The Foreign Film Thread...

antihero

antihero

Suspended / Banned
Messages
4,274
Name
Paul
Edit My Images
Yes
Carrying on from the saturday nights are rubbish thread, thought I should start a thread for foreign films and open a whole new world of cinema for some people (as a lot of Hollywoods films are remakes of foreign stuff)...

heres mine to start;

Rare Exports: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RQlikX4vvw
Let The Right One In: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZJUgsZ56vQ
The Troll Hunter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLEo7H9tqSM
Rec: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAnbWCjmOkA
The Host: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfNg_BveIks

...please add more :)
 
Just about any of the Kurosawa films - Rashomon, Kagemusha and Seven Samurai (guess what film that became when Hollywood nicked the idea)
Other Japanese films - Zatoichi, Brother, OldBoy

La Femme Nikita
Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources, good backstabbing French life.
Das Boot
La Vie en Rose is a good biopic of Edith Piaf.
Persepolis tells what life is/was really like in Iran after their revolution.

Plus a million other French films, black and white, gauloises smoke drifting in curvy Citroens...
 
Run Lola Run was quite good.
Pans Labyrinth is a classic.
Entre Les Murs (The Class) is gritty along the same lines as La Haine.
 
I've had a few people over the years tell me they will only watch a foreign film if it's dubbed as they can't be bothered with subtitles. Such a shame as they have missed out on so much.

Two of my favourites are Subway and Downfall. Coincidentally, I was thinking about a German film I saw, must have been about 30 years ago, called Fleisch (I think it was dubbed). Wouldn't mind watching it again but it doesn't appear to be available anywhere.
 
If find that after a while you don't really notice you're reading the subtitles

City of God is one to watch
 
wack61 said:
If find that after a while you don't really notice you're reading the subtitles

City of God is one to watch
Click to expand...

City of God is one of the best films i've ever seen. It's fantastic.
I also watched The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo last year and I couldn't believe it was subtitled, I was so engrossed I didn't even realise I was reading them!
 
fabs said:
I've had a few people over the years tell me they will only watch a foreign film if it's dubbed as they can't be bothered with subtitles
Click to expand...

I'm the opposite, I won't watch a film that has been dubbed, I think it ruins it.
 
Haven't got my dvd collection in france, but a few great films i remember are:
Amores Perros
Man Bites dog
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Run Lola Run
A Prophet
The Motorcycle Diaries
Battle Royale

I have Mesrine (another cassel film) which i am hoping to watch later, its been recommended to me by a few people. I'll also give a +1 to City of God. Theres some great chinese/korean/japanese films out there as well, aside from the obvious like Hero and House of the flying daggers, which are both visually stunning!
 
The City Of Lost Children is very good. French, I think, but available dubbed.

Then there's the Japanese Death Note 1 & 2. And Ring - remade by the Americans as The Ring.
 
Mesrine is a must , truly amazing flick.

Boy in the striped pyjamas

Sin nombre
 
MisterE said:
The City Of Lost Children is very good. French, I think, but available dubbed.

Then there's the Japanese Death Note 1 & 2. And Ring - remade by the Americans as The Ring.
Click to expand...

"La cité des enfants perdu" is indeed french - it's a jean-Pierre jeunet film, like Amelie and Delicatessen, and Mic-macs - I think he's an excellent director!

Sent from my iPhone using TP Forums
 
Try a few modern Russian ones:

Адмиралъ (Admiral) - Russian Civil War story - very good
Брестская крепость (Brest fortress) - The outbreak of the Great Patriotic War
9 Рота (9th Company) - Soviet Afganistan War story

Some of the Chinese ones are also excellent:

Assembly - Chinese Civil War story
Nanking - the Japanese occupation of the famous Chinese city (very horrific!)
 
The films of Besson (Subway, Nikita) and Kurosawa (Yojimbo etc) have already had mentions so I'll suggest Kieslowski, specifically A short film about love. That was made in Poland under martial law, before the fall of the Berlin wall.

My other favorite of his is Blue, which stars Juliette Binoche (who is mesmerising in this and IMO should have won the best actress Oscar that year, but didn't even get nominated). All of the Three Colours trilogy and the Dekalog are worth investingating as they are all excellent.
 
Taxi and district 13 are two decent french action flicks with a touch of comedy. Something the french seem to do surprisingly well!
 
