ABCs at the Movies: The Doubles Round!

[oilgun]

aka: Le dernier jour

Synopsis
It's Christmas. Simon is nineteen years old. He returns home with Louise, a young stranger, whom he has met on the night train. The family home is on an island in the sea. His relationship with his parents is in turmoil. When family secrets are revealed, they ignite a sexual attraction that ultimately drives Simon into facing the truth about himself.


Featuring Gaspard Ulliel, one of my fave cuties:



==COMMENT==
I think we need another cinematic cutie round soon...

[Fran]

Also known as:  Kept and Dreamless

From IMDb:  Florence, a young irresponsible mother and her precocious daughter, Eugenia, have an unusual relationship. The roles between the two are reversed. Florence is totally inept at caring for a daughter, whereas Eugenia, only 10 years old, shows maturity and responsibility far beyond what her age might lead you to suppose.

[memento]

IMDB: Annie Braddock graduates from college as an anthropology major and freezes during the interview for an internship at a big corporation. To find herself, she takes a job as a nanny in Manhattan's toney Upper East Side, tells her mother she got the internship, and moves in with the X family - a cheating husband, a control-freak wife, and Grayer, a lad of five. Mrs. X works the nanny day and night while neglecting her son. As the summer wears on, Annie is chatted up by a young man in the building, dubbed Harvard Hottie. She puts her anthropology skills to use to save her sanity, but how long can she suffer? Will she speak up, and will she discover who she is.

[Meryl]

[Fran]

Also known as:

Fist in His Pocket (USA) Fists in the Pocket (UK)

From IMDb:  A deeply disturbed young man subject to seizures benignly decides to murder members of his dysfunctional family for altruistic reasons.

[memento]

IMDB:
I got "The Quiet Room" on the basis of the cover in the video store. It was a risk and a risk that was absolutely worth taking.

There are few films that attempt to understand the thinking of a kid. There are even fewer films that have an actor that can portray it. In this film there are both.

There is nothing cutesy here. The girl, a seven year old, has decided not to speak because of the conflict between her parents. That's essentially it. But there is so much in the honesty of the child's monologue that resonates with any person who has been a child trying to understand the irrational world of grownups.

This film is brilliant.

=aside= Gil
I know you're the "Q" expert, but I got so excited when I finally found one that I had to play it.

[oilgun]

Synopsis
A mother, father and son live together in a small apartment in Taipei but lead very separate lives. The son, Xiao-kang (Lee Kang-sheng) drifts through life without a job; the mother is an elevator operator having an affair with a man who pirates pornographic movies; and the father pursues illicit pleasures in the city's gay saunas and is on a mission to stop the leaking water from the apartment upstairs. When the son is stricken with an agonizing pain in the neck and shoulders, seemingly from taking an ill-advised dunk in the polluted Tansui River, the family is driven on a quest to alleviate the son's pain.

==ASIDE Sandy==
I think you are now the Q expert.  I searched for a Q and gave up after about 45 minutes...

[Fran]

From IMDb:

In honor of my film class wrapping up this week, I will be counting down my top five favorite films we have watched for class. I begin with my #5 choice, Secrets and Lies, a Mike Leigh drama/comedy about the secrets and lies (shock) that tear apart a dysfunctional British family. Brenda Blethyn plays Cynthia Purley, the very dramatic and always crying single mother who is one day contacted by the daughter she gave up for adoption… who happens to be black. The look on Blethyn's face is priceless as she flashes back to a one night stand she had as a young lady.

Most would think Leigh's story would revolve around race relations, which is not the case at all; race is never an issue). Instead he revolves his story around the Purley family, a unit so torn apart from over the years that a simple family cookout turns into a soap opera. "Secrets and lies! We're all in pain! Why can't we share our pain? I've spent my entire life trying to make people happy, and the three people I love the most in the world hate each other's guts, and I'm in the middle! I can't take it anymore!" This memorable quote comes from Maurice Purley, brother to Cynthia and talented photographer. Maurice is your classic good guy, the passive patriarch who always tries to hold the family together. (The irony around his character is that he cannot conceive a child with his wife, Monica). You almost feel sorry for the successful Hortense, as if she would be better off not knowing her birth mother at all.

The actors are so talented in this film that Leigh, at times, uses no cuts during a scene. The camera stays in one spot as the actors' play out scenes that can last 10-15 minutes. After you get past the difficult British dialect (you may want to use captions while watching), you will feel as if you are that nosey neighbor who can't help but listen and enjoy the problems this family confronts… and that's no lie.

[memento]

IMDB: Tommy is blind, deaf and dumb, but there is nothing wrong with him. As a small child, he accidentally witnessed the murder of his father by his stepfather. His mother and stepfather told him to forget everything he had seen and heard, and to never talk about it; but Tommy carried it to the extreme, turned inward, and stopped seeing, hearing or speaking at all. He suffered much while growing up, and finally found happiness in, of all things, playing pinball. When he became the world champion pinball player it brought his family fame and fortune. After being spontaneously healed, he began to teach others of his unique perspective on life, eventually becoming a religious cult figure.

=aside= Fran
This turned out to be a fun, challenging theme.

[southendmd]

IMDb user comment:  Very nice, touching movie. Made me cry. A story of a boy coming of age while dealing with a dying mother and rebelling against his father all in the context of a loving extended family. The (Jewish) cultural angle gave it authenticity. A fine performance by Nathan Watt but that John Turturro is really something. Michael Richards was essentially Kramer again. Interesting in that it is a woman director (Diane Keaton) who brings this story of male family love to the screen. While mom is very loving as well, she sadly and symbolically abandons Steven/Franz by dying and it is the weird (eccentric and harmlessly schizophrenic) uncles who support him thru it all, once again posing the question, "Who really are the crazy (or heroes, for that matter) among us?" I give it an 8.