Carola (Broadway Theatre Archive)

Starring:Leslie Caron, Mel Ferrer, Carmen Zapata, Anthony Zerbe, Albert Paulsen, Michael Sacks
Director: Norman Lloyd
Studio: Kultur Video
Product Type: DVD

Amazon.com

An unusual psychological spy thriller, Walk on Water follows Israeli agent Eyal (Lior Ashkenazi, from the superb romance Late Marriage) as he tries to learn from a German brother and sister (Knut Berger, Push and Pull, and Caroline Peters, Schone Frauen) whether or not their grandfather, a Nazi commander, is still alive--but his growing friendship with the pair forces him to grapple with his wife's suicide only months before. Walk on Water grapples with racial prejudice and homophobia without once seeming preachy; surprisingly, the spy storyline introduces these issues naturally, as Eyal's hostility towards Arabs and his blithe view of Nazi war criminals are central to his character. Ashkenazi is charismatic and subtle; his bedroom eyes and understated smolder make him something of an Israeli Clive Owen. Don't buy Walk on Water expecting James Bond spectacle, but the excellent performances, intelligent script, and quiet tension will draw you into this thoughtful and emotionally nuanced movie. In English, with a few subtitled scenes in Hebrew and German. --Bret Fetzer

Description

This enthralling award-winning film by internationally-acclaimed director Eytan Fox explores the motives, strengths, and, ultimately, the humanity of an Israeli assassin sent to rectify a wrong committed five decades earlier. Eyal is a top assassin in the Israeli secret service. He has killed terrorists before, but this time he is sent to eliminate an aging former Nazi war criminal. During his mission, Eyal meets his target's granddaughter and grandson, who inadvertently help him uncover his own troubled history and face his demons, while they discover the ugly truth their family has hidden from them for decades. What began as a straightforward mission, has suddenly escalated in intensity and complexity - thrusting three very different people into a thrilling triangle of murder, friendship and fate.

Customer Reviews:

Interesting little film.......2007-06-16

Not always a fan of spy thrillers, but always a fan of good stories, this movie was surprisingly entertaining. It's a film out of Israel about an agent, similar to a CIA agent, trying to find out about a Nazi war criminal from a German woman who has been living in Israel for many years, and her visiting brother, who could be the criminal's grandchildren. Hearing about the Holocaust from a non-American perspective was fascinating given how self-centric Americans tend to be.

It's not an action-packed thriller though. It's more about the relationship that develops between the three main characters in spite of the agent's strong hatred of Nazis. The primary actors were good in their roles.

The dialog is in multiple languages - Hebrew, English, and German, with English subtitles for the Hebrew and German lines. I'm one of those people who would rather read subtitles than have the characters speak English with a heavy accent so the subtitles didn't bother me.

Overall, I would recommend this movie.

Excellent, even though not really a "gay movie".......2007-05-14

This movie is excellent, even though not really a "gay movie". One of the main characters is gay, but this issue is not overly forced. I found the storyline good and the acting excellent. A bit of nudity from the main characters is added, but the whole movie otherwise is portrayed in a sensative way, though i found the end a bit disappointing. Highly recommended
Richard

A very good and courageous movie.......2007-04-12

"Walk on Water" is courageous film, confidently directed by Eytan Fox based on the screenplay written by his partner Gal Uchovsky and well acted. Its subject is a Mossad's agent whose new mission is to hunt the former Nazi criminal who lives nowadays somewhere in South America. In order to trace him, Eyal (Lior Ashkenazi) takes a job as a tourist guide for the grandson of war criminal - sociable, open, friendly young German, Axel. Axel arrives to Israel to visit his sister Pia who chose to live in Israel and work in a kibbutz and to talk her into reconciling with their parents. Eyal drives Alex in his SUV, shows him the country. They sit on the coast of Dead Sea, both smeared by celebrated therapeutic mud from neck to toes. In another scene, Alex tries to walk on the water of Kinarteth (the Sea of Galilee); three of them visit the gay- bar in Tel Aviv - Alex does not hide his sexual orientation.

The characters are interesting and compelling. The story is engaging and I feel connected to the movie the way very few movies make me. I recognize the places I've been to and I've come to love and to dream of seeing them again and again. The film starts in Istanbul, Turkey on the boat over the Bosphor and the guide talks about the bridge between Europe and Asia. I've been on the boat like that and I saw the bridge. Then the action takes place in Israel and I was happy to recognize Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, The Sea of Galilee (Kinereth), The Dead Sea where one just floats without swimming, the desert.

The plot moves from Israel to Berlin where Eyal is visiting with his new friend's family. Alex's and Pia's father celebrates his anniversary and for the first time, a helpless dying old man arrives to Berlin, the Nazi criminal, Axel's and Pia's grandfather, Eyal's target. The film explores the moral dead ends of the modern society full of hostility and old unpaid debts. Eyal remembers the history of his country and its people, he knows not from the books about Holocaust. He is a soldier and must be merciless but he has to learn something about understanding from his young German friend. Film attracts by the non-standard approach to the familiar themes of religious prejudices, homophobia, neo-fascism, newest terror and other sources of the hatred, which destroys the world. It would not surprise me to find out that the film has many detractors in Germany, Palestine, and in Israel. The final is a little too neat and belongs to the modern fairy tale genre. I see it as the director's dream that he wanted to come true - the people with different backgrounds, mentalities, history, and preferences would understand one another and would come toward one another with the open hearts and clean thoughts. Dreams, dreams...

