The Battle of Algiers is a 1966 Italian-Algerian war film by Gillo Pontecorvo. It depicts the fight of rebels against the French government in Algeria’s capital during the Algerian War that took place between 1954-1962. It was shot in the city and features a newsreel look in black and white with documentary-style editing to heighten […]
The Battle of Algiers – ★★★★½ Read More »
Hearts of Darkness is a US documentary film about the chaotic and wild production of Francis Ford Coppola’s 1979 cinematic masterpiece Apocalypse Now. It was mainly shot and narrated by Coppola’s wife Eleanor and later edited and finished by George Hickenlooper and Fax Bahr who premiered it at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival. The footage
Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker’s Apocalypse – ★★★★½ Read More »
This interview is another meaningful addition to the original Shoah project by French filmmaker Claude Lanzmann that was released in 2001. It features the eye witness account of Yehuda Lerner, a Jewish prisoner of the Sobibor extermination camp during World War II that participated in a revolt, which enabled him to flee from the camp
Sobibor, 14 Octobre 1943, 16 Heures – ★★★★½ Read More »
In 1979, Claude Lanzmann interviewed Maurice Rossel as part of his Shoah documentary project, who was an official of the International Red Cross during the Second World War. Rossel is known for his visit of the Theresienstadt Concentration Camp and erroneously reporting that the living conditions of the Jewish prisoners there were almost normal and life in the camp
Un Vivant Qui Passe (A Visitor from the Living) – ★★★★ Read More »
French documentary film director Claude Lanzman’s last released work before his death in 2018 features previously unreleased interviews with four women from different European countries who survived the holocaust. The accounts were part of the original Shoah project that was released in 1985 but in Lanzman’s opinion seemed to be stories of their own that
Shoah: Four Sisters – ★★★★★ Read More »
This 2018 documentary film by French director Julien Faraut is set at the final of the 1984 French Open between John McEnroe and Ivan Lendl at a time when McEnroe was the world’s top-ranked player. Vogue called it the best film about tennis that was ever made and it really makes for an very interesting
John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection – ★★★★½ Read More »
The US-Colombian 2004 HBO drama film Maria Full of Grace written and directed by Joshua Marston is an excellent early 2000s naturalistic international arthouse film. It follows Colombian teenage girl Maria Álvarez, who is unsatisfied with her poor life situation and agrees to take on the job of a drug mule. The dramatic structure is
Maria Full of Grace – ★★★★½ Read More »
A list of all the films I’ve seen in cinema in 2021.
Films Seen in Cinema in 2021 Read More »
Diese Woche kommt der exzellente Dokumentarfilm Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse von Maria Speth in die Kinos. Der Film handelt von einer sechsten Schulklasse in Mittelhessen und ihrem Lehrer Herr Bachmann, der kurz vor der Rente steht und mit einer ganz besonderen Art unterrichtet. Er nimmt jedes einzelne Kind wahr, fördert gezielt die Kreativität z.B.
Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse – ★★★★½ Read More »
The 2020 psychological drama film The Father written and directed by French director Florian Zeller is now screening in cinemas. The film is about an aging man called Anthony played by Anthony Hopkins (Silence of the Lambs, 1991) who is suffering more and more from dementia and his daughter Anne who tries to find help