The Thirteenth Wellington Film Festival 1984
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- DirectorRobert van AckerenStarsGudrun LandgrebeMathieu CarrièreHanns ZischlerEva, an upper-class housewife, frustratingly leaves her arrogant husband and decides to enter the call girl business. She lets Yvonne, a prostitute, teach her the basics and both set out for prey together, until Eva starts an affair with Chris, who turns out to be a call boy, as well. Consequently, she moves into his penthouse, large enough for both to offer their services separately.
- DirectorJane CampionStarsGabrielle ShorneggGeraldine HaywoodMarian KnightThe awkwardness and confusion of burgeoning sexuality in teenage girls in a twisted and repressed suburban culture.
- DirectorSam RaimiStarsBruce CampbellEllen SandweissRichard DeManincorFive friends travel to a cabin in the woods, where they unknowingly release flesh-possessing demons.
- DirectorChris MarkerStarsAmilcar CabralFlorence DelayArielle DombasleA woman narrates the contemplative writings of a seasoned world traveler, focusing on contemporary Japan.
- DirectorJacki OchsStarsMax GailRon KovicUsing striking archive and war footage in support of interviews with veterans, scientists, attorneys, the U.S. Air Force, the Veterans Administration, Dow Chemical and more; this film documents the extraordinary history of chemical warfare, agricultural herbicides, damage to the world environment, and the plight of Vietnam veterans and their families as they struggle for treatment of exposure to Agent Orange and dioxin. As soldiers return from new wars plagued by illness, disability and post-traumatic stress, as citizens question leaders decisions, as fresh environmental catastrophes evoke debate about accountability; it is critical to illuminate struggles and lessons from the past.
- DirectorChris BeaverJudy IrvingStarsJudy IrvingDocumentary about the nuclear industry.
- DirectorMiguel LittinStarsDean StockwellAlan EsquivelCarmen BunsterAlsino, a boy of 10 or 12, lives with his grandmother in a remote area of Nicaragua. He's engulfed in the war between rebels and government troops when a US advisor orders the army to open a staging area by the boy's hamlet. Alsino tries to be a child, climbing trees with a girl, looking through his grandfather's trunk of mementos and trying to fly; he goes to town to sell a saddle, has his first drink and is taken to a brothel. But the war surrounds him. The US advisor takes Alsino on a chopper flight, but he's unimpressed. The soldiers' cruelties awake rebel sympathies in Alsino, and after an army assault backfires, the lad is fully baptized into the conflict.
- DirectorLaura MulveyPeter WollenStarsMiriam MargolyesFrida KahloTina ModottiThis documentary is related to an art show directors Wollen and Mulvey organized for London's Whitechapel Gallery, attempting to pair the rather different work of two female creators, painter Frida Kahlo and photographer Tina Modotti.
- DirectorFrançois TruffautStarsFanny ArdantJean-Louis TrintignantJean-Pierre KalfonAfter he's implicated in several murders, a real estate agent hides out from the cops while his intrepid secretary does some private investigating of her own to locate the killer.
- DirectorGerald PottertonStarsMavor MooreA minister who can't say goodbye goes on a vacation.
- DirectorHans-Jürgen SyberbergStarsEdith CleverMartin SperrRobert LloydRichard Wagner's last opera has remained controversial since its first performance for its unique, and, for some, unsavory blending of religious and erotic themes and imagery. Based on one of the medieval epic romances of King Arthur and the search for the holy grail (the chalice touched by the lips of Christ at the last supper), it recounts over three long acts how a "wild child" unwittingly invades the sacred precincts of the grail, fulfilling a prophecy that only such a one can save the grail's protectors from a curse fallen upon them. Interpreters of the work have found everything from mystical revelation to proto-fascist propaganda in it. Hans-Jurgen Syberberg's production doesn't avoid either aspect, but tries synthesize them by seeking their roots in the divided soul of Wagner himself. The action unfolds on a craggy landscape which turns out to be a gigantic enlargement of the composer's death mask, among deliberately tatty theatrical devices: puppets, scale models, magic-lantern projections. The eponymous hero is sung by the specified tenor voice (Reiner Goldberg) but mimed on screen by a male and a female performer alternately, reflecting what the director takes to be the creator's own sexual conflicts. Syberberg's pacing, dictated by the majestic pace of Wagner's score, is slow, but enlivened by constant subtle shifts in point of view, and memorable performances by actress Edith Clever as the villainess/heroine Kundry (sung by Yvonne Minton), orchestra conductor Armin Jordan as the remorseful knight Amfortas (sung by Wolfgang Schoene), and Robert Lloyd (the faithful retainer Gurnemanz).