Unusual Israeli Thriller.......2007-04-08

An unusual spy thriller from Israel, Walk on Water's first scene follows Eyal (Lior Ashkenazi, a fine and handsome actor, somewhat reminiscent of Clive Owen, and who played a quite different character in the comedy Late Marriage), a tough-minded Mossad agent, as he coolly kills a Hamas operative in Istanbul in front of his family. Soon after returning from this mission, though, his wife commits suicide, so his superiors decide to give him what looks like a light assignment: posing as the tour guide of a couple of German tourists (a brother and sister) in order to become friendly with them and find out if they know about the whereabouts of their grandfather (a former nazi, who is presumably still living in Argentina). As it happens, the Germans are very different in their outlook from Eyal - they are liberal types who want to understand why Palestinian terrorists are willing to blow themselves to pieces - this humanization of the Palestinians infuriates the tough Sabra. The Germans are different in another way - the brother is gay, in contrast with the very macho Eyal, and much is made in the movie about their uneasy relationship. The final act of the movie, as Eyal goes to Germany to deal with their grandfather is more contrived, less believable, but the movie overall is highly entertaining and thought provoking.

Beautiful .......2007-03-31

It is a reconciliation of two different cultures that seem not to forget what had happened. It shows the evolution of two different ways of thinking into accepting that, what some people did years ago, do not represent an absolute reality at this present.

Average customer rating:

Deluxe Edition Delivers
FANTASTIC! Gets better each time I watch it...
Amazing film!
Neo Noir South Florida
the vamp & the weak

Body Heat (Deluxe Edition)
Starring: William Hurt , Kathleen Turner , Richard Crenna , Ted Danson , and J.A. Preston
Director: Lawrence Kasdan
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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Chinatown

ASIN: B000HC2LHG
Release Date: 2006-10-24

Amazon.com essential video

While scoring high-profile credits as a screenwriter (including The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi, and Raiders of the Lost Ark), Lawrence Kasdan made his directorial debut with this steamy, contemporary film noir in the tradition of Double Indemnity and other classics from the 1940s. In one of his most memorable roles, William Hurt plays a Florida lawyer unwittingly drawn into a web of deceit spun by Kathleen Turner (in her screen debut) as a married socialite who plots to kill off her husband with Hurt's assistance. Kasdan's dialogue is a hoot (sometimes it borders on satire), and the sultry atmosphere is a perfect complement to the perspiration-soaked chemistry between Hurt and Turner, whose love scenes caused quite a stir when the film was released in 1981. John Barry's score sets the provocative mood, and both Ted Danson and Mickey Rourke are splendid in memorable supporting roles. --Jeff Shannon

Description

William Hurt and Kathleen Turner strike sparks in Lawrence Kasdan's Body Heat, a sexy, haunting tale of desire and skullduggery that echoes 1940s film noirs but is charged with an energy and passion that could only flare in the '80s. Aided by a sultry John Barry score, Kasdan's assured directorial debut foreshadowed the emotional textures he would bring to later films The Big Chill, The Accidental Tourist and Grand Canyon. Sit back and bask in this contemporary classic's wicked warmth.

DVD Features:
Additional Scenes
Featurette:Body Heat: The Plan Body Heat: The Production Body Heat: The Post-Prodution
Interviews:1981 Interview Footage with Kathleen Turner and William Hurt
Theatrical Trailer

Customer Reviews:

Deluxe Edition Delivers.......2007-05-27

Body Heat is one of my all time favorite movies. I am a big fan of film-noir, of which Body Heat was a modern exemplar as well as an example of a time when adults made movies for other adults.

Since other reviews amply explain the plot, I will restrict my comments to the DVD. I do want to say that part of the magic of this movie is the pitch-perfect casting from William Hurt as the over-matched, incompetent lawyer, to the gorgeous and sensual Kathleen Turner as his femme fatale, to even those acting in smaller roles such as the Ted Danson as the dancing DA and Mickey Rourke as an expert arsonist for hire. There is not a bad casting decision here, nor a wasted scene.

The Deluxe Edition DVD provides several worthwhile extras. Most notably, interviews with Kasdan, Hurt, Turner, and Danson shot recently, provide a great deal of insight into the intent of the movie, how the actors were selected, why the movie was shot in Florida instead of New Jersey as originally planned, and some of the obstacles that had to be overcome (the cold weather!, Alan Ladd's objection to Hurt's mustache, Turner's shyness about filming nude during the sex scenes, and so on). Most interesting to me was the explanation of what Maddy Walker (the Turner character) was feeling at the end of the movie in the final scene. The movie always seemed ambiguous to me with respect to whether she really cared for Racine or not. The documentary provides some insight from Kasdan's and the actor's perspectives.

The axed scenes are also of interest. I almost always agree with the decision to exclude scenes when I have seen them on DVDs and this is no exception. However, it is interesting to see how the story was originally planned and that there was actually a failed attempt to murder Maddy's husband prior to the successful attempt. It is also nice to see Turner in a sexy stewardess outfit (in the movie the Racine character has a thing for women in uniforms).

The sensuality of John Barry's wonderful jazzy score can not be emphasized enough. The score is, as Kasdan remarks, a character in the movie.

In short, the Deluxe Edition is worth the extra few dollars over the regular edition for any Body Heat fan. Would that they made movies like this today!

FANTASTIC! Gets better each time I watch it..........2007-05-22

I bought this after seeing it on cable and being reminded of what a good film it was.

On the off chance you are looking at this review and haven't seen it, William Hurt is a small town lawyer seduced by a local femme fatale, Kathleen Turner, and he gets in over his head in doing her bidding. His best friend, a assistant district attorney, played by Ted Danson, is in the unenviable position of having to investigate his friend. The drama and plot twists unwind from there...

I have now watched it several times, and I actually think it gets better each time you watch it, because you start noticing small details about the scenes and plot that you might have originally missed...this film has aged beautifully. Amazing ambience and Hurt,Turner, Mickey Rourke (back when he was cool), Danson, and the other supporting actors are great.

