kinky boots (2005)

Joel Edgerton takes over his father's shoe company in Northampton, England. He meets a drag queen. Antics ensue. One scene goes something like this...

"Northampton's not North! It's Midlands"

"No, Charlie, Tottenham Court Road is Midlands."

Handsomely photographed and a pleasure to watch.

nostalgia (tarkovsky, 1983, in russian and italian)

A Russian writer hangs around Italy. His assistant yells at him. He takes a long walk across an emptied pool with a lit candle in his hand.

My favorite parts are the flashbacks to Russia and the plays with scale. At some point, we see into a room with dirt and stuff on the floor, except the dirt and stuff sort of look like they are a whole countryside. Later on, there is a scene of a landscape with a Russian cottage and then the camera pans back and whoa.

седьмой спутник (герман, 1967, in russian)

Petrograd or thereabouts, 1918 or thenabouts. A bunch of tsarist army officers are held captive in a swank palace or something. Later on in the movie, there is some great Russian Civil War action.

Some people spell the director's name "German". Others spell it "Gherman" or "Guerman" so that you won't pronounce it the same way as the nationality.

Like in other Aleksei German movies, there is beautiful snow. There are also cool hats.

Andrei Popov is very sympathetic in the main role.

хрусталёв, машину! = Khrustalyov, My Car! (герман, 1998, in russian)

Moscow, 1953. Everyone's worried about the bad shit that may go down if they stumble into the secret police's radar. Or maybe everyone's tired of worrying about this shit after years of said shit.

Some people spell the director's name "German". Others spell it "Gherman" or "Guerman" so that you won't pronounce it the same way as the nationality.

Like in other Aleksei German movies, there's lots of good snow.

Unlike the early Aleksei German movies, this one is full of noise. Rollerskates. Fancy cars. Musical instruments. Many-roomed apartments full of weird objects. Hanging laundry. Spitting. Hitting. Unilateral pronouncements. Lots of lines but little dialogue. Characters rarely react to what the other characters say. A lot of characters in a small space with a lot of other characters they don't like.

Yuri Tsurilo is effective and big as the main character, whose name is not Khrustalyov.

проверка на дорогах (герман, 1971, in russian)

Somewhere not far from Pskov, 1940s. The Russian partisans do what they can against the German army.

Some people spell the director's name "German". Others spell it "Gherman" or "Guerman" so that you won't pronounce it the same way as the nationality. In English, the movie tends to get called "Trial on the Road".

The snow looks really great in this movie. So do the birch trees.

Vladimir Zamanskiy is perfect as Lazarev. Close-ups of his no-bullshit face and bright eyes are appreciated.

The jester from Andrei Rublev - Rolan Bykov - plays the leader of the partisans. Andrei Rublev himself - Anatoliy Solonitsyn - plays the leader's right hand man. The bellmaker from Andrei Rublev (as well as Ivan from Ivan's Childhood (a.k.a. My Name is Ivan)) - Nikolai Burlyaev - brings great manic energy to his scenes as a captive of the partisans.

For another great partisan movie, see Elem Klimov's "Come and See".

the fall of otrar (1991, in kazakh)

Central Asia, early 1200s. People in the city of Ürgenç debate how seriously to worry about Genghis Khan. (Ürgenç rules the Khwarezmian Empire (which includes Persia)). Meanwhile, the city of Otrar lies at the northeastern edge of the Khwarezmian empire and so people there know that they should worry a lot.

This film is beautifully shot. It might be an accident that the movie uses a variety of film stocks, but it seems to me that just makes it better. Each time the film stock changes, you're struck how gorgeous the new footage is.

Everything is awesome. Genghis Khan's scenes are awesome.

Aleksei German (the Russian director of such hits as "Khrustaliov, My Car!") wrote the movie.