Thread: NonRussian films (work in progress)

Originally Posted by rockzmom

In honor of Father's Day here in the U.S.... one of the best TV theme songs!
"Best Friend", written and performed by Harry Nilsson

I've never heard this song before but immediately recognize it as something familiar. It is because of the "Puppy song" by Harry Nilsson which is the soundtrack for the "You've got mail" movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzDRY2h-nEg (video in this clip has nothing common with the movie).

Originally Posted by CoffeeCup

Originally Posted by rockzmom

In honor of Father's Day here in the U.S.... one of the best TV theme songs!
"Best Friend", written and performed by Harry Nilsson

I've never heard this song before but immediately recognize it as something familiar. It is because of the "Puppy song" by Harry Nilsson which is the soundtrack for the "You've got mail" movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzDRY2h-nEg (video in this clip has nothing common with the movie).

Very good!!!

Harry is one of those people that you know his songs but not his name..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmmwMx06Pg8

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Nilsson

Originally Posted by Crocodile

I think Sun Valley Serenade was beating Die Frau meiner Träume in popularity.

what?!

Well everyone... It seems like it has been forever since I have watched a non-American movie and posted about it. I just have not has the mental capacity to deal with subtitles or really "deep" hard to follow story lines.

I recall trying to start up The Master and Margarita again and I rewatched the same three of four episodes and then I had to stop as it is too taxing... so I am turning to you the experts... What would be a good summer film for me to watch? Something that if I stop and start it would not be too hard to follow?

Starrysky, I know you love Indian films... maybe I could branch out and try one of your favorites?

Basil... I know you love the animations (as well our war film expert) & gRomoZeka... which animations haven't you posted that I could watch?

Originally Posted by rockzmom

... which animations haven't you posted that I could watch?

Have you seen these?
Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson (with Eng subs) RECOMMENDED.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HULUEK0PkbU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2emcWHVULE

Here's a nice cartoon for kids about two naughty dogs:
Bobik visits Barbos (Бобик в гостях у Барбоса)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp7zzFAQhzw

About Sidorov Vova" (1985) - I wonder do you find this funny?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JBUY8KtUIw

And a classic cartoon:
The Snow Queen (1957) in 7 parts (English subs)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg3pGB_Yfp8 (part 1)

There are a lot of great Russian cartoons on youtube, but unfortunately they do not have English subs.
For example, there's a cartoon based on Russian medieval sagas about a young woman, who went to save her husband from captivity. I really liked it as a kid. You can enjoy a short video from this cartoon (to Mylene Farmer's "Sans Contrefacon") here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JplD-zHjfXA

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

Originally Posted by rockzmom

... which animations haven't you posted that I could watch?

Have you seen these?
Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson (with Eng subs) RECOMMENDED.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HULUEK0PkbU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2emcWHVULE

Here's a nice cartoon for kids about two naughty dogs:
Bobik visits Barbos (Бобик в гостях у Барбоса)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wp7zzFAQhzw

About Sidorov Vova" (1985) - I wonder do you find this funny?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JBUY8KtUIw

And a classic cartoon:
The Snow Queen (1957) in 7 parts (English subs)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg3pGB_Yfp8 (part 1)

There are a lot of great Russian cartoons on youtube, but unfortunately they do not have English subs.
For example, there's a cartoon based on Russian medieval sagas about a young woman, who went to save her husband from captivity. I really liked it as a kid. You can enjoy a short video from this cartoon (to Mylene Farmer's "Sans Contrefacon") here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JplD-zHjfXA

THANK YOU!! I did not know that Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson came in an animation format! I have the movie version that Olya did the subs for and never got around to watching it.

Has anyone seen this one, "The Cat Who Walked By Herself/ Кошка, которая гуляла сама по себе" from 1988
It came up on the list next to Sherlock and caught my eye. It is based on Rudyard Kipling's short story, The Cat that Walked by Himself.

You can watch the entire film here with English subtitles:
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?doc...4486&hl=en-CA#

Link on IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0997248/
Wiki Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cat...ked_by_Herself

Originally Posted by rockzmom

THANK YOU!! I did not know that Sherlock Holmes & Dr. Watson came in an animation format! I have the movie version that Olya did the subs for and never got around to watching it.

You are welcome! I'm sure you'll enjoy the movie. My absolute favourite is "The Hound of the Baskervilles": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hound_ ... (1981_film)

Has anyone seen this one, "The Cat Who Walked By Herself/ Кошка, которая гуляла сама по себе" from 1988

I've never heard of this version! Looks very artistic, but I'm much more used to the older one from 1968, which had been aired pretty often on TV.
"The Cat Who Walked By Himself/ Кот, который гулял сам по себе" (no subs, but everything is pretty clear from the context)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0G0be9iwKw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otn-L9oUeeA

If you like Kipling here's a beautifully made cartoon "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" (sadly, no subs). The colors are amazing, I especially like the scene during the rain in the first part.

"Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" / Рики-тики-тави (1965)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3FER9hOAJk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76us1bjTGCM

And you definitely have to see "Adventures of Mowgli" if you have not seen it yet!!! It's epic!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventures_of_Mowgli
First part:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mix_e7cQUhg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCkeABQlDcw
(all parts are available in the list to the right. Again, no subs, but it's worth watching at least for a couple of minutes for its great old style animation with a unique twist)

The Tale of Soldier Fedot
The first part: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYQwWwQV ... re=related

The language is a huge part of it and I'm not sure how much of it was lost in translation, but they tried hard.

A side bar for one second here... This is a clip from the show that aired last night, So You Think You Can Dance

Alex, is a trained and working Ballet dancer who this week has been paired up with Twitch who is a trained and working Hip-Hop dancer.

Alex MUST learn the style of Hip-Hop for the very first time and then be judged on it. The result is an AMAZING piece of choreography that blends both Hip-Hop and Ballet and shows the depth of talent that Alex has and how quickly he can learn a completely different style of dance!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLbjKnv0ju4

Originally Posted by rockzmom

I just have not has the mental capacity to deal with subtitles or really "deep" hard to follow story lines.

Originally Posted by rockzmom

I have the movie version that Olya did the subs for and never got around to watching it.

Undoubtedly it is the movie you should start watching immediately. Wiki link. Even though it is a detective stories it will not force you to follow hard the story line at all. All of us were talking that the episodes of "The Hound of the Baskervilles" are the best. It is true but to get all the joy of these two episodes you need to be introduced to the Holmes' fictional world which was built in this series. Be sure to start with the first episode "Acquaintance" which portrayed the main characters. The second episode "Bloody Inscription" introduces the "deductive reasoning" technique in the begin of the episode and also introduces Inspector Lestrade who is a pretty colorful character in this series.

You can avoid the final episodes "The Twentieth Century Approaches" these are not as good as all the other episodes.

Originally Posted by CoffeeCup

All of us were talking [s0uwieqp]that[/s0uwieqp] about the episodes of "The Hound of the Baskervilles" and saying they are the best. It is true but to get all the joy of these two episodes you need to be introduced to [s0uwieqp]the[/s0uwieqp] Holmes' fictional world which was built in this series. Be sure to start with the first episode "Acquaintance" which portray[s0uwieqp]ed[/s0uwieqp]s the main characters. The second episode "Bloody Inscription" introduces the "deductive reasoning" technique in the begin of the episode and also introduces Inspector Lestrade who is a pretty colorful character in this series.

You can avoid the final episodes "The Twentieth Century Approaches" these are not as good as all the other episodes.

Coffeecup, you are correct, I only have The Hounds... And I do recall how much everyone recommend this film, and YET... somehow I had no idea it was series!!!!

Would someone be kind enough to look on the Russian Yandex-server for me to see if there are versions of the other films/series with English subtitles available for download?


Here are the links to the Hounds if it helps anyone to find the others...
Part 1: http://narod.ru/disk/4358781000/Houn...art_1.avi.html
Part 2: http://narod.ru/disk/4358782000/Houn...art_2.avi.html

I've found the first episode "The Acquaintance" on youtube with English subs.

It was divided in 7 parts.
part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5
part 6
part 7

FYI. To be sure that you will not miss some parts. Episode "The Acquaintance" contains two stories: the first one is the story how Holmes and Watson met each other and became partners; the second one is about a poor girl whose twin-sister was dead just before her sister's marriage and the girl was frightened of her own life.

I've found both first episode "The Acquaintance" and second "Bloody Inscription" together on youtube with English subs.

there are 14 links
part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5
part 6
part 7
part 8
part 9
part 10
part 11
part 12
part 13
part 14

Originally Posted by rockzmom

Starrysky, I know you love Indian films... maybe I could branch out and try one of your favorites?

*I've been engulfed by the dangerous underworld called Hindi cinema, so all my free time is consumed by it now.*

Just noticed that this whole thread was moved and a subforum created... Good idea.

Yeah, for half a year I've been watching mainly Hindi movies. I've now seen about, I dunno, 50 films. Not that much, really, but I am rather cautious when it comes to watching stuff.

rockzmom, you really shouldn't have asked! *groaning* How can I restrain myself from talking about my fave subject at the moment? There'll be no stopping me now!!