I bought this exact DVD off Amazon, so I can speak about the extras. This specific DVD includes some scenes that were cut--including one scene involving a first murder attempt on Richard Crenna that failed. The other extras included some interviews in Europe that took place in 1981 with Turner and Hurt. The next set of extras is discussions with the actors today about the making of the film--interesting to see how they have aged. Lawrence Kasdan, the director, is also interviewed. There's a LOT of interesting information about how it was filmed (it was cold, not hot when they shot the movie!), some artistic choices that were made, etc. I actually thought, for once, that the extras were valuable, because I had never seen film noir, and the extras really emphasize the point that Kasdan was going for a sexy recreation of old film noir like the Asphalt Jungle. Never seen those, but if they are as good as Body Heat, I will go rent...

Amazing film!.......2007-02-21

This film is definitely not given the credit that it is due. It is spicy and enticing all the way through. As a student of the law I can definitely relate the everything that occurs in this film. The main characters are full of plotting, schemes, and deceit. This movie teaches a great lesson for life, showing what can happen when you are not careful, let your guard down, and get too entrapped in physical relationships. This movie is highly recommended. You will love it!

Neo Noir South Florida.......2007-01-04

I continue to go back to certain movies. This is one that gets better with each viewing.
William Hurt and Kathleen Turner provide the melting point, but the supporting cast is entirely up to the needed level to make this one of the best dark thrillers of the past 25 years. Ted Danson is particularly good in his turn as prosecutor, while the late Richard Crenna turns in a creditable performance as the money machine that ignites the fires of greed. J.A. Preston is terrific as the police investigator who follows, or is he led?, the trail of the crime.
Moody, dark and intricate, with everything working, this is one of my favorites.

the vamp & the weak.......2006-12-01

"You wanna hear something wild?...". No doubt about it: best erotic thriller ever. Story and characters totally pull the viewer into a world of crime, greed and blind passion. Superb music score by John Barry. South Florida's money and temptation at its best.

Average customer rating:

Opera : a well made Argento but not his best
A must for fans of Italian horror.
Gore and Humor at the Opera.
Very Very Good movie
Oh Yeah!!

Opera
Starring: Urbano Barberini , Francesca Cassola , Ian Charleson , Barbara Cupisti , and Maurizio Garrone
Manufacturer: Starz / Anchor Bay
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00005LQ05
Release Date: 2001-10-30

Customer Reviews:

Opera : a well made Argento but not his best.......2007-06-15

Opera is worth seeing for horror fans, in my opinion, if only for the amazing scene where the bullet comes through the door and hits her in the eye. That scene alone is worth the rental if you are a gore fanatic.

Other than that this movie is overall very well made, like most of Argento's giallos, but its flaws lie in the storyline being too one dimensional, in my opinion. It's a feast for the eyes.

A must for fans of Italian horror........2007-01-24

Terror at the opera was the first Dario Argento film I've ever seen back in 2001 and it was terrific, it has all the qualities that make a dario Argento film great from the excellent camera shots and angles and stylish directing from Argento to the great and gory death scenes. Alot of people said that this was a return to form after the failure of Phenomena which I thought was my personal favorite I mean it wasn't that bad, the film is a Gialo or murder mystery that takes place in the La Scala Opera House in Milan where strange things begin to happen as two people are mysteriously killed and a female member of the cast begins to experience a feeling of deja vu. The film has some great scenes in it including the killer himself who likes to stalk the female lead who ties her up while killing people right in front of her, he places a bunch of needles so she won't have to close her eyes. The clever use of a crow in the opera was also great as it starts flying and swirling all over the place and Dario uses a special camera teqniche, the best death scene has to be the gunshot through the keyhole and it was quite bloody as well as the other death scenes. It's an excellent film thats very thrilling and has a surprise twist ending involving the serial killer although it wasn't scary and the acting could have been better but then again what do you expect from an Italian horror film its not theatre acting, Dario Argento adds alot of class to most of his films so thats good enough for me. Overall I have to say that it was one of my favorites and I would include this along with Tenebrea and Zombie in my top ten Italian horror films of all time, its definitely worth a look.

Gore and Humor at the Opera........2006-07-06

Dario Argento's Terror at the Opera is simply about a psychotic hooded killer who terrorizes an opera diva whom he adores. The opera diva is Betty, a young singer who gets a chance to star in Macbeth when the original lead has an accident and breaks her leg. Her powerful (not) performances in Macbeth attracts the killer who randomly kidnaps Betty, ties her up and tapes a row of sharp pins under her eyes forcing her to watch him commit murder. Later on in the film we find out why he does this to her aswell as the killers secret identity. Terror at the Opera is more of a slasher rather than a horror, (as there is no real scary moments in the entire film) but still a good horror.

TATO is a very enjoyable horror/slasher. For the usual horror fanatic, it does deliver as it is gory and strangely at times very humorous. The camera work is great in this film as it exaggerates the gore by simply zooming in on a penetration of a knife or when the camera becomes the eyes of Betty, showing us what she sees through those sharp needles taped under her eyes. Apart from gore, TATO also has a mystery factor. As the film progresses introducing new characters and reminding us of old suspicious characters, the viewer soon begins to wonder who is the killer. And of course this does lead to a twist at the end.

With plenty of violence, mystery, thrills and humor, Dario Argento's well paced feature will not dissapoint. One bad thing I can say about this film is that the acting is quite bad, but that maybe the result of the terrible dubbing. However, Terror at the Opera is still an entertaining film and well worth a look.

