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Hitchcock, Grant, Caine, Connery, James Mason, Olivia, De Haviland, Rathbone, O'Toole, Marty Feldman, the Monty Python crew, Peter Sellers, to name just a few--all of whom first made their marks in then to US audiences the very foreign British film industry.
Hi Rufnek
was surprised to see Grant and DeHaviland listed. She was working at Warners when she was eighteen; Did she really play in British films before that?
Always thought Grant started in films at Paramount. I know he was on the British stage before that - US stage also. I saw him in a short made at Paramount (c. 1932) He was not given any billing. He played a sailor in a scene in a Chinese gin mill
regards, grey



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If it had to pass Customs to get to me, it's furrin.

For exactly the reasons bleacheddecay stated, English language films made in other countries still have a foreign feel, although I'd add that I also get that feeling watching films by Spike Lee and Woody Allen...
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Foreign Film? well i guess if you consider pans labyrinth a foreign film that is a great one
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I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
Foreign Film? well i guess if you consider pans labyrinth a foreign film that is a great one
And unless you are Spanish, you would have to consider it a foreign film, surely...?



Hitchcock, Grant, Caine, Connery, James Mason, Olivia, De Haviland, Rathbone, O'Toole, Marty Feldman, the Monty Python crew, Peter Sellers, to name just a few--all of whom first made their marks in then to US audiences the very foreign British film industry.
Hi Rufnek
was surprised to see Grant and DeHaviland listed. She was working at Warners when she was eighteen; Did she really play in British films before that?
Always thought Grant started in films at Paramount. I know he was on the British stage before that - US stage also. I saw him in a short made at Paramount (c. 1932) He was not given any billing. He played a sailor in a scene in a Chinese gin mill
regards, grey
Good catch, grey! Actually I didn't mean to enter Olivia DeHaviland--what I was going for was Lawrence Olivier and his long-time love, Vivian Leigh, but in a moment of brain fizz (or bad spelling), I wrote "Olivia" instead Olivier and thinking of Leigh as "the actress in Gone With the Wind" my fizzy brain subconciously continued connecting the wrong dots by writing "DeHaviland" (the last surviving principal cast member from GWTW) instead of Leigh! A really goofy mistake! But I thought I was right about Grant doing films in Britain. In checking back, however, I found that, as you said, he did theater in Britain and the US before getting in the movies in Hollywood. Guess I must have been thnking about his role in None But the Lonely Heart (1944)!!



I don't really like distinguishing between foreign films and - what's the opposite - homegrown films? ha. They're both movies, made by people all around the world with unique insights about it. I guess I wouldn't consider English movies foreign, because of course there can be English actors in American films and vice versa, and so I find it hard to tell which is which sometimes. So basically, to make it easier, films in a different language are considered "foreign".

I don't go out of my way to rent foreign films because I think they're exotic or anything, but if I hear of a great film I'm not going to step back from it just because it's "foreign". I don't mind subtitles at all; in fact if I'm watching an American movie I turn on the captions because I like to read the dialogue in case I miss something. But I despise dubbing. Last night I was watching Woody Allen's Husbands and Wives and I was struck by Judy Davis's powerful soliloquys; I wanted to see how the dubbing in French sounded. Since I had nothing to do at the time, I turned on the French dubbing and the actress that voiced her sounded completely dead next to the impassioned speeches of Judy Davis.

Weirdly enough, my favorite foreign film is this really unknown Ang Lee movie called Eat Drink Man Woman. It's about this chef and his three daughters and their conflicts - pretty normal stuff. But the fantastic thing about it is how it connects the tantalizing Taiwanese food with the plot. I haven't seen the Akira Kurosawa "classics" like Ikiru or Ran or anything like that, though. But generally, I'm not a fan of huge sets and massive casts and constant fighting. I like quaint little movies with very few characters.



Thursday Next's Avatar
I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
I don't go out of my way to rent foreign films because I think they're exotic or anything,
Me neither, but part of me does think that you are likely to have a higher chance of getting a good movie if you rent a foreign film, because there must be something good about it if it made out of its original country. Although of course it still comes down to personal taste.



As an all time Classic foreign film YoJimbo ranks right at the top. As for recent foreign films Pan's Labyrinth and Volver were great.
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Man, I don't know why I didn't join this forum before. Nothing beats movies.