I also have sitting here pending watching:

The Horde - French zombie splatter movie :thumbs:
Aftershock - Japanese (hmmm might be Korean) earthquake disaster movie

Must get round to watching those sometime but both come highly recommended to me.
 
desantnik said:
Try a few modern Russian ones:

Адмиралъ (Admiral) - Russian Civil War story - very good
Брестская крепость (Brest fortress) - The outbreak of the Great Patriotic War
9 Рота (9th Company) - Soviet Afganistan War story

Some of the Chinese ones are also excellent:

Assembly - Chinese Civil War story
Nanking - the Japanese occupation of the famous Chinese city (very horrific!)
Click to expand...

I have watched some of the new Russian films and liked them very much: Tichy Don, Ostrov (bit heavy), Pol mgla (half fog)
but I must say 9 Rota and 1612 are bit silly.
 
Dobermann is pretty good for a foreign film :thumbs:
you could also try Irreversible!
Hard Boiled was very well regarded back in the laserdisc days too
 
Some great films already listed.. in particular Låt den rätte komma in, Lola rennt, Nikita (and any of the early Luc Besson movies), etc.

On a lighter note to many of those already listed I'd add Tillsammans as a Swedish comedy, the German Hitler diaries comedy Schtonk!, Jacques Tati as Monsieur Hulot in Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot.

Although not films I would recommend Forbrydelsen (currently showing as The Killing on BBC4/iPlayer) and the Swedish Wallander series starring Krister Henriksson (much better than the Branagh version, although the Branagh version is closer to the books, and Rolf Lassgård doesn't quote work in the role for me).

Edit: How could I forget Les Triplettes de Belleville, brilliant French animation comedy.
 
Last edited:
menthel said:
Taxi and district 13 are two decent french action flicks with a touch of comedy. Something the french seem to do surprisingly well!
Click to expand...

It's the Luc Besson touch.. it then comes as no surprise when you see his name pop up in the credits for english language films like The Transporter (producer, writer), etc.
 
lazym said:
I have watched some of the new Russian films and liked them very much: Tichy Don, Ostrov (bit heavy), Pol mgla (half fog)
but I must say 9 Rota and 1612 are bit silly.
Click to expand...

No, 9 Rota is quite "sensible" compared to a lot of the "bulk action movies" they churned out about Chechnya. Really cringe worthy stuff there that even the stilted Soviet period version of 80's movies seem good by comparison.

If you like 80's movies, В зоне особого внимания ("at the special attention zone") is a good laugh - if only to see the evil CIA plotting world domination from a luxury mansion with a swimming pool and golf course :bonk:
 
To me, foreign is anything not prodused or resident in the UK, so Hollywood films are foreign!
 
Some great ones up there. I quite like Battle Royale, jean de floret, One Missed Call and it's ilk. I might try to find Siberiade, it's Russian. The only reason it caught my attention is the theme, which is the basis for PPK's 'Resurrection' but the film is well reviewed, too :)
A bit silly but I also liked Daywatch!
 
I'd rate each of these above an 8/10:

Mesrine (French)
Tell No One (Spanish)
The Secret In Their Eyes (Spanish)
The Lives of Others (German)
Amelie (French)
Baader Meinhof Komplex (German)
A Prophet (French)

These are obviously English translations of the movie titles, you can find the native name on www.imdb.com
 
Last edited:
Baader Meinhof Komplex was superb actually.

I'd also add "Che" (part 1 and 2) to the list - awesome!
 
onomatopoeia said:
That is the normal meaning of "foreign film", certainly.
Click to expand...

So any film with spoken english is not foreign :eek: doesnt matter country of production ...States, Uk, Australia or.. Cambodia.
For me American film are foreign by miles. Thousands of miles .

"Zack and Miri make a porn" "Hangover". Love these ones.
 
seeing as I started it, I suppose I should clarify that by Foreign I did mean non-English speaking (or non-native language speaking if you like, as maybe a chinese film, filmed in china with chinese actors, speaking english would be classed as foreign too in my book)

...back to the flicks...there's always Haute Tension and Ils..
 
absolutely love Emir Kustoricas movies !!! but well , I watch them in Russian, tried in English - didn't make any sense. he also has one movie with J.Depp called - arizona dream . yes, it's in English, yes, it stars a superstar, yes it's filmed in USA, but it's the only one, and is well worth watching.
 
EMA747 said:
A couple of German ones I really enjoy and both totally different

The Live of Others - http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B000R342...s why we have spy cameras all over the place.
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top