Very Very Good movie.......2006-02-17

This film is A VERY good one..it has mystery,horror,style good acting. The crows annoyed me to bits but that was part and parcel of what made the film so creapy. The camera work is second to none and i believe is ahead of it's time;how they found the killer is beyond me but even that was a good stroke. The lead actress was a bit over the top with the noise she made and she to me failed to cut it as the opera singer type and she looked stilted while performng the opera scenes but she was nice in her role.

Filled with twists and turns it's ending rivals any i've seen for drama .

This is highly recommended by me..highly.

The score is just awesome.

Oh Yeah!!.......2005-12-31

"Opera" aka Terror At The Opera was the first Argento movie I ever saw. It was fantastic! Great storyline, great gore, great Argento style. This movie flowed, music was all heavy metal- yeah!! You have to buy the 2-disc version of this film so you will also have the soundtrack. The soundtrack in this movie is outstanding. Great murders, great gore, great acting, great everything. Argento should be very proud of this film.

Average customer rating:

Okay, so I'm the one guy who didn't think it was all that and a bag of chips.
An Experience that will Stay With You For Some Time To Come...
loved it
Ridiculous ending, not worth watching!
This is a very good movie

Open Your Eyes
Starring: Carola Angulo (II) , Gérard Barray , Joserra Cadiñanos , Penélope Cruz , and Ion Gabella
Manufacturer: Lions Gate
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Vanilla Sky
Belle Epoque
The Sea Inside
Woman on Top
Amores Perros

ASIN: B00005LZOD
Release Date: 2001-08-21

Amazon.com

Imagine if an actor's director like Eric Rohmer--whose films consist almost entirely of conversation between pairs or small groups of people--made a film that incorporated elements from movies like Dark City, eXistenZ, The Thirteenth Floor, The Truman Show, and Total Recall. The result might resemble Alejandro Amenabar's remarkable second feature, Open Your Eyes, which favors ideas over effects and offers twist upon twist with mind-warping agility. This film rewards multiple viewings, pushing the viewer toward one perception of reality, then switching to another until reality itself is called into question. Melodrama, love story, and psychological thriller combine with a dash of science fiction, forming a plot that is both disorienting and deceptively precise.

Set in Madrid, the story defies description, but this much can be revealed: young, handsome Cesar (Eduardo Noriega) is vain, rich, charming, and--following a botched suicide-murder scheme by a jilted lover--horribly disfigured. He'd fallen in love with Sofia (Penélope Cruz) but is now an embittered husk of his former self, stuck in a "psychiatric penitentiary" on a murder charge and hiding behind an expressionless mask. His reality has crumbled, but as the film's agenda is gradually revealed, we realize that there are other factors in play. Exposing that agenda would be a criminal offense against those who haven't seen the film; suffice it to say that Open Your Eyes takes you into the twilight zone and beyond, and does so cleverly enough to prompt Tom Cruise to produce and star in an English-language remake, Vanilla Sky. The 2001 remake, directed by Cameron Crowe, costars Cameron Diaz and Penélope Cruz, who reprises her original role. --Jeff Shannon

Customer Reviews:

Okay, so I'm the one guy who didn't think it was all that and a bag of chips........2006-12-21

Abre los Ojos (Alejandro Amenabar, 1997)

Okay, I have to say this first: Eduardo Noriega is the male lead in the new Brad Anderson movie Trans-Siberian. I don't need to know anything else, because Brad Anderson is about as close to being a god as movie directors get. If Anderson thinks Eduardo Noriega is the goods, then Eduardo Noriega is the goods.

He's also the star of the much-talked-about Alejandro Amenabar film Abre los Ojos, which everyone and his mother complained was desecrated when remade in America as Vanilla Sky a few years ago. And while I can't find anything wrong with slagging a Tom Cruise flick, I'm not terribly sure why this movie is being held up as the gold standard. Maybe it's a relativity thing; I have (to the value of my sanity, according to friends) managed to avoid seeing Vanilla Sky.

In any case, the plot: Cesar (Noriega, who, did I mention, is in the new Brad Anderson movie?) is an arrogant, handsome womanizer who meets the woman of his dreams, Sofia (Penelope Cruz). Problem is, the girl he jilted for Sofia, Nuria (Before Night Falls' Najwa Nimri), isn't too happy with the arrangement. While offering him a lift home, she commits suicide by crashing her car, an accident that leaves handsome Cesar horribly disfigured.

Now, intercut with all this are scenes of Cesar being interviewed by a doctor, so we know there's a lot more to this story than we're being let in on. And that's all well and good, except that the movie keeps raising two questions for each one it answers. At that rate, you're going to be left with a whole lot of unanswered questions when the movie ends. And that's exactly what we get. It's not so much that the film is ambiguous, which it is, but it's that the ambiguousness of the ending is the part about which we can feel we have the clearest grasp on. There's an "as you know, Bob" character at the end to explain everything, but Amenabar has given us a very strong feeling throughout his tenure in the film that the guy is, quite simply, lying his tuckus off. And where does that leave us? (Knowing nothing but our interpretation of the ambiguous ending, of course.)

What we do get is some rather fine shots of Penelope Cruz showing a lot more skin than we've seen from her before, a handful of really good performances (including Noriega's), and a mystery that, were it to come to any sort of conclusion, would be a cracker. Now, I'll be the first to admit that it's entirely possible I missed some small detail that makes the whole thing make perfect sense, but until someone points it out to me, 'm still wondering what it is about this movie (aside, of course, from Penelope Cruz naked) that gets peoples' juices up.

