ABCs at the Movies: The Doubles Round!

[Fran]

aka Neokonchennaya pyesa dlya mekhanicheskogo pianino



From IMDb:

Early in the 20th century, family and friends gather at the country estate of a general's widow, Anna Petrovna. Sofia, the new wife of Anna's step-son, recognizes Misha, the brother-in-law of one of the widow's admirers: a few years before, they had been idealistic lovers and now she can't believe he has settled for a dim wife and a job as a teacher. Amidst parlor games and idle talk of women's rights and peasants' capabilities, Sofia and Misha rekindle their love.  Will they flaunt convention, abandon families, and run away to pursue lost dreams?  Rescue comes from an unexpected place.

[memento]

From IMDB:

Vision Quest is a coming of age movie in which high school wrestler Louden Swain (Matthew Modine) decides he wants to be something more than an average high school athlete and sets his sights on a prize that many don't think he can win -- he then sets out to reach his goal alone, without much support from his father or coach. His father rents a room to a young drifter, Carla (Linda Fiorentino). Swain falls in love with her and she helps him stay focused and prevents him from losing sight of his goals. Although a lower-budget film than Flashdance or Top Gun, this movie is similar in theme and style. Madonna makes her first appearance in a major motion picture as a lead singer in a local band performing her hit songs "Crazy For You" and "Gambler".

[oilgun]

[Fran]

From IMDb:

When an African dictator jails her husband, Shandurai goes into exile in Italy, studying medicine and keeping house for Mr. Kinsky, an eccentric English pianist and composer. She lives in one room of his Roman palazzo. He besieges her with flowers, gifts, and music, declaring passionately that he loves her, would go to Africa with her, would do anything for her. "What do you know of Africa?" she asks, then, in anguish, shouts, "Get my husband out of jail!" The rest of the film plays out the implications of this scene and leaves Shandurai with a choice.

[Fran]

aka Rok spokojnego slonca



From IMDb:

"The Year of the Quiet Sun" tells of the love which blooms with considerable difficulty between an American GI and a Polish woman in post-WWII Poland(?). Unlike most war romance flicks where people virtually collide with each other driven by the stark desperation and deprivation of war, this film has the pair of protags (Wilson & Komorowska) spending most of the film's almost 2-hour run tentatively sorting through their pain and suffering to find feelings they can trust to be real. There's little doubt this is an excellent film. However, it is as depressingly barren as the ravaged landscape it occupies and for many will prove to be too real to be enjoyable. Not an escapist film, "...Quiet Sun" is for realists only.

[memento]

From IMDB:

This movie is terrific... i really had my money on Britteny Murphy for a long time after seeing this...why did she go blond and all brentwood skinny? Zach and Reba seems to me a real throwback to a kind of 70's guerrilla comedy ...a time when filmmakers liked to take established genre and turn it on its ear. the romantic comedy in this case... where in the formula says you have to keep the characters apart till the end of the movie. this is usually achieved by making the romantic rival a prick or a bitch ...and once he or she is out of the way...viola ...happy ending. here the characters are held apart by the neurotic grief caused by the death of their last loves... the whole death=love thing is great. how very sad this movie didn't get to have its day or didn't get the money behind it to fully flesh it out. virtually all the performances in it are stellar especially najimi (in a religious rightwing skewering performance) ,Murphy and flannery. this should go in one of those 100 greatest movies you've never heard of books.

[Fran]

Scary Movies!

[Ellemeno]

[Fran]

From IMDb:  Set in Chicago, "Boogeyman" tells the haunting tale of a young man traumatized by memories of terrible events he experienced in his childhood bedroom and who, years later, reluctantly returns home to face his fears of a monstrous entity that could be real or merely a figment of his imagination.

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rttfauphhnA[/youtube]
Trailer:  2:22

[oilgun]

From IMDb:   A group of five college graduates rent a cabin in the woods and begin to fall victim to a horrifying flesh-eating virus, which attracts the unwanted attention of the homicidal locals.