Toronto Passions

Name your favourite (Non English Language) Film

GPIDEAL

Prolific User
Jun 27, 2010
23,359
12
38
Cinema Paradiso

La Vita e Bella

Ladro Di Biciclette (perhaps my best foreign film).

I still need to see Mediterraneo!

(I'm partial to Italian films but I've seen some great foreign films from Argentina, India, Japan, Germany, and France, to name a few).
 

Smash

Active member
Apr 20, 2005
4,075
12
38
T Dot
Motorcycle Diaries :clap2:

 

gar

Member
Jan 31, 2002
657
21
18
I still get goose bumps whenever I see these films

Tokyo Story (1953) and Late Spring (1949) by Yasujiro Ozu
Ordet (1955) by Carl Dreyer
Tree of Wooden Clogs (1978) by Ermanno Olmi
Yellow Earth (1984) by Chen Kaige
 

NorthernBear

Dirty (Not So) Old Man
Jun 13, 2009
2,529
2
0
North of GTA
Life Is Beautiful was good but I saw another one with the same actor that I enjoyed much more.

It is called Johnny Stecchino or Johnny Toothpick in English.

It stars Roberto Benigni and is one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. I have been searching for it on either DVD or Blu-Ray for a long time but I do not think it is available in Canada anymore.
 

brazilianguy

Well-known member
Oct 18, 2010
1,097
74
48
Martyrs 2008 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

go check it out if you never heard of this movie!!! like go!! stop your life and go watch this movie!!! lol
 

Titalian

No Regrets
Nov 27, 2012
8,500
9
0
Everywhere
Jacques Mesrine, One of the most notorious criminals of France, True story, He also escaped from a Montreal prison. Great movie.

 

MadonnaLove

Banned
Dec 1, 2012
1,976
11
0
GTA

To Live, It's one of my favourite movies . Amazing movie, infact the whole movie is here on youtube to watch. Enjoy


"To Live" is a simple title, but it conceals a universe. The film follows the life of one family in China, from the heady days of gambling dens in the 1940s to the austere hardship of the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. And through all of their fierce struggles with fate, all of the political twists and turns they endure, their hope is basically one summed up by the heroine, a wife who loses wealth and position and children, and who says, "All I ask is a quiet life together." The movie has been directed by Zhang Yimou, the leading Chinese filmmaker right now (although this film offended Beijing and earned him a two-year ban from filmmaking). It stars his wife, Gong Li, the leading Chinese actress (likewise banned). Together their credits include "Ju Dou," "Raise the Red Lantern" and "The Story of Qui Ju." Like them it follows the fate of a strong woman, but also this time a strong man; somehow they stick together through incredible hardships.
At first, the troubles are the husband's own fault. Fugui (Ge You) is a degenerate gambler who loses his family home and fortune at dice. "Turtle spawn!" his old father cries, beating him with a stick. His wife Jiazhen (Gong Li) wants nothing more to do with him, and from a life of indolence he finds himself selling needles and thread on the street.
The man who won his house gives him a set of beautiful shadow puppets, and he goes on the road as an entertainer, quickly swept up by the Nationalist army to amuse the troops. Then one morning, drunk, he oversleeps as the army retreats, and he hears a thundering sound on the snow, which is the Red army advancing. Ever adaptable, he joins them, and eventually finds his way back to his hometown and his wife, son and daughter.
Life is very hard. But they survive under the new communist regime. (Ironically, the man who won his house at dice is executed as a counter-revolutionary landowner.) A childhood illness causes their daughter to become mute and hard of hearing, but in the precise arithmetic of matchmaking a likely partner is found for her: A supervisor of the Red Guards at a factory, who is lame.
The story progresses in terms of temporary advances and crushing setbacks, one caused when a starving doctor, jailed by the Red Guards, cannot assist at a crucial time because he has gorged himself on seven sweet buns. Another family loss is caused by an old friend, who vows he owes them a life, and will eventually be called upon for repayment. Years come and go; jolly murals of Mao Tse Tung appear on the courtyard walls, and then fade in the sun and rain. And somehow they live.
The best art, it is said, comes from turmoil - from hard times. In China no serious filmmaking took place for decades, and now great films are coming in a torrent from that country. The authorities are not always so happy to have the nation's past examined with such frankness, and with films like "To Live" and "The Blue Kite" (released earlier this year) there is a certain inexorable pattern: They are made, shown at foreign film festivals, honored ("To Live" won acting awards at Cannes), play briefly in a few sophisticated cinemas in Beijing or Shanghai, and then they disappear.
The honesty of "To Live" earned Zhang Yimou and Gong Li not only a two-year ban on further co-productions, but a ban on even speaking about their film. But "To Live" has been made, it is playing all over the world, it exists on the screen as a fascinating testament about ordinary human lives conducted under terrifying conditions, when one's fate could hinge on a chance remark or an instant political edict from a zealous teenager.
It is a big, strong, energetic film, made by a filmmaker whose vision takes in four decades of his nation's history, and who stands apart from all the political currents, and sees that ordinary people everywhere basically want what his heroine cries out for, a quiet life. It is exciting to see these new films as they emerge from China. They are history being written, celebrated, and mourned.
 

Don Draper

Cufflinks & Cognac
Nov 24, 2009
6,364
644
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Azumi 1 & 2 are right up there. I think it is the deep universal story of dedication and war that fascinates me .... or the could be the young beautiful ninja ... :D

I have Part One. Like it very much. I have to find the 2nd part now.
 

Art Mann

sapiosexual
May 10, 2010
2,900
3
0
Thanks for starting this list, Don. You're jogging some great film memories.

Here's one that seems to have slipped under the radar for many people, but is an outstanding film if you're in the mood for a love story, a romantic tragedy.

Les parapluies de Cherbourg.

From 1964, directed by Jacques Demy, starring Catherine Deneuve, with music written by Michel Legrand, it's a cinematic masterpiece. Unlike the Hollywood musical genre, with a corny plot and dialog linking occasional songs, this ground-breaking pop-art opera is entirely a film in song.


(Interesting side note from contemporary pop culture: Mad Men's Don Draper and Lane Pryce, stuck in the office on New Year's Day, discuss going to see this movie together.)
 

Don Draper

Cufflinks & Cognac
Nov 24, 2009
6,364
644
113
[SIZE=+2]Almodovar's unforgettable 'Todo Sobre Mi Madre'...


...and his first film away from Madrid in the more Enticing and Beautiful Barcelona[/SIZE]
 

Don Draper

Cufflinks & Cognac
Nov 24, 2009
6,364
644
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[SIZE=+2]Where there is Love there is also Passion, Torment, Anguish, Lunacy and Joy...


...'Betty Blue' is that girl you will never, ever get out of your heart, mind and memories. Mon Dieu!
[/SIZE]
 
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