And did I mention that Eduardo Noriega is in the new Brad Anderson flick? ** ½

An Experience that will Stay With You For Some Time To Come..........2006-10-02

Abre Los Ojos came to my attention after seeying it's American Remake, Vanilla Sky. Vanilla Sky had amazed me and had been spinning in my mind for a long time after I had seen it. Then I found this dvd of the original, and bought it here on Amazon.
When it arrived I immidiately watched it, ready to be pulled into that world which Vanilla Sky had pulled me in about a year ealier. Only this time, this movie stunned me even more than Vanilla Sky did, it captured me, moved me and gave the world of dreaming and love a totally different perspective than it gave me when I watched Vanilla Sky.
The reason?
The original is simply more powerfull than it's remake.

Abre Los Ojos is one of those movies that is everlasting. It is a tense thriller, a beautiful love story, an emotional drama, a big mystery and can even be placed under the catagory Horror at some moments.
The story is the most original and one of the most powerfull stories I've ever seen. It's complex, it's tempting, it's confusesing, it's powerful... It's everything that makes a story worthwhile and is absolutely something to remember and think back to.
The cast is fantastic. Penelope Cruz plays the exact same role that she plays in Vanilla Sky. The thing that makes her better in this one than the remake is that she has no problem pronouncing her scentences. Spanish is her motherlanguage, the language she was raised with and the language she can pronouce with pure pasion and fantastic acting. She also did a fantastic job in Vanilla Sky, don't get me wrong, but here you can feel her emotions fluently and she gives her absolute best and in Vanilla Sky you can't really feel that even though she acts absolutely great in that movie.
The leading role is for Eduardo Noriega, an actor that is absolutely convincing and realistic for the part he plays. He was a great casting choice and gives his very best. The thing that makes him believable is that you will feel for his character during the movie. He portrais his character in such a way that is only said in one word: powerful.

The other aspects of the movie: the setdesign, the locations, the lighting, the music, the cameramovements, the editing, the atmosphere and everything else is all maqnificent and leaves a powerfull impression. It helpes the story live and feel real to the audience.
Everything has been taken care of to make every small detail look stunning which helps you even more with falling in love with this movie.
Don't you worry about the language (the whole movie is spoken in Spanish), cause when you are into this movie you won't even notice that you are still reading the subtitles.

My only left advice to you is: Watch Abre Los Ojos first, and after that Vanilla Sky. I did it in the other direction and all I can say is that I think it's a pitty that I did so. So don't make the same mistake that I did and watch Abre Los Ojos first! You will understand what I mean when you will watch Vanilla Sky secondly.

So open your eyes and be moved by this absolute masterpiece of filmmaking. Yes people, this is what the movies are all about!
WOW, what a film!

loved it.......2006-08-28

This film, which in my opinion is way better than Vanilla Sky, flat-out spreads important questions to the viewer. the most important being: how far are you willing to go, how much of your life will you allow beauty to control?

Ridiculous ending, not worth watching!.......2006-08-10

This movie was captivating and interesting for the first 3/4ths of it. It is a psychological thriller/mystery and you obviously want to find out the big explanation at the end that resolves all your questions. Well, the ending was so incredibly far-fetched and crazy that I can't believe that anyone who read the WHOLE script actually wanted to work on this movie. It ends up being a stupid "sci-fi" type ending. So, if you want to get all into a movie, only to have them resolve it with the most ridiculous scenario possible, buy this one!! ....or....DON'T.

This is a very good movie.......2006-08-05

I got this movie so that I will continue to improve on my Spainish. I am thrilled to find such good movie in the process. I have seen Vanillia Sky, but this is so much better, in some way much more original. The performances...what can I say, I stayed glued to the television until the end.

Average customer rating:

A Holocaust movie with a difference
Love and Honour
Wonderfully structured movie
rosenstrasse
A MAGNIFICENT FILM...

Rosenstrasse
Starring: Katja Riemann , Maria Schrader , Martin Feifel , Jürgen Vogel , and Jutta Lampe
Director: Margarethe von Trotta
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures
ProductGroup: DVD
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Downfall
Good Bye, Lenin!
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ASIN: B0006IIKRQ
Release Date: 2005-01-18

Customer Reviews:

A Holocaust movie with a difference.......2007-03-17

For me, this movie is very different than other Holocaust movies, in that it explores the issue of what happened to Jewish spouses of Aryan women...the story itself is based on a true occurrence, and the movie begins with a wake...the widow is tormented by visions of her past in wartime Berlin & shows disapproval at her daughter's choice of a non-Jewish fiance...the daughter then discovers there is more to her mother's past than she was ever told, and travels to Germany to discover her mother's past...the story is told in flashbacks through reminiscences, and basically focusses on the plight of Aryan women in Berlin whose Jewish husbands have been confined in a place called Rosenstrasse...I won't give too much away, but I must say that for a slow-paced movie, it is quite gripping as we are kept guessing as to the final fate of the Jewish spouses...as for the acting, the characters from the past did an excellent job, their performances were very realistic, and heart-wrenching, especially the actress who plays the main role of Mrs Fabian Fischer, the Aryan wife. In the present day, the actress who plays the daughter who seeks to unearth her mother's past wasn't very convincing, but all in all the story itself makes up for other lacks in the movie, and it is definitely watchable for the unique plot.

Love and Honour.......2006-05-03

Having read about the Rosenstrasse miracle in various books I rejoiced when somebody chose to make a movie about it. I eventually managed to get a copy.

It is an incident unique in the story of the Holocaust. Fanatical nazis in Berlin of all places were forced to return Jews they wished to deport to the Death Camps. It happened when they seized mixed marriage Jews as part of the Berlin Round up. And much to their astonishment, their German spouses showed up outside the place they were kept demanding their release.

Much to everybody's astonishment, they got it shortly aferwards.

This is their story.