I watch a lot of movies, but really what Thursday said is true, if it had enough umph to make it out of it's Country it's gotta be something special. I have been trying to pick up a lot of foreign stuff as of late, just to see what tastes good out there. I grabbed Oldboy and just actually waiting for Dnevnoy Dozor (Daywatch) to make it out onto DVD.
Truly if any of you have the chance do yourselves a favor go out and grab Oldboy, or if you into really odd movies grab yourself Ichi the Killer, gotta be okay with a little bit of a raw film for the later, but if you get past that it's pretty good.

I know it's kind of a noobish thing to do, but I have been looking all over the net, forums everything trying to find out basically the soundtrack for Dnevnoy Dozor (daywatch) can anybody help me out, even just a name of one or three of the songs :) from it would be soooo helpful, I loved the music. Also if any of you are in a town still playing Daywatch, and have seen Nightwatch, go and check it out. It's a very well done movie.



With foreign films, do we mean non-English films?
I've watched some Korean films (English subtitled) lately and I have to admit some of them are really good.



What a great thread! I agree with alot of what was said here. For me I tend to go out of my way to collect foreign films and French ones in particular. The French have been making far superior films to Hollywood for alot of years IMO. And there are alot of good ones that I have yet to see. Thankfully this is becoming easier with DVD's. It seems that this medium is here to stay hopefully at least as long as VHS was and apparently they are easier to put together because the volume of things coming out is pretty staggering.
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there are a few foriegn films that i really love and a few i hate

Battle Royale A+ one of the best movies ever
City of God A another great movie

Oldboy C- holy crap it went from good to horrible
Suicide Club D- basicly one of the most movies ever
Battle Royale 2 F shooting for 2 hours
Yakuza Papers F impossible to follow story



Put me in your pocket...
Thought I'd bump this thread up as well. It's more of a worthy discussion than recommending or listing faves.

Define this category and then share your general attitude towards this obscure film form. What are foreign films to you, what is your opinion of them, how often do you see them?
What are foreign films to you?
For me, anything that isn't in spoken in the english language and where you have to read subtitles. No, I don't think of films made in the UK as foreign...but I do love they way they speak.


What is your opinion of them?
I just see them as dramas, comedies, action, romantic or tragedies. My opinion is the same for all movies. I need to like the characters, story, actors...and I want to be moved into laughter, tears or that sweet warm and fuzzy feeling.


How often do you see them?
Not as often as I'd like...maybe a couple a month (sometimes less, sometimes more). My husband doesn't like reading through subtitles so I usually watch them when he's out of town or busy doing something else.


So what grade do I get adidasss?



A system of cells interlinked
I want to second Adidass's recommendation for The Return. A must see, IMO.
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Man, I don't know why I didn't join this forum before. Nothing beats movies.

I watch a lot of movies, but really what Thursday said is true, if it had enough umph to make it out of it's Country it's gotta be something special. I have been trying to pick up a lot of foreign stuff as of late, just to see what tastes good out there. I grabbed Oldboy and just actually waiting for Dnevnoy Dozor (Daywatch) to make it out onto DVD.
I liked but didn't love Nightwatch, but I liked it enough that I'm really looking forward to Daywatch. How does it compare with the first?

Also, when recommending Ichi The Killer (which I like a lot) you should mention that it is extremely violent; almost cartoonish in its intensity. It's almost like watching a real-life "Itchy and Scratchy" film. (Ichi and Scrachi?)



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
It has been a really long day, but I've planned to post here since Annie bumped the thread. I have a few non-English-language films which haven't been mentioned yet, but I may make this a multiple post, depending on what comes up. I enjoy films from everywhere, but for whatever reason, I notice that I'm especially attracted to French films.



First off, I want to mention that I like The Return, both for its beautiful photography and its sorta-creepy, coming-of-age story. It is very memorable, even if my friends to whom I showed it weren't really clear what they saw.

I love certain political thrillers, especially Costa-Gavras' Z
and Elio Petri's Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion
The former is cutting-edge popular filmmaking made to condemn a real-life tragedy, and the latter is a fictional satire on something which I fear happens far too often in real life.

I also love Gerard Depardieu's delineation of Cyrano de Bergerac.


Of course, it's a witty and beautifully-written play, and it's tough for a good actor to have problems with the role (just ask, through seance, Oscar winner Jose Ferrer), but this version is really incredible. Maybe it's because it's actually being done in French, but I truly believe that it's because Depardieu was born to play the role. Director Jean-Paul Rappeneau is no slouch at creating wonderful mise-en-scene either. I guess the only complaint I may have is that Anne Brochet could be more angelic as Roxane, but she's plenty fine enough for a poor guy who considers himself physically deformed.

