Your Favourite Foreign Language Films

Oh yes- Life is Beautiful - so sad at the end. I think I watched a version dubbed into German as it was part of my German course a few years ago.

This reminds me of another holocaust film, Jacob the Liar: the original German version was better imho, than the American version, but both were pretty good.

The Germans are usually brutally honest about the holocaust in their films, which is great. It is now the 70th anniversary of the death of Sophie and her brother Hans Scholl, of the German anti-Nazi resistance group White Rose, who were guillotined because they spread anti-Nazi information. There was a film about them - I think it was called The White Rose. Again, very sad.

Mine is LA VITA E BELLA directed by Roberto Benigni, it can be translated as Life Is Beautiful, I love to watch it!!!

The Lives of Others
Tokyo Story
The Lacemaker
Jean de Florette/Manon de Source
My Girlfriend's Boyfriend (I think that's what it's called)

Joyeaux Noel . Seasonal and very moving.

Nothing to do with mining at all crimson

Is it about mining; the Welsh miners going to South America and all that? Might dig out my Duffy cd tomorrow; she's sort of gone off the radar recently.

Just watched a little gem. Patagonia. It has Matthew Rhys in it, which is always a bonus. Reminds me of the young Richard Burton a bit. And he went to school with my friend John in Cardiff ( Matthew did AND Ioan Gryffydd - the only difference is that John is not an international heart throb film star, he is a dad of 2 baby girls in NZ). And it has Duffy in it briefly.
Anyway ... This is a lovely film in Welsh and Spanish and is 2 stories about journeys. One from Wales to Patagonia and the other from Patagonia to Wales. Great contrast in the scenery. Lovely.

annodomini, thanks for the welcome.

crimson, Crin Blanc is a black and white film about the relationship between a boy and one of the wild horses of the Camargue. Beautifully shot and a sad but uplifting ending. I haven't seen Holy Motors but I would recommend Zero de Conduite, a wonderful silent French film about anarchy in the classroom.

Have you seen Holy Motors grumppa?Very weird French film but pays homage to a lot of early French film.

Metropolis; what a film. They had Nosferatu complete with live music at our cinema the other week but I was unable to go . Weren't the Kordas very involved with German film making prior to the war when they had to move to America? And isn't there an Alfred Hitchcock connection through his wife; I think a lot of his ideas came from early German films. I've never seen Crin Blan; is it on utube I wonder?

Welcome, grumppa. I hope you will join us on some of our other threads too.

Applied to join Gransnet yesterday specially to mention The Red Balloon. Unfortunately the confirmatory email from GNHQ went straight to spam, so I have only just been able to log in.

Glad to see TRB has already been mentioned; DGS aged four has loved it since he was three. Got it on a DVD with Crin Blanc (White Mane), another great little French film.

Most of my other favourites have already been listed, esp. Jacques Tati. Yes also to La Reine Margot. And how about silent foreign films: Metropolis, Pandora's Box, Diary of a Lost Girl?

I watched Leaving starring Kristin Scott Thomas and was very disappointed with it. I've got Volver in the video box [the one that had Priscilla in]; another film I never got round to watching.

Also on my list, Agnes Varda's Les Glaneuses (the Gleaners).

Echo loads of others favourites... anyone seen Cous Cous? That was a lovely film...sad but lovely!

Not a great fan BUT
I've Loved You so Long - with Kristin Scott Thomas (acting in French)
Volver with Penelope Cruz.
Both brilliant and not to be missed.

I find them a bit weird, but do have a fascination with all things Japanese. I've watched Spirited Away a few times. Such a different culture.

what about studio ghibli cartoons-Kiki and Totoro and the one about the world of cats-i buy them whenever I can on dvd and the first 2 are GCs favorites

Claude Chabrol's film "Le Boucher" (The Butcher) is my favourite, with his then-wife Stephane Audran starring as the school teacher in the small Dordogne village where the action is set. It's moody and strange with some wonderful shots of the surrounding scenery. I've watched it many times, and have also visited the village where it was filmed - strange to see the Mairie (town hall) and the school attached to it, where a lot of the action takes place.

Thank you Grans for all these ideas!

My recent favourite was a German film "Three Quarter Moon" about a grumpy, racist taxi driver who ends up having to look after a six-year-old Turkish girl who speaks only Turkish.

And the Americans steal from English cinema. Their 'Italian Job' was an insult to the Michael Caine/Noel Coward original imho.

A lot of Western cinema stole stories from Japanese cinema, for example, The Magnificent 7 from The 7 Samurai. One neglected Japanese film chronicled the life of a schoolmaster in a private school. Sayonara, Noodle San - a classic!

Oh yes, 'Fear eats the soul' - loved it, especially as the older woman really looks like an older woman, not like the stretched plastic Hollywood version of an older woman.

I know I'm repeating myself here so forgive me but, now I've realised that The Killing is a like a murder mysery evening where you are thrown red herrings and given little clues, I just sit and let it wash over me. It does seem a little formulaic [repeating myself again]. Think the main difference though, is that, to me Sarah Lund wasn't the most important character in the first series; all the main characters were interesting in their own right [and quite charismatic] but in this one it's all about her. There's a funny thing on utube that I'll try to find.

crimson I enjoyed the first series of Forbrydelsen the most. I love that word in Danish, so rich and sounds much better than "The Killing". I agree that series 2 and 3 not a patch on the first one. Perhaps because it was fresh and new! But still like it. I try and not look at the subtitles and see whether I can guess at what they are saying (drives DH mad because I say it under my breath) because it seems to be the same stem language as Dutch which in turn is the origin of Afrikaans (which I am fluent in). Come to think of it, there are some smashing Afrikaans films - do they count as foreign language films? Kringe in die Bos would be one of them.