I must confess I thought the New York scenes where the main character starts by meeting a relative her mother doesn't tell her about were rather flat and two dimensional. The modern German scenes weren't that bad but the scenes set during WWII Berlin were superb. Great costuming. Great scene organization and set design. Nice drama. Good character portrayal. A happy ending, something unique for Holocost films.

Overall, this is a great film.

Wonderfully structured movie.......2005-10-07

The structure of the movie reminded me of "Eleni", a weaving of the past and present as a child goes back to investigate the horrors that were the parent's past. Starts slowly but settles into a pace that can be truly savored. This is a movie that I will find myself revisiting again and again.

rosenstrasse.......2005-09-25

i am being a bit naughty here. the review is not about the film. the review is about amazing amazon. every time i buy something - maybe for about 10 years now, my order is perfectly tracked, timeously delivered and i am one happy customer, every time.

the one and only time i complained about non-delivery, amazon offered an apology and replaced all the goods.

one week later, i found the original package in my home - my son had received it and had forgotten to tell me. i contacted amazon who merely suggested i keep the original delivery - and when i offered that they debit my card a second time, amazon graciously declined.

what a company!!!
michael cohn
sydney
australia

A MAGNIFICENT FILM..........2005-09-07

This film is based upon the true story of the German women who, during Word War II, protested the internment of their Jewish husbands in a building located on Rosenstrasse, a street in Berlin. These were women who defied the Nazi status quo by remaining married to the husbands whom they loved so dearly, although it came with a price.

The film tells the story through the juxtaposition of the present and the past. The story is told in flashback. In the present, the viewer is introduced to Ruth Weinstein (Jutta Lampe), a secular Jewish woman, living in present day New York, She has just lost her husband, and appears to have lost her senses, as well. She insists that her family sit Shiva, speaking only German while observing Orthodox traditions. She refuses to acknowledge her first cousin, who has come to pay her respects. Ruth also refuses to acknowledge Luis Marquez (Fedja van Huet), her only daughter's Nicaraguan, non-Jewish fiance. Luis had been a protoge of the deceased, who had had no issue with the idea of Luis marrying his daughter. Ruth now forbids her daughter to marry Luis or she will disown her. Hannah (Maria Schrader), the daughter, is at a loss to account for her mother's seemingly irrational behavior and is totally appalled by it.

When Hannah speaks to her mother's first cousin, whom she had never before met, she discovers that her mother had lived with her first cousin and her family when she first came to the United States from Germany. Hannah comes away thinking that the answer to her mother's apparent derangement lies in Berlin, with an Aryan woman Hannah does not even know is still alive. This woman had, apparently, saved Ruth's life during the Nazi's reign of terror. This was news to Hannah, as she knew virtually nothing of her mother's past, as Ruth had never spoken to her about it. When her mother insists on remaining uncommunicative on the issue, Hannah decides that for all their sakes, she needs to get some answers. So, she goes off to Germany to seek in the past the answers that she cannot get in the present.

Fortunately for her, she discovers that the woman for which she is looking is, indeed, alive, although quite elderly. She contacts the woman, ninety year old Lena Fischer (Doris Schade), telling her that she is doing research on the issue of Aryans and their Jewish spouses during World War II. Ms. Fischer agrees to see her, and during their session the story of her mother unfolds in flashback, In Berlin of 1943, many Jews married to Aryans were swept up by the Nazis and taken to a building on Rosenstrasse to await a determination of their fate. Virtual prisoners, their spouses and children were unable to communicate with them. Ruth's mother, Miriam Sussman (Lena Stolze), was one of these Jews. Her daughter, eight year old Ruth Sussman (Svea Lohde), had escaped her mother's fate, as she had obeyed her mother's instructions when the Nazis paid the Sussman home a visit. Unfortunately for Ruth's mother, the Nazis discovered that her Aryan husband had divorced her two years prior, thereby sealing her fate, and she, unknown to Ruth, is transported East. One can well imagine what happened to her.

At the same time, Fabian Israel Fischer (Martin Feifel) is also swept up from the factory where he works and taken to the building on Rosenstrasse. Fortunately for him, his wife, thirty-three year old Lena Fischer (Katja Riemann), is an Aryan devoted to her husband. Both are musicians. She is a concert pianist, and he is a violinist. They met before the war, bonding through their music. Although he is Jewish, and she is a member of a noble Aryan family, the von Eschenbachs, they married. Her father, however, disowned her for marrying Fischer. Her mother was sympathetic but under her father's thumb. Her brother, Arthur (Jurgen Vogel), however, remained loyal to his sister and friendly with his brother-in-law. With the rise of the Nazis, life for the Fischers changed. They were forced to live in reduced circumstances, giving up the music that they loved. Instead, Fabian was made to work in a factory from which he was taken peremptorily to the building on Rosenstrasse.

Lena sought the help of her brother, Arthur, now a soldier in the German army. He is sympathetic and tries to get Fabian released to no avail. Lena herself tried, but was looked down upon as little more than a whore for having married a Jew whom she now refuses to divorce. Instead, she stood vigil for her husband, Fabian, with the other Aryan women on Rosenstrasse, and it was there that she met Ruth Sussman. Ruth attached herself to Lena, and Lena assumed responsibility for the child. Without Lena, Ruth would never have survived. Lena takes care of Ruth for three years, forming a mother-daughter bond. After the war, Ruth's aunt, her mother's sister, claimed Ruth, and Lena was forced to send Ruth to join her aunt in America. Ruth never knew what happened to her mother, Miriam, and never understood why Lena, her surrogate mother, gave her up to go and live with total strangers. It is Ruth's ignorance of the situation that lies at the heart of her dysfunction.