My favourites remain practically the same:

Favourite Hindi movies Part 1

1. Asoka (2001; dir. Santosh Sivan)

-- for SRK's performance, for the tragic story and for the visuals from Santosh Sivan... It's a treat

I really strongly recommend this movie to anyone who thinks there's nothing original in Indian movies. It may seem a bit strange at first but this is one movie most bolly-fans practically worship...

Check out these great fan videos, for example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUNhKIjbDuA&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_KD7...eature=related

Making of Asoka

asoka on rediff.com









2. Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (199 Karan Johar's debut as a director and one of my all time favourites... It has colours, emotions, a lot of heart and sincerity...











3. Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995; Aditya Chopra) -- a true classic from first-time director Aditya Chopra. This one has been on in Mumbai theatres for 15 years now. It's also one of only two Hindi movies that got a spot in the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" book. It's a brilliant comedy in a lot of ways... and great music. The movie that catapulted Shahrukh Khan and Kajol to fame and made them into a legendary screen couple in India.

















4. Main Hoon Na (Farah Khan) -- this is a brilliant self-parody! I've loved this movie for a long time and never tire of it... It's all about the humour and irony and I love all the characters.















5. Chalte Chalte (2003; Aziz Mirza) -- already wrote about it too.

Love Rani... Favourite Indian actress...

Favourite Hindi movies Part 2

6. Josh (2000) -- Bollywood remake of Westside Story.













7. Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi -- just a very nice, feelgood, heartfelt, beautiful movie. Exactly "my type" of film. Very nice music. Check out two songs from it:

Tujhe Mein Rab Dikhta Hai
Yaara Main Kya Karoon...
(I See God In You, Dear, What Am I to Do?)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ux-BqSBomE

Haule Haule ("Little by little you'll love me")
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkPhLZ0Zpr8

















interesting review

8. Devdas (Sanjay Lila Bhansali)

9. Dil Se (1998; Mani Ratnam) -- well, I already wrote at length about it earlier...

And there are a few others that I liked a lot (Yes Boss, Ram Jaane...) But maybe later...

These are almost all mainstream movies, with Asoka and Dil Se being a bit of art-films. They are all qute entertaining but of course it depends on your taste. There are directors in Bollywood that make more serious, gloomy, original, whatever, movies, like Mani Ratnam, Ram Gopal Varma (Satya, Company), Anurag Kashyap (Black Friday, No Smoking) but the thing is, they are not "my" movies. Those are often about terrorists, Mumbai criminal underworld and things like that.

Don't remember if I posted this before:

BollyWHAT?'s Top Ten Films
http://www.bollywhat.com/rentalguide.html

1. Kuch Kuch Hota Hai
2. Dil Se
3. Satya
4. Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge
5. 1942: A Love Story
6. Dil Chahta Hai
7. Zakhm
8. Lagaan
9. Satta
10. Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak

There are too oldest film awards in India:

Filmfare Awards
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filmfare_awards

Filmfare Award for Best Movie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filmfare_Best_Film_Award

and National Film Awards (this one is more "serious"; but those films that get this award are as a rule very obscure and hard-to-find)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Film_Awards

National Film Award for Best Film
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationa..._for_Best_Film

-------------------------

I've seen My Name Is Khan recently and thought it was great. In September it'll be released in theatres in Russia. Well, I'll write about it a bit later too.

"My Name is Khan" (2010)



I liked it quite a bit. I was actually very surprised that I liked it so much, because for some reason I was rather wary of this film.. But it turned out to be much better than I expected. Spectacular if not sulime in some aspects (acting, cinematography, music), and very entertaining on the whole. At least, it's way better than most of the stuff Bollywood churns out. As Nikhat Kazmi of The Times of India said, it's "indubitably one of the most meaningful and moving films to be rolled out from the Bollywood mills in recent times."

The film is about a Muslim with Asperger's syndrome (Rizwan Khan) living in post 9/11 US... "My name is Khan and I'm not a terrorist" is his mantra. The film is not without flaws but it's got great performances from Shahrukh Khan, Kajol and supporting cast, great music and stunning cinematography. America looks really beautiful here. For all those who don't know, Shahrukh and Kajol are the legendary, most beloved couple in Hindi cinema, Han Solo and Princess Leia or Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn of Hindi cinema, as someone put it. So this movie was a bit of a big deal because it has them reuniting after about 10 years.

Shahrukh -- well, prior to this, I've seen him in more than 30 other films, plus interviews. I had my doubts about Shahrukh playing an autist. Because he seems so far from being even an introvert. I know he's a really good actor but I was absolutely thrown by his performance here... Because I never saw "Shahrukh" in Rizwan. I totally believed in this character. Because of his condition, Rizwan is a very touching, endearing character. A lot like Forrest Gump. I don't know much about autism. I've seen "Rainman", of course, and we learned about it as part of psychology courses at my uni... As far as I can judge, it was great work on SRK's part. I've read comments from people who work with autists that it was spot-on.

