What are your favorite foreign language films?
I saw ‘Let the Right One In’ a little while back and was blown away. What are your favorite foreign film or films?
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Sexo pudor y lagrimas, amores perros, todo el poder and amarte duele are GREAT mexican films.
Run Lola Run, Rosenstrasse,Good Bye Lenin!, Y Tu Mama Tambien, Amelie, and Pan’s Labyrinth.
The Italian (russian), Life is Beautiful (italian), Amelie (french), Le Vie en Rose (french)
@adreamofautumn: I just recently saw Pan’s Labyrinth and it is amazing.
My personal favorite is Saving Face. It’s in both English and Mandarin so it’s really only a half foreign language film, but it’s extremely well done.
@eponymoushipster just reminded me of some of my favorite films! Love amelie and life is beautiful.. as well as pan’s labyrinth.
@A_Beaverhousen…. you’re right… subtitles suck… but if you speak more than on elanguage and find films in those then no problems arise… plus… as in most things… lost in translation really does apply.
@asmonet – That is a beautiful movie.
A few of my favourites are Oldboy, Farewell My Concubine, Raise the Red Lantern, Battle Royale, Offside, Bicycle Thief, Ikiru, L’Atalante… Once we get into classic movies, it’s hard not to just name the staple ones.
Which one? I think they’re both visually and emotionally stunning.
The Best of Youth! It was an Italian mini-series, but I saw it as a movie on two separate DVDs… about six hours long all together?
Amelie and Pan’s Labyrinth as well, although those are better known.
These aren’t as well known but are all winners
Carlos Saura’s Carmen-I love the music and story from Bizet’s opera. I’m a sucker for great dance and this film showed me flamenco was great and the play within a play form is always fun.
The Return of Martin Guerre-a fascinating, historically authentic. mystery and my introduction to Girard Depardieu (woohoo)
A Man and a Woman-Oh so romantic and oh so French
The Red Lantern-by Chinese not just about Chinese through western eyes
Les Chevre, Les Comperes, Trois Hommes et un Couffin-Comedy the French got right but Hollywood couldn’t
Ran-Japanese King Lear with sons and gloriously acted and filmed
The Gods Must Be Crazy-OK only partly foreign language and not very sophisticated but still very charming and good for a day with a sub.
Saawariya. Sorry, didn’t see your other response. It was visually stunning.
Oh, and The Conformist is on my list, too. Which reminds me… I need to get a copy of that.
EDIT: And Leolo and Jesus of Montreal. French Canadian. Not really a “foreign language” to me, but it should still count.
i liked Cinema Paradiso as well.
Oops, I forgot Monsoon Wedding Indian but not so Bollywood
Is anyone else curious as to whether @galileogirl has walked away from her computer or if she’s writing the most epic list of incredible foreign films ever?!
@galileogirl I didn’t realize you had posted that one above! I felt like all I saw was “galileogirl is crafting a response” for quite some time. I was waiting with bated breath for it!
@adreamofautumn I was checking the spelling of the French films. I wouldn’t say the best ever, but pretty good.
Sometimes I am a little slow since I lost the use of my right hand.
@galileogirl really?! That’s unfortunate, i’m sorry to hear that. Last year I broke my arm and had to type for 2 months with only one hand, what a slow process that was!
Monsoon Wedding sort of rips my heart out when I watch it, great movie. It’s weird that the western audience sees Slumdog Millionaire as such a pinnacle of Indian cinema that while good, doesn’t hold a candle to movies like Monsoon.
Tom Twyker directed Run Lola Run and his next two movies were sublime: The Princess and the Warrior and Heaven. They both take the frentic plot and intensity of Run Lola Run but he seems to have more confidence in taking more abstract approaches to storytelling.
The Princess and the Warrior has Franka Potente again and is one of my favorite movies. Takes the Romeo and Juliet tale only as a starting point and crafts this amazing journey for two unlikely lost souls finding each other along the way.
Heaven has a slightly more conventional plot that carries similar conventions of 2 individuals forced to flee what they know. The scenery though is beautiful and Cate Blanchett is always mesmerizing.
@artificialard I would agree that there are a number of incredible movies that come out of India that would make Slumdog fall to its knees and worship. Also…I haven’t seen the others by Twyker, but i’ll be Netflix-ing them immediately! Thanks!
@adreamofautumn Excellent! I’d like to what you think of them, I like your taste. I can’t say I loved Pan’s Labrynth but it’s definitely been one of the most intensely memorable movies I’ve seen in recent memory.
Con air
Catch Me If You Can
The Never Ending Story
Oh you are referring to films that are in different languages, then
La Cage Aux Folles
Betty Blue – French
The Yellow Earth – Chinese
Before Night Falls – Spanish
Night Watch – Russian
Night Zoo – Canadian French
Jules et Jim
Triplets of Belleville
Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down
Perros Amores
Trainspotting (is Scottish a foreign language?)
@simpleD Man, if that was the case then we can add the British in Gosford Park. Interesting movie but was quite the challenge for my unrefined Canuck ears.
“Kalpiki Lira” (Greek) 60s b/w movie about a counterfeit coin and how it brings actual happiness to people who think they are rich when finding it.
“Jizda” a recent Czech film about 2 men falling in love with the same hitch-hiker
“Im Juli” a German road movie about a Turkish immigrant travelling all the way to Istambul only to fall in love with a German girl
“Goodbye Lenin” also German, about a woman falling into a coma in the DDR times and coming out of it in a new capitalist world that her kids try to hide from her.
@simpleD I nearly needed a dictionary and/or a translator to get through Trainspotting, it counts as a “foreign language” film to me! (also…great movie! Good choice!).
many Chinese films are quit amazing:
Farewell my concubine
In the mood for love
Crouching tiger hidden dragon
Infernal affairs (departed us version)
The eye (2002)
Flying daggers(?)
Happy together
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