What happens to them all during the war and the impact that the Nazis were to have on all their lives makes for a well told tale. The film offers a very balanced view of ordinary Germans in war time, telling a story not generally known. Under the deft direction of Margarethe von Trotta, the performances in this film are phenomenal, and the film has won many awards. Katja Riemann won the Best Actress Award at the 2003 Venice Film Festival. It won the David Di Donatello Award in 2004 for Best European Film. At the Bavarian Film Awards in 2004, it won for Best Cinematography. This is a powerful and compelling film that is totally riveting. Bravo!

Average customer rating:

Deluxe Edition Delivers
FANTASTIC! Gets better each time I watch it...
Amazing film!
Neo Noir South Florida
the vamp & the weak

Body Heat
Starring: William Hurt , Kathleen Turner , Richard Crenna , Ted Danson , and J.A. Preston
Director: Lawrence Kasdan
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: 6304698518
Release Date: 1997-11-19

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

Deluxe Edition Delivers.......2007-05-27

FANTASTIC! Gets better each time I watch it..........2007-05-22

Amazing film!.......2007-02-21

Neo Noir South Florida.......2007-01-04

the vamp & the weak.......2006-12-01

Average customer rating:

Night Crossing
Mann's film makes us realize the true value of freedom...
Share History With Your Gradeschooler.
Night Crossing
A Cold War classic from Disney!

Night Crossing
Starring: John Hurt , Jane Alexander , Doug McKeon , Keith McKeon , and Beau Bridges
Director: Delbert Mann
Manufacturer: Walt Disney Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B0000DZTIN
Release Date: 2004-03-02

Description

In the fall of 1979, one of history's most ingenious and courageous flights to freedom took place when two families fled from Communist East Germany to the West in their own handcrafted hot air balloon. Starring John Hurt (HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE), Jane Alexander (THE CIDER HOUSE RULES), and Beau Bridges, Walt Disney Pictures brings to the screen this remarkable true story of the Strelzyk and Wetzel families and their daring, death-defying escape.

Customer Reviews:

Night Crossing.......2007-05-29

Night Crossing brought the subject of the Berlin wall alive for my students. The quality of my video and DVD were excellent

Mann's film makes us realize the true value of freedom..........2007-01-11

'Night Crossing' is about an enormous barrier designed not to keep enemies out but to keep its own people in...

'Night Crossing' is about a very long border fencer equipped with silent alarms and automatic firing systems...

'Night Crossing' is about the denial of the basic human rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness...

'Night Crossing' is about the fear and pain that afflict so many families...

'Night Crossing' is about one attempt to risk a crossing through the border zone...

'Night Crossing' is about a loving father whose only desire is to give his boys what should never have been taken away from them...

'Night Crossing' is about a disturbed mother who wants her babies and her husband alive...

'Night Crossing' is about a caring husband who wants his family to be together but in a better place...

'Night Crossing' is about children who want to be free to reach at anytime the sky...

'Night Crossing' is about a hot-air balloon handcrafted and built by two families...

'Night Crossing' is about a balloon which could go just high enough to crash or catch fire and explode...

'Night Crossing' is about two determined men who want their family to climb into a hot air balloon and float away to 'liberty'...

'Night Crossing' is about the fear of getting caught by an evil regime...

'Night Crossing' is about a sensible man who can't let bad dreams stop him...

'Night Crossing' is about an icy policeman who wants every lookout tower on full alert...

With exquisite music by Jerry Goldsmith, Delbert Mann's 'Night Crossing' makes us realize the true value of freedom...

Final thoughts:

There are a few moments in everyone's life, certainly in public lives, that can define a person...

For those of us old enough to remember the Reagan presidency, seeing the clips again in the wake of his death makes it seem like those events happened just yesterday, or last week. The voice, the expressions, are all so familiar. But for a large percentage of people, these events might as well have happened fifty years ago, if not more. They are part of the distant past. President Reagan is a name, and not much more. President Gorbachev is another name, and not much more. So how can we remember these two men who had such a huge impact on their country?

Reagan and Gorbachev worked together to tear down the Berlin Wall and to steer their superpower nations away from nuclear confrontation...

Share History With Your Gradeschooler........2006-10-29

Watch this film with your child or grandchild and be prepared to answer questions about this historical time period. My children enjoyed this film years ago and it is now a pleasure to share it with my grandkids. Plenty of action and suspense to keep their interest and I always watch it with them the first time or two, to help them understand what is happening and why.

Night Crossing.......2006-03-09

I am just soooo grateful and thankful to have found this DVD as we used to watch this with our children and it's a wonderful true story. With much appreciation, Karon

A Cold War classic from Disney!.......2004-12-10

This is the true story of one of the greatest escapes of the 20th century! The year is 1979. The Strelzyk and Wetzel families desperately want to leave Communist-controlled East Germany so they decide to build a huge hot-air balloon to carry them over to West Germany. Not only is it risky relying on a balloon to carry two families, they also have to avoid East German police. This is a well-crafted Disney film that the whole family will enjoy. The cast includes John Hurt, Jane Alexander, and a then-unknown Beau Bridges. Although I'm very happy to own this on dvd, this is a bare-bones dvd as far as special features go. At least the sound quality is better than my old vhs copy. Still, this is a very important and inspiring story that everyone should know about and I highly recommend this movie to people of all ages.

Average customer rating:

Trash
WRONG RATING

Morgana
Starring: Cristiano Nocera , Axel Bonura , Giovannino Donato , and Linda Holdahl
Director: Carola Cerreti
Manufacturer: FULL MOON
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Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B0001DMVDA
Release Date: 2004-04-06

Customer Reviews:

Trash.......2005-05-03

This is really a piece of trash and that's where it is going. Amazon advertised the "unrated" version" sent the "R" version. Really dissapointed with Amazon. Don't waste your money.

