in Sao Paulo about Heitor, a writer and literature professor, and Julia, a theatre student turned veterinarian. A fight over the telephone propels Heitor into a journey through the chaotic city streets to reconcile with Julia. Their personal history unfolds against the backdrop of the city and its people in a series of events representing the struggle between poetry and science.

On Dry Well Lane in Beijing in 1953, Chen Shujuan and Lin Shaolong marry. A year later their son, nicknamed Tietou (Iron Head), is born. The Party is everywhere: Mao's photograph, loud-speaker announcements, visits from the neighborhood committee. Shaolong dies in a reform camp; a close family friend, who protects Shujuan and her son partly out of guilt for lying to authorities about Shaolong, succumbs to malnutrition; a confrontation with the Red Guard leads to injury, imprisonment and death. Shujuan's love for Tietou sustains her, and the child's blue kite embodies hope: "I can make another for you," says Tietou's dad; by the end, Tietou promises this to a small child.

WELFARE shows the nature and complexity of the welfare system in sequences illustrating the staggering diversity of problems that constitute welfare: housing, unemployment, divorce, medical and psychiatric problems, abandoned and abused children, and the elderly. These issues are presented in a context where welfare workers as well as clients struggle to cope with and interpret the laws and regulations that govern their work and life.

A lift begins displaying some erratic behavior, like trapping some party goers and nearly suffocating them, and decapitating a security guard. Felix, the technician from the lift company, can't find anything wrong with the circuitry. When he and a nosy reporter begin asking questions of the lift company's electronics partner (Rising Sun Electronics) his boss puts him on a leave of absence. A subsequent visit to a professor leads them to believe that some evil experiments are being conducted.

A look at the work of Stinson Hunter and his gang who pose as underage girls in order to catch pedophiles.

With the Christmas season fast approaching, department store window decorator Sloan Van Doren is hoping to take over the recently-vacated head window designer spot but finds she has to prove herself by going up against rival Jake Dooley. As the two compete they find they may have more in common than they think. Stars Chyler Leigh and Naomi Judd.

Ajay Mehra (from previous Ghayal-1990), after finishing off his life sentence, starts a newspaper called Satyakam. Still dealing with the haunting trauma of losing his loved ones, Ajay manages to make a credible name for himself in investigative journalism. Working with a strange team of RTI activists, ex-criminals and ilk; and even stranger ways of unearthing and presenting truth, Ajay Mehra has earned quite a fan following among the youths, who finds his fearless and unforgiving approach in dealing with all kinds of sociopaths very inspiring.

Chico is a young piano player with big dreams. Rita is a beautiful singer with an extraordinary voice. Music and romantic desire unites them, but their journey - in the tradition of the Latin ballad, the bolero - brings heartache and torment.

In the year 1215, the rebel barons of England have forced their despised King John to put his royal seal on the Magna Carta, a seminal document that upheld the rights of free men. Yet within months of pledging himself to the great charter, the King reneged on his word and assembled a mercenary army on the south coast of England with the intention of bringing the barons and the country back under his tyrannical rule. Barring his way stood the mighty Rochester castle, a place that would become the symbol of the rebel's momentous struggle for justice and freedom.

Four segments by four different Directors. Kiriko (Takanori Tsujimoto), The Children’s Samurai (Kenta Fukasaku), The Firing Range (Makoto Tahara), and Assault Girl 2 (Mamoru Oshii). Kiriko: the spirit of a murdered assassin takes revenge on the gang that killed her and her sister. Children's Samurai: an educational film narrates the like of a modern grade-school samurai dealing with bullies. Firing Range: the rifle of a Meiji Era soldier and the pistol of a modern police officer are transformed into powerful new weapons when they face off. Assault Girl 2: two guardian angels duel in a wheat field.

A ticking-clock thriller following Winston Churchill in the 24 hours before D-Day.

Major Lex Kearney, dishonorably discharged from the army for cowardice in battle, has actually volunteered to go undercover to try to prevent raids against shipments of horses desperately needed for the Union war effort. Falling in with the gang of jayhawkers and Confederate soldiers who have been conducting the raids, he gradually gains their trust and is put in a position where he can discover who has been giving them secret information revealing the routes of the horse shipments.

One little ancient British village still holds out against the Roman invaders. Asterix and Obelix are invited to help. They must face fog, rain, warm beer and boiled boar with mint sauce, but they soon have Governor Encyclopaedius Britannicus's Romans declining and falling. Until a wild race for a barrel of magic potion lands them in the drink.

Sam, a freelance journalist, decides to investigate the growing phenomenon of disaffected youth joining extremist groups. He infiltrates a group of four young people who have been tasked with the creation of a jihadist cell and whose mission is to destabilise the city centre of Paris.

A guy called Eric (Hense the title) owns a huge house and some greedy people want to build a mall over it. So they get someone to burn down his house. Eric is badly burned but not dead, and a year later the mall opens. What they don't realise is that Eric is living underneath the mall and he's very angry!