Kajol is a fantastic actress. Very natural, very beautiful, very watchable, she is the only one who nearly succeeds in stealing the scene from Shahrukh. I can never take my eyes off her.

Music. The music is very modern but with national, Sufi motiffs. "Muslims in America" describes it best. It can be downloaded here. My favourite is Noor E Khuda. In fact, my favourite scenes in the movie are during this song -- Khan's journey through America.

Director. Karan Johar is one my favourite Indian directors (along with Santosh Sivan, Aditya Chopra, Farah Khan and Aziz Mirza). He's not the best director out there but I love him for the kind, warm and sincere person he is. I think his best film was Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, his debut, which he made when he was 25. In KKHH you can see that everything is from the heart, perhaps that's why it's been so popular. His other films -- Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham, Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna, Kal Ho Naa Ho (as a screenwriter) are interesting works and some of the few films that made me cry my heart out but they have maaaany flaws... Karan has been sort of blamed for making fluffy romances. Now, MNIK is quite different. It doesn't have any dance--song routines/item numbers. The songs are all in the background. The subject matter is quite serious but the film is not gloomy, it has some great humour.

MNIK is human. Beautiful. Touching. Sincere. Heartfelt.

All this can be said about other Johar's films as well.

Cinematography by Ravi Chandran is... well, fantastic.
Fave shots





The first half of the movie is so good in terms of scripting, that it's a bit of a shock to see how it goes downhill in the second half... It is as if Karan sabotaged himself. But I have to say, this film is such an emotional rollercoaster that I didn't really care about the flaws toward the end. MNIK has been described as "Slumdog Millionaire" meets "Forrest Gump" meets "Rainman" but this creates a slightly negative image of ideas rehashed... whereas MNIK looks really fresh and interesting.

It was released in the US in February and an abridged version (about 100 min) was released again in June ,if I'm not mistaken. In Russia, we'll see it in theatres in September but I don't think it's gonna make any collections, really, because of all the piracy.

Oh God, I could go on and on and on about it, I'd better just stop.

Official website

MNIK on imdb

wiki article



A nice review by Charles R. Larson

another interesting review, only in French

nice fan video

Some pics from MNIK

















































OK, that's enough about one film... Told ya, there'd be no stopping me. Hope I've not been too obnoxious... Please, don't kill me for the pics overload. It's just that I saw it recently and the impression is still very strong.

Starrysky, dear! Maybe we want to open a separate topic for foreigh movies?

Originally Posted by Lampada

Starrysky, dear! Maybe we want to open a separate topic for foreigh movies?

+10000
Или может быть лучше открыть свою тему про индийские фильмы.

А я послей вот этой старой пародии индийские фильмы смотреть вообще не могу - после нескольких минут просмотра пробивает на ха-ха. Правда, последним индийским фильмом, который я посмотрел от начала и до конца, был "Танцор диско" и смотрел я его, как сейчас помню, в совковом сельском клубе в Рязанской области году так эдак в 88.

Originally Posted by starrysky

OK, that's enough about one film... Told ya, there'd be no stopping me. Hope I've not been too obnoxious... Please, don't kill me for the pics overload.

starrysky!!! you made my day.... 105 degree heat here and my migraines are killing me and you have just made me feel soooo much better... thank you!

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

Originally Posted by Lampada

Starrysky, dear! Maybe we want to open a separate topic for foreigh movies?

+10000
Или может быть лучше открыть свою тему про индийские фильмы.

Lampada! I agree with you and gRomoZeka. I think that this thread might be getting tooo large and hard to navigate. Maybe if we had different sub threads it would be easier?

We could start with starrysky's amazing Hindi/Indian reviews that she has posted in this thread and make a Hindi/Indian sub thread that would be great!

I guess the question would be where to have all of these in ONE central place so that everyone can find them easily? So no matter what films/tv you are looking for you would go to ONE central location and all the sub groups for discussion would be there. Does that make sense?

So, like one for Animation with all the great things that gRomoZeka has, and Basil's War collection, one for Hindi/Indian, and make others as we need them but have them all under ONE umbrella. We can still have the catch all Russian reviews that Hanna started and this major beast of a thread as they both have a wealth of information with lots of links and people can just ask questions in this thread about ANY TV or FILM.... but it might be nice to have the genres broken out for people to be able to find a movie quickly that suits what they are specifically looking for.

Thoughts? Counter ideas or suggestions?

What do you think???