What's your favorite foreign films?

maestrowork · Feb 3, 2006

You know, those films in which the characters speak strangely and there are those funny words at the bottom and you really have to struggle to read them while trying to watch the film and sometimes those words just don't make sense....

I'm a sap, so my favorites are a bit on the sappy side:

1. Cinema Paradiso -- it gets me every time because I relate to the protagonist so much

2. Amelie (Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain) -- whimsical, sweet, quirky, and Audrey Tautou is cute as a button

3. Manon des Sources (Manon of the Spring) -- beautifully tragic/sad movie, and Emmanuelle Beart is gorgeous beyond words

4. Motorcycle Diaries (Diarios de Motocicleta) -- great film about a controversial historical figure

5. Dirty Pretty Things -- technically a foreign film but in English. Strange. Evocative. Provocative. Again, I'm in love with Audrey Tautou.

6. Ju Dou -- beautiful, sad, gripping. Gong Li is mesmerizing in this film

aruna · Feb 3, 2006

Of the ones you list, I loved Manon des Sources, but also the one before it, Jean de Florette. I get to see a lot of good French original movies as I have a good friend who is French and a film buff. ANyone see Le Sabot des Arbres? Great!

I liked Motorcycle Diaries - I did almost exactly the same journey in 1971.
I did NOT like Amelie. It was just too.... too.. I dunno. Too something, It annoyed me almost beyond endurance.

I like Bollywood movies but at the moment the only one that comes to mind is Lagaan. Great film!

I know several original German movies; most Americans only know Run, Lola Run, which was OK but didn't knock me over. Prefer Angst Essen Seelen Auf (sic) by Fassbinder

WerenCole · Feb 3, 2006

La Rafifi. . . how could you not like that. . . just about most of the work of Fellini as well.

maestrowork · Feb 3, 2006

For some reasons, the appeal of Fellini just escaped me. I must not be as sophisticated as I thought. Never really a fan of Italian films either. French, I love.

underthecity · Feb 3, 2006

Wellll, I wouldn't consider any of these my favorite, but I did enjoy

Man Bites Dog, a cinema verite "documentary" about a serial killer. From Belgium, I think.

Fitzcarraldo, from German director Werner Herzog about a man played by Klaus Kinski who wants to build an opera house in the middle of the Amazon jungle.

I second Cinema Paradiso.

allen

MadScientistMatt · Feb 3, 2006

My wife and I subscribed to Netflix as local rental shops just don't seem to have the movies we were looking for.

I just saw the restored version of Fritz Lang's Metropolis. Wow. The plot may have been simplistic and heavy-handed, but the art they put into the props and sets was just stunning. It was also interesting to see the way the used special effects that wouldn't even be attempted now, such as trying to make hand-drawn animation look real.

TheIT · Feb 3, 2006

I don't watch many foreign films, but I'd have to add the orginal Diabolique to the list. My French teacher in high school showed it to us in class. It's a murder mystery with some great twists. I've never seen the remake and don't intend to since I have good memories of the original.

TheGaffer · Feb 3, 2006

In as close to an order as I can...

1. Ikiru, Kurosawa's greatest, about a dying bureaucrat in 1950s Japan

2. Wings of Desire, Wim Wenders

3. La Femme Nikita, which just rules

4. The Bicycle Thief

5. The Circle (Iranian film from a few years ago about women in Iran)

6. The Devil's Backbone, Guillermo del Toro directed - creepy stuff

7. Run Lola Run (Lola Rent)

8. Hable Con Ella (Talk to Her, Almodovar)

9. Amores Perros

10. Aguirre, the Wrath of God -- German movie, directed by Herzog, crazy stuff about the search for the Lost City of gold in South America. Klaus Kinski at his lunatic best.

eldragon · Feb 3, 2006

We watch mostly foreign films, and also subscribe to netflix because of their great selection.

I loved Motorcycle Diaries. It was incredible to hear about Che Guevera's start in life.

Elling is a favorite of both mine and my husbands. I think its Norwegian.

The Way Home - about a Korean boy who stays with his old grandma in the hills.

Character - about a boy who has a terrible father and even though he is not in his life, he makes his life a misery.

Billy Elliot - it's in English, but it's not US.

Kontroll - a Hungarian film about subway murders. VERY intense.

Those are some of my favorites, the ones I liked enough to own.

eldragon · Feb 3, 2006

4. The Bicycle Thief

One of my husbands favorite movies. I detest the end, so sad!!!

Shwebb · Feb 3, 2006

MadScientistMatt said:
My wife and I subscribed to Netflix as local rental shops just don't seem to have the movies we were looking for.

