This is a movie I really really liked that is totally artsy-fartsy and obscure. Triplets of Belleville is a french animation project that features less than 2 sentences of dialog through the whole thing. One of them being a fat american saying "Hamburger?" It is impossible to not be intrigued by this movie since no one talks but there is always something amazing going on with the best music ever. In a nutshell it is about a boy who trains for the tour and gets kidnapped during the race by american mobsters, and his elderly and loving grandmother and loyal dog bruno track him down and they meet the triplets in New York who are an elderly group of sisters who like to improvise music using stuff like fridgerator racks and vacuum cleaners. They used to be really famous in the 20's but now they are really old and very poor... Here is the trailer. There is a sequence in this film which is Bruno's dream (the dog) and it might be one of my favorite scenes in a movie ever. This movie was stolen from me, so I can't just clip it out for you. It is a really emotional cartoon, believe it or not. The love the grandmother and dog have for the grandson is something that would be hard to capture in film.
Das Experiment is my favorite thriller ever. It is German and features Moritz Bleibtreu
who turns me on more than any other man on the planet. There is full frontal in this film too. It is about the Stanford Prison Experiment of the 70's that you likely studied if you took a psych, soc, or abnormal psych class in college or high school. X amount of people signed up for a study where they would either be inmates or prison guards and the prisoners had to sign away their legal rights. It was a study about power and social roles. Needless to say it got out of hand, people went crazy and in real life the study was shut down because of the results they were getting. This film took liberties. It is my favorite suspense/thriller because it is the only movie that has ever had me dig my nails into my seat and boyfriends arm and I was literally leaning forward. Germans are VERY good at telling a story and their whole film scene is less glamorous so people take the art a lot more seriously. That comes thru in every german movie you will ever watch. Here is the only english preview I could find. It doesn't do it justice at all. This movie will have your heart pounding, your inner lib screaming, and wanting to jump into your tv to save people. This is a good movie to watch high if you get a little paranoid, but not if it makes it harder to pay attention for you. I HIGHLY recommend this movie to anyone, even if they don't like subtitles.
Run Lola Run is a movie you've probably heard of if not seen. It also features Moritz and is another German film. Franka Potente (spelling?) crossed over into American films with the Bourne series after this. If you like artsy-fartsy you'll like this movie. It is the same story told 3 times with an extreme event in their lives. Each 1/3 shows what would happen differently if they chose a different avenue when trying to resolve their crisis. There is some TREMENDOUS directing in this project - ground breaking. It has a very 90's grunge feel, but despite that this was an instant classic. The first clip is a trailer I have found, and the second is the beginning scenes of the film I ripped and uploaded in high quality.
One more thing about this. I have actually learned a basic amount of German from watching this film over and over and over and over again. Granted, I am like 80% kraut and most of my friends speak it so that may have made it easier. THIS is the film that will make your heart melt with love for Moritz too. He is so gorgous and this character just makes you want to hold him. I need to take a break to think of some more films that aren't foreign language and to just do some stuff.
I will say that Gael Garcia Bernal is in a tight running with Moritz for sexiest man to have ever had the pleasure of crossing my cornea. I would expect one of his movies to come up in part 2 or 3 of this post. Thinking back on the good movies is really hard. Forgive me.
