Unforgettable Foreign Films

Published September 10, 2007

By Erin Sullivan

In regard to other genres of film, foreign films can be ignored or overlooked. Perhaps it is because some people simply want to be entertained by a film and do not want to or cannot read subtitles while viewing the film (I know people who use this excuse), or perhaps it is because some people do not know where to start. Whatever the reason may be, here are a few very different films that are worth checking out.

1) 2046
Wong Kar-Wai’s Hong Kong film is the final installment in the trilogy which also includes Days of Being Wild and In the Mood for Love. The film follows the results of a journalist’s ( Tony Leung Chiu-Wai) affair with a beautiful young woman ( Gong Li) in the 1960s through a complex plot with multiple story lines and time travel. Kar-Wai focuses on aesthetics and the depths of human emotion which create an extraordinarily fascinating and intriguing film.

2) Trois Couleurs: Bleu, Blanc, Rouge
Krzysztof Kieslowski’s French and Polish trilogy is based on the three colors and ideas of the French flag and contemporary French society. Each film focuses on different characters and the tragedies they encounter. In Bleu, Juliette Binoche plays a woman coping with the death of her husband and child as a result of a car accident. Blanc revolves around Karol ( Zbigniew Zamachowski), a man in the midst of a divorce and his attempts to get back at his wife Dominique ( Julie Delpy). In Rouge, Irene Jacob plays Valentine, a student and model dealing with her possessive boyfriend who later befriends a retired judge. Each of the films is intertwined and the characters’ fates are revealed in a final culmination at the end of Rouge.

3) The Seventh Seal
Ingmar Bergman’s most influential and breakthrough film revolves around a knight ( Max von Sydow) whose homeland is infected by the plague shortly after he returns from the Crusades. Upon his return, the knight discovers that Death has come for him, and he attempts to buy some time by challenging Death to a game of chess. The haunting imagery in this film helps to generate deep reflections about both the meaning of life and of death.

4) La Haine
Director turned actor Mathieu Kassovitz’s urban thriller explores violence and racism among three teenagers ( Vincent Cassel, Hubert Kounde, and Said Taghmaoui) in a suburb during police riots in France. La Haine is intense and slightly disturbing in the way it addresses anger and oppression in French society. Until recently La Haine was not issued in the United States due to its controversial content even though it came out twelve years ago.

5) Amores Perros or more simply, Love’s a Bitch
This is the first film of Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu’s “Death Trilogy,” with 21 Grams and Babel being the other installments. It stars Gael Garcia Bernal, Vanessa Bauche, Alvaro Guerrero, Goya Toledo, Emilio Echevarria, and Lourdes Echevarria. This intense film focuses on three different story lines, all of which are connected through the same car accident in Mexico City. Each story explores the darkness and cruelty of human nature through tragedy.

With such a huge variety of foreign films available it is difficult to compile a small list. Each of the films listed is unique in its own way and while each received great reviews from critics at the time they were released, they are not widely discussed or referred to today outside the study of film. So the next time you can’t decide on what movie to watch or when you are procrastinating on your reading, give one of these films a try.

Print This Article

Comments