- DirectorPeque GallagaStarsCherie GilSandy AndolongLiza LorenaTwo affluent families struggle and learn to survive during the Japanese occupation in the Philippines.
- DirectorMichelangelo AntonioniStarsTomas MilianDaniela SilverioChristine BoissonA director's wife leaves him. He pursues another woman who also departs. This inspires a movie idea about women's relationships. He searches for an actress to star in the film and his life.
- DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsGérard DepardieuWojciech PszoniakAnne AlvaroIn 1793, as the Terror begins in France, Georges Danton, a champion-of-the-people, returns to clash against Maximilien Robespierre and his extremist party.
- DirectorJimmy PickerStarsScott RecordA character closely resembling then-mayor Ed Koch sings a variation on the "Theme from 'New York, New York'" in an entirely clay-animated film depicting a variety of locations and celebrities associated with New York City.
- DirectorKároly MakkStarsJadwiga Jankowska-CieslakGrazyna SzapolowskaJozef KronerPolitical and sexual repression in Hungary, just after the revolution of 1956. In 1958, the body of Eva Szalanczky, a political journalist, is discovered near the border. Her friend Livia is in hospital with a broken neck; Livia's husband, Donci, is under arrest. In a flashback to the year before, we see what leads up to the tragedy. Eva gets a job as a writer. She meets Livia and is attracted to her. Livia feels much the same, but as a married woman, has doubts and hesitations. In their work, they (and Eva in particular) bang up against the limits of telling political truths; in private, they confront the limits of living out sexual and emotional truth.
- DirectorRainer Werner FassbinderStarsRosel ZechHilmar ThateCornelia FroboessPartially based on the life of Sybille Schmitz, who found fame under the Nazi regime, but whose career was destroyed afterward. Veronika Voss is a once prominent UFA actress, kept by her doctor, who raises suspicion in a sports journalist.
- DirectorHedda RinnebergHans SachsStarsCamilla Horn
- DirectorÉric RohmerStarsBéatrice RomandAndré DussollierFéodor AtkineSabine vows to give up married lovers, and is determined to find a good husband. Her best friend Clarisse introduces her to her cousin Edmond, a busy lawyer from Paris. Sabine pursues Edmond, with the encouragement of Clarisse, but Edmond does not seem very interested.
- DirectorManuel Gutiérrez AragónStarsÁngela MolinaAna BelénEncarna PasoIn a small Spanish village, Gloria, the imperious head of a troubled family, is devoted to her two sons. The brothers, Óscar and Juan, have frequent violent disputes. Óscar, the oldest, and his steel-willed mother run the family's grocery store called el Jardín (The Garden), which does a brisk business in the black market. Juan is the handsome, irresponsible, best-loved second son. When Oscar marries his lover Ana, Juan heads for Madrid to work for Franco. He also leaves behind his impoverished cousin, Ángela, pregnant with his son. Jump ten years. Juanito, their son, has rheumatic fever. The doctor says to pamper the boy. Years later, Óscar and Ana remain childless. Gloria wants to bring her illegitimate (and incestuous) grandson and only heir, into the family circle. As Juanito recovers, Juan returns in desperate need of cash; Juanito witnesses a theft blamed on his innocent mother. Things come to a head at a saint's-name party for father and son. Jealousies, betrayals, and a bullet converge.Demons in the Garden
- DirectorCynthia ScottStarsSusana RobledoAntonio RobledoRita BoziFor a few weeks each year, in the depths of winter, senior students at the National Ballet School of Canada are treated to a style of dance that is unlike any other - flamenco.
- DirectorMargarethe von TrottaStarsHanna SchygullaAngela WinklerPeter StriebeckOlga and Ruth become friends. Olga is independent, separated from her husband, living with an immigrant pianist, and teaching feminist literature. Ruth is withdrawn, a painter, possibly mentally ill. Ruth dreams in black and white, sometimes of her suicide. Olga lectures on a 19th-century writer, von Günderrode, a suicide after the breakup of her intense friendship with Bettina Brentano. Ruth's husband Franz encourages the women's friendship, then, as Olga draws Ruth out and the friendship deepens, he becomes jealous. After the women travel to Egypt, Franz has a tirade. Ruth seems crushed between her husband and her friend, and how she responds is the film's climax.A Labour of Love
- DirectorNorman McLarenStarsJean-Louis MorinSylvie KinalSylvain LafortuneA balletic interpretation of the Greek myth in which dancers enact the tragedy of the beautiful youth who condemns himself to a trapped existence through excessive self-love.
- DirectorPeter WellsA boy's awakening recognition of his (homo)sexuality and the 1954 royal visit coincide in this complex memoir of national under-development and solitary personal growth.