Meghan,
While some of these films are older, your professor has perhaps not
shown them before in her class; many of them are classics.
Or: My Treasure
Visually controlled, emotionally precise and dramatically intricate,
Keren Yedaya's Or (My Treasure) combines uncompromising realism with
compassionate storytelling. Winner of the 2004 Cannes Film Festival
Camera D'Or for best debut film, Or is the work of an "uncommonly
sensitive" filmmaker who delivers "walloping irony" (Time Out New
York) without resorting to audacious showmanship or self-conscious
technique.
Or (Dana Ivgy), a pretty and popular Tel Aviv high school student,
works nights at a neighborhood restaurant while taking her first
tentative steps out of innocence and into first love. But Or's real
full-time job is looking after her mother Ruthie (Ronit Elkabetz -
Late Marriage). After 20 dehumanizing years of curbside prostitution,
Ruthie's survival instincts have begun to deteriorate, and it's up to
Or to see that mother and daughter don't both wind up on the street
together. Or's love, loyalty and resourcefulness are put to the test
as Ruthie's compulsive self-destructiveness keeps driving her back
into prostitution. As the cruel realities of marginalized city life
multiply, Or is forced to choose between her mother's bottomless needs
and having an uncorrupted life of her own.
A harrowing urban chronicle and a subtle coming of age journey, Or is
a truly modern tragedy that plays out inside dark apartment blocks,
under cold neon lights and in shadowy back alleys. Yedaya's graceful
directorial restraint and Dana Ivgy's and Ronit Elkabetz's
"unflinching performances" (The New York Post) give Or an intimacy
that sidesteps preachy social outrage and knee jerk moralizing, while
savagely indicting street prostitution as the degrading modern-day
slavery that it is.
http://kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=758
Different From The Others
One of the first gay-themed films in the history of cinema, Different
From the Others was banned at the time of its release, later burned
by the Nazis and was believed lost for more than forty years. Using
recently discovered film segments, still photos and censorship
documents from different archives, Filmmuseum Muenchen has resurrected
this truly groundbreaking silent film for DVD.
Enacted in 1871, the German penal code's Paragraph 175 sentenced
thousands of accused German homosexual men to jail terms for
"unnatural vice between men." In 1919, director Richard Oswald (Tales
of the Uncanny) and psychologist Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld created a film
intended to expose the unjust Paragraph 175 and help liberate the
"third sex" from legal persecution and public scorn. Different From
the Others casts Conrad Veidt (Cabinet of Dr. Caligari) as Paul
Körner, a gay concert pianist blackmailed by a closeted low-life named
Bollek. When Körner's budding romance with a handsome young music
student runs afoul of Bollek's extortion, Körner goes to the German
courts for protection. But the draconian Paragraph 175 makes criminals
out of both accuser and accused, and the love Körner has found may
cost him his career, his freedom or his life.
Conrad Veidt's uncompromising performance (the same year as his
legendary portrayal of Cesar the somnambulist in Caligari) places a
human face on Hirschfeld's reformist fervor and Oswald's tragic
melodrama. In its frank depiction of gay bars, closeted homosexuality,
and the suffocating expectations of straight society, Different From
the Others is both a fascinating time capsule and a remarkably modern
cinematic plea for tolerance and change.
http://kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=732
Sex In Chains
Brimming with visual invention and breathless erotic angst, Sex in
Chains uniquely combines gorgeous cinematic craftsmanship with bold
subject matter. Made at the peak of the German silent era, Sex in
Chains defines the Weimar era artistic freedom that would shortly fall
prey to the Nazis. An astonishing mixture of love story, socially
conscious exposé and lurid melodrama, Sex in Chains assuredly balances
tender romance with candid erotica and uninhibited imagination with
crisp realism. It's maybe the best silent film of its director and
star Wilhelm Dieterle. He later became successful in Hollywood as
William Dieterle, directing classics like The Life of Emile Zola and A
Portrait of Jennie.
When Sommer (Dieterle) accidentally kills a nightclub patron harassing
his wife Helene (Mary Johnson), he's sentenced to three years in
prison. Inside prison, Sommer grapples with the realities of men
separated from women but not from temptation, while outside Mary longs
for her husband's reassuring caress. Denied the physical comfort
promised in their marriage vows, the young newlyweds are driven to
risk their future and find release where they can -- Sommer in the
arms of a handsome fellow prisoner and Helene with the boss whose
kindness becomes her only solace.