WRONG RATING.......2005-01-13

AMAZON LISTS UNRATED BUT IS A R RATED ONE HAD TO SEND BACK TO SELLER !!

Average customer rating:

I love giallo!
even though its cut its still fun!
Tenebre
Triumphant return to Giallo for Argento!
Slick, Violent & Suspenseful. One of Argento's Most Entertaining Films.

Tenebre
Starring: Isabella Amadeo , Mirella Banti , Christian Borromeo , Mirella D'Angelo , and Anthony Franciosa
Manufacturer: Anchor Bay
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00000IBRJ
Release Date: 1999-03-16

Amazon.com

After several excursions into supernatural horror, Dario Argento returned to the homicidal frenzy that made his reputation with this mystery that plays more like a grown-up slasher movie than a detective thriller. Anthony Franciosa stars as Peter Neal, a bestselling horror novelist whose promotional tour in Italy takes a terrible turn when a mysterious killer re-creates the brutal murders from his book with real-life victims. The first to die are so-called "deviants," Neal's own friends, and finally there comes a promise that the author himself is next on the list. Columbo it ain't, but Argento has always been more concerned with style than story and his execution of the crimes is pure cinematic bravura. From the simple beauty of a straight razor shattering a light bulb (the camera catches the red-hot filament slowly blacking out) to an ambitious crane shot that creeps up and over the sides of a house under siege in a voyeuristic survey that would make Hitchcock proud, Argento turns the art of murder into a stylish spectacle. He even lets his kinkier side show with flashbacks of an adolescent boy and a teasing dominatrix in red stiletto heels that become a key motif of the film. The objects of Argento's homicidal tendencies are traditionally lovely, scantily clad Italian beauties, and with self-deprecating humor he even inserts a scene in which Neal is taken to task for the misogynist violence of his stories--an accusation Argento himself has weathered for years. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews:

I love giallo!.......2007-03-02

This movie got me into giallo flicks.The story blows anything Hitchcock did out of the water and the special effects are awesome.The goblin music is probably my favorite soundtrack for a horror movie ever.DARIO ARGENTO IS GOD!

even though its cut its still fun!.......2007-02-16

i love this movie but its not really a giallo but more like a slasher movie this was once banned in the uk so dont watch around grandma there are a lot of good death scenes an amazing soundtrack and beautiful (cut) camera angles

Tenebre.......2006-11-01

Tenebre is tied with suspiria as my favorite Argento film. Let me tell you why. First off, the cinematography and lighting is great. This movie is just as stylish as suspiria and rivals its cinematography and beautiful lighting techniques. Second, this is probably the best giallo ever. It really kept me guessing until the gruesome finale. You are constantly wondering who the killer is and what that girl in those flashbacks mean. Third, this is probably Argento's goriest. We have two throaght slashings, a stab in the neck, an axe in the head, an arm lopped off (creating the beautiful arm painting scene in which a woman's arm is lopped off and her blood continuisaly spews and eventually she squirts her blood onto a wall), an axe in the back, a pole through the stomach, and plenty of stabbings.
The movie is about a murder mystery writer who is finding out about murders based on those from his book Tenebrea(wich means darkness in Italy or something like that). The murders (and his past) cause the writer to spiral into insanity which you'll find out about at the end.
Tenebre is a truly awesome giallo as you can see. For those of you just tuning in to Argento I strongly recomend you see this or suspiria first. Do whatever you can to see this movie. Rent, buy it, steal it if you must!!!!!! It is truly a great movie. Kudos to Argento once again. Peace out:)

Triumphant return to Giallo for Argento!.......2006-06-23

Argento's return to giallo in 1982 after his two supernatural outings SUSPIRIA and INFERNO was triumphant one. By this point Argento was so well versed in the sub-genres conventions that TENBRE has an effortless feel about it, the sense that the director was hardly stretching his innumerable talents. The film has a nice allegorical feel in its exploration of the effects of violence in the media on people. In this case it is not a film, but a novel. Argento is clever to divert attention away from the medium of cinema. At the time of the films release just such arguments about violence were reaching an apex, especially in the UK where TENEBRE was actually banned due to its violent content and the influence such imagery might have.

From a visual perspective Argento goes to the extreme opposite of his previous two films, by presenting a bright and starkly lit world, this brightness is taken to its extremity when one character played by JOHN SAXON is stabbed to death in broad daylight. The film works well, because of a confusing narrative structure, which is punctuated by flashbacks, which is what one expects from a giallo. If it makes sense, then arguably it has failed. As usual the film is filled with tremendous set pieces, including an astonishing sequence where Argento shoots a house from every conceivable angle in one take. A scene which is disturbing because of the almost omnipotent quality of the gaze of the killer. The Rome location is evocative and surprising in the rather dour and dreary impression it gives.

Sadly the broader themes of the film are not dealt with in a particularly intelligent and sensitive way and half way through the film Argento loses patience and begins despatching cast members with clockwork regularity. Performances are above average for an Italian horror production as is the soundtrack. Considering the way Argento deteriorated as the 80's became the 90's, TENEBRE stands as one of the directors better films.

Slick, Violent & Suspenseful. One of Argento's Most Entertaining Films........2006-06-07

When Peter Neal (Anthony Franciosa), a popular horror novelist visits Rome to promote his latest best-seller "Tenebrae", he is suddenly thrust into a world of murder and mayhem when a psychopath goes on a killing spree and uses techniques described in his book. The killer seems to be on a mission, killing off people (mostly women) who are morally corrupt and are referred to by the killer as "deviants".

This blood-soaked, fast-moving Argento flick is not in the same classic level as his masterpiece "Suspiria" or even "Deep Red" but his fans seem to love it regardless. The film is not really a horror film but a