One of my family's favorite films is My Father's Glory, playwright/filmmaker Marcel Pagnol's reminiscence of vacationing with his Parisian family in the mountains of Provence in the early 20th century.



It's a beautiful film, showing family relationships at their most honest, yet still innocent. It's hilarious, but it's so wise, warm and romantic, all at the same time, that it certainly is worthy of what my wife calls it, "the most romantic film I've seen". It's a romance of a couple, a family, the land and people they love, and all their memories. The sequel, My Mother's Castle, is highly-recommended too.



I have dozens more to talk about, but I'll try to come back soon, not that you care.
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Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
I have a few other fave non-English-language films which haven't been discussed much before.


Jesus of Montreal,directed by Denys Arcand, is a wonderfully original take on the life of Jesus told through a modern Canadian theatre troupe recreating his life story. It's amazing how such a humorous and "profane" film can also be deeply moving and thought-provoking. Lothaire Bluteau is awe-inspiring playing the actor who BECOMES Jesus. The camaraderie depicted by his "Disciples" is equally affecting. Even so, I will warn you that this is probably the only film about Jesus where you will see an animated movie about the Big Bang and actors dubbing in the filthy, yet hilarious, dialogue of a hardcore porno film (no graphic images shown).


The 1965 Czech film, The Shop on Main Street, directed by Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos, is another deceptively humorous film, set during WWII, about how all the Jewish shopkeepers in a Slovakian town help support a poor old lady (Ida Kaminska), who "owns" a button shop but has no assets at all. Jozef Króner is unwillingly assigned to be the woman's "Aryan controller" and a bond forms between the two. The final 40 minutes are as harrowing as anything you can imagine, showing how the Jews are forced on their Sabbath to present themselves for "processing and transport".

My fave non-English-language animation is Bruno Bozzetto's Allegro non troppo (1977).


It's a double-edged satire. In the animated segments, there are wonderful comments on similar episodes in Walt Disney's Fantasia. But, almost half the film is a live-action, b&w slapstick spoof of Fellini! The cartoons we see are being drawn by a slave animator (Nino Manfredi), who's forced to draw by a malevolent conductor while he leads his orchestra, consisting entirely of little old ladies, in the playing of the classical music (Ravel, Sibelius, Debussy, Stravinsky, Vivaldi, Dvorák) heard during the animaton. Thus, the film mixes the ridiculousness of the Three Stooges with the sublime music and visuals. Plus, all the stories contain plenty of food for thought since Bozzetto is a political satirist.



Wow I haven't thought about Jesus of Montreal in awhile. I remember when it first came out this was like the-little-film-that-could.

Maybe y'all should merge these foreign film threads into one and sticky it. It's weird seeing like 3 of the same topic under "This Just In..."



Define this category and then share your general attitude towards this obscure film form. What are foreign films to you, what is your opinion of them, how often do you see them?

Yes Chris, I am baiting, and it will get bloody.
At first glance of this topic I find it amazing that such a simple question has amassed such a long and indepth commentary from so many people until I read the small print before I took a look through your public profile.
I know it easy to discover where you are from by clicking on your avatar but with that said I wished you had stated your country of origin in your opening post. The reason I say this is I find it misleading when you know that the majority of members are from the United States so of course they are going to share their point of view from the american perspective on quote/unquote "foreign films." I am not going to make judgement on whether or not this was intentional because that is beside the point since you stated you're trying to bait people into your accusations of prejudice.
I share your views that catagorizing any film as foreign does a disservice to any movie since cinema is a global art form and looking through your profile I see we share a love for Perdo Almodóvar as well as Kar Wai Wong and Deveti Krung was one of the first films from overseas I ever watched along with Cesta Duga Godina Dana.
With this being said, the way you approached the topic assassinated your cause and overshadowed your meaning by the disparaging the members you were trying to educate.
There are several cliches that could be used at this moment but they lack any value to the point I am trying to make so I will conclude mt argument by say this,"You will encounter legions of americans online who are never going to understand the appeal of overseas cinema and I am sure this is true for many other nations as well. I know this can be infuriating but you can't let these simple minded people define every foreigner you encounter because there are those of us who my not have experience in the motion pictures of other nations but that doesn't mean we wouldn't appreciate these films if we were introduced to them. So don't scorn these open minded people by depreciating their intelligence and artistic comprehension."