Remarkably at ease with his taboo subject matter, director Dieterle
depicts the hothouse passions of Sex in Chains with ravishing black
and white photography. Actor Dieterle gives a restrained, honest
performance as a traditionally-minded young husband forced to test his
marriage and his very sexuality. Though censored after its 1928
release, Sex in Chains has been restored to its original state-of-the-
silent-film-art brilliance by the Filmmuseum Muenchen and is presented
here for the first time on DVD.
http://kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=731
Dementia
An entirely unique and utterly bizarre rediscovery, John J. Parker's
Dementia is a 1950s-style foray into the mind of psycho-sexual
madness. Set entirely in a nocturnal twilight zone that blends dream
imagery with the cinematic stylings of film noir, Dementia follows the
tormented existence of a young woman haunted by the horrors of her
youth, which transformed her into a stiletto-wielding, man-hating
beatnik.
Accompanied by George Antheil's sci-fi score, the camera follows a
"Gamin" (Adrienne Barrett) on a surreal sleepwalk through B-movie
hell, populated by prostitutes, pimps and would-be molesters, all
photographed by William Thompson (Plan 9 From Outer Space, Maniac,
Glen or Glenda?).
Two years after its original release, a narration track of foreboding
psychobabble (diabolically spoken by Ed McMahon) was added to
Dementia, some controversial scenes were cut and the title was changed
to the more sensational Daughter Of Horror. For 45 years, only this
revamped bersion has ever been shown. This Kino on Video edition
presents the original cut of Dementia, digitally mastered from the
35mm negative, as well as the complete Daughter Of Horror (U.S. 1957.
55 mins. B&W.) from a 35mm print, and other rare souvenirs of this
most peculiar motion picture achievement.
http://kino.com/video/item.php?film_id=648
Let me know if any of these are interest.
Best,
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Sheldon
Vice President
Kino Lorber, Inc.
333 W. 39th St., Suite 503
New York, NY 10018
(212) 629-6880
www.kino.com
On Jul 6, 2010, at 4:30 PM, Meghann Matwichuk wrote:
Thanks for all the great suggestions so far. To answer Elizabeth's
question -- these are some of the topics the instructor is looking
to explore over the course of the semester, so no, she's not
expecting to find films that cover all these in one title. She's
looking for a handful of films from different world cinemas from
2008 or so forward.
Best,
Meghann
On 7/6/2010 4:19 PM, Elizabeth Sheldon wrote:
Must a film contain all of the 'areas of interest' or only one?
Best,
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Sheldon
Vice President
Kino Lorber, Inc.
333 W. 39th St., Suite 503
New York, NY 10018
(212) 629-6880
On Jul 6, 2010, at 3:43 PM, Threatt, Monique Louise wrote:
So, does that rule out Antonio’s Line? J
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]
] On Behalf Of Meghann Matwichuk
Sent: Tuesday, July 06, 2010 3:32 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [Videolib] Collective Brain: Gender Issues in Foreign
Feature Films
Hi All,
My annual appeal to the collective brain:
I have a women's studies instructor who teaches a class on gender
issues in world film each fall. She tries to use all new titles
each semester, and it can be a challenge for her to find a new
slate each year. Any recent releases that come to mind would be
greatly appreciated. Here are the topics / areas that are of
particular interest for her: "intersexuality, reproductive
rights, marriage choice, prostitution, religion and cultural
gendered practices."
She is ONLY interested in feature films -- not documentaries.
Thanks in advance,
*************************
Meghann Matwichuk, M.S.
Associate Librarian
Instructional Media Collection Department
Morris Library, University of Delaware
181 S. College Ave.
Newark, DE 19717
(302) 831-1475
http://www.lib.udel.edu/ud/instructionalmedia/
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VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion
of issues relating to the selection, evaluation,
acquisition,bibliographic control, preservation, and use of current
and evolving video formats in libraries and related institutions.
It is hoped that the list will serve as an effective working tool
for video librarians, as well as a channel of communication between
libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and
distributors.
VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion of
issues relating to the selection, evaluation,
acquisition,bibliographic control, preservation, and use of current
and evolving video formats in libraries and related institutions. It
is hoped that the list will serve as an effective working tool for
video librarians, as well as a channel of communication between
libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and
distributors.
VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion of issues
relating to the selection, evaluation, acquisition,bibliographic control,
preservation, and use of current and evolving video formats in libraries and
related institutions. It is hoped that the list will serve as an effective
working tool for video librarians, as well as a channel of communication
between libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and
distributors.