That's the problem we have, too--so we haven't seen many. But I did like:

"Run Lola Run" (I run really fast in my dreams, and this echoed that nicely.)

"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" One of the few foreign films we could find.

Thanks for starting this thread Ray--it's hard to know what is good out there if you've never had anyone recommend anything.

mkcbunny · Feb 3, 2006

For classics, anything by Kurosawa.

For recent films, I would have to push City of God. Great film.

eldragon · Feb 3, 2006

It's a foreign documentary - "The story of the weeping camel." Incredible film.

maestrowork · Feb 3, 2006

Ah Billy Elliot. At the end, when the father got all chocked up... damn!

katiemac · Feb 3, 2006

I haven't seen too many foriegn films outside of some of the ones that where already mentioned: Amelie, Lola Rent, Bicycle Thief, Ju Dou, Circle of God, Crouching Tiger, Le Chateu de Ma Mere, Peeping Tom, Grand Illusion, and the Celebration. There's probably a few more I can't remember, including an absolutely mundane French film about a hotel and party where the characters were merely "the man" and "the woman."

Celebration is my favorite, hands down, but Circle of God and Amelie are up there, too.

Shadow_Ferret · Feb 3, 2006

I'm not a fan of foreign films because I'm such a slow reader. The subtitle is gone before I have a chance to read it.

That said, I did think Kung Fu Hustle was hilarious.

robeiae · Feb 3, 2006

Godzilla.

writerterri · Feb 3, 2006

I liked the first Jacky Chan movie that came out here.

And does The Passion Of The Christ count?

tiny · Feb 3, 2006

Love foreign films, but refuse to watch unless they are subtitled. The minute they dub them, I'm done.

Raise the Red Lantern – Chinese
To Live - Chinese
Scent of the Green Papaya – Vietnamese
Devils Backbone - Spanish
Das Experiment – German
Venus Beauty Institute – French
Eat Drink Man Woman - Chinese

roach · Feb 3, 2006

My favorites (or those that have stuck with me over the years):

Run Lola Run, also The Princess and the Warrior
The Brotherhood of the Wolf - great adventure period piece
Oldboy - Korean action with a hint of Greek tragedy
Farewell My Concubine
Shaolin Soccer
Avalon - weird cyberpunk story

There are probably others that just aren't coming to mind right now.

I love Netflix*. We got rid of cable a year and a half ago and get all of our televised entertainment from there. It's kind of funny that I see some movies listed here that are sitting in my queue.

*(Am I the only one who's filled all 500 slots in the queue? I can't be.)

Perks · Feb 3, 2006

'Til Human Voices Wake Us But that's not wildly foreign, I guess. I don't need subtitles for your average Australian accent. I love that movie.

La Femme Nikita
Run, Lola, Run

Yeshanu · Feb 3, 2006

I don't watch many foreign films (unless you count LoTR

), but Life is Beautiful was just...

... beautiful.

Eveningsdawn · Feb 3, 2006

Le Diner de Cons (The Dinner Game) - most hysterical french film EVER

Amélie (of course)

Inspecteur Toto

La Boum (this is actually a terrible movie, but worth it for being so terrible)

8 Femmes (it's got singing)

I watched most of these in school. There are more, but can't think of them.

SC Harrison · Feb 3, 2006

Through A Glass Darkly and Fanny & Alexander by Ingmar Bergman,

Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and...well, pretty much everything by Miyosaki,

Rashomon, The Seven Samurai...okay, everything by Kurosawa too,

Blue, White, and Red by Krzysztof Kieslowski,

La Ventura by Michelangelo Antonioni,

That's all I've got for now—these names are killing me.

PrettySpecialGal · Feb 3, 2006

I do love LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL...

and anything by Jackie Chan, and KUNG FU HUSTLE, CROUCHING TIGER, SHAOLIN SOCCER, and the such. Haven't seen too many that aren't martial arts related... but again,

I do love LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL...

What's your favorite foreign films?

Fear the Death Ray

On a wing and a prayer

Funny what? Do I amuse you?

Fear the Death Ray

Finestkind

Empirical Storm Trooper

Infuriatingly Theoretical

Docking Bay 94

in a van down by the river

in a van down by the river

She's the creepy-looking dude

Bufflehead

in a van down by the river

Fear the Death Ray

Five by Five

Court Jester

Touch and go

It's a dorky day!

riding the sun

annoyed and annoying

delicate #!&@*#! flower

Elf Queen

Just Sing.

Dances With Hamsters

roll, roll, roll in ze hay