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100 DAYS BEFORE THE COMMAND
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Our Price: $29.95
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Made the year before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, this "visually astonishing, erotically charged and emotionally jarring" (The New York Times) film captures the battle-weary attitude of the Russian people as well as a sexual ambiguity among soldiers that had never been portrayed in prior Russian cinema. The film's subtle use of homoerotic imagery and subtext caused it to be banned by Soviet censors when first released. Five young Red Army recruits struggle to preserve their humanity and compassion as each day seems to bring another act of senseless violence. In Russian with English Hussein Erkenov---USSR---1990---71 mins.
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12
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Our Price: $28.96
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From the director of Burnt by the Sun comes this Oscar-nominated remake of 12 Angry Men.
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12:08 EAST OF BUCHAREST
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Our Price: $22.95
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Set 16 years after the fall of Ceausescu and days before Christmas, three men--a local TV host, a drunken teacher, and an aging Santa--take to the airwaves.
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1612
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Our Price: $26.98
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Judicious, no, but this historical epic based on the Time of Troubles in seventeenth century Russia sure is blood-soaked and action-packed. After the death of Tsar Boris Godunov and the murder of his heirs, Russia descends into chaos and is left vulnerable to Polish and Swedish invaders. 1612 is the story of how young Prince Dmitry Pozharsky (Mikhail Porechenkov) unites his people and saves the motherland. Special effects supervised by Ilya Churinov (Night Watch). In Russian with English subtitles. Vladimir Khotinenko---Russia---2007---135 mins.
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25 FIREMAN STREET
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Our Price: $29.95
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An important film by Istvan Szabo with an intricate flashback structure that recalls Resnais. The setting is an old house on the eve of its demolition; during a hot summer night, the numerous inhabitants indulge in dreams and recollections of the events of the past thirty years. Hungarian with English Istvan Szabo---Hungary---1973---93 mins.
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30 DOOR KEY (FERDYDURKE)
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Out of Stock
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Jerzy Skolimowski returned to Poland to film this surreal comedy based on a cult novel by Witold Gombrowicz. Set during the onset of World War II, a young writer (Iain Glen) is challenged by a former professor (Jerzy Binczycki) to become a man or return to a nightmarish adolescence. The latter makes for a much more interesting descent into the absurd. Nominated for the Golden Lion at Venice. With Crispin Glover and Robert Stephens. In English.
Jerzy Skolimowski---Poland/France---1991---90 mins.
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4
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Our Price: $24.95
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From director Ilya Khrzhanovsky comes this post-Soviet Russian film that uses a basic plot structure--three strangers sitting in a bar telling wild, untrue stories, then going their separate ways--as an excuse to film some of the most nightmarishly sinister images to come out of Russia in recent years. 4 makes Night Watch: Nochnoi Dozor (2004) seem like a playful Van Helsing 2 in comparison. Highly allegorical, 4 is filled with rotten meat, wild animals, old hags, and other abject objects befitting an industr ial wasteland, just one of film's unavoidable critiques of contemporary Russian life. "The stark surreal images evoke a mixture of terror and absurdity that comes as close to the experience of actual nightmare as anything I've seen on screen" (Stephen Holden, New York Times). Official Selection at the Venice, Rotterdam, and Tribeca Film Festivals. In Russian with English Ilya Khrzhanovsky---Russia---2005---126 mins.
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4 MONTHS 3 WEEKS AND 2 DAYS
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Our Price: $19.95
In Stock
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Cristian Mungiu's Cannes Golden Palm-winning drama about two women seeking a black-market abortion. The tension makes it almost unbearable to watch.
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50 YEARS POLISH FILM SCHOOL 1
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Our Price: $99.95
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After World War II, Poland's socialist government centralized filmmaking in the Lodz Film School. By 1956, the first wave of Polish School filmmakers set out to make films that would put Poland on the world's screen. Five such examples are included here. Kanal and Ashes and Diamonds are both part of a trilogy from the one and only Andrzej Wajda. Kanal (1957, 96 mins.) is an almost hallucinatory portrait of a group of Polish citizens and patriots who attempt to flee the Nazis through the sewer system of a war-devastated Warsaw. Ashes and Diamonds (1958, 105 mins.) illustrates the conflict of idealism and instinct in this story of a young resistance fighter who assassinates the wrong man at the close of WWII. Also from Wajda, Lotna (1959, 89 mins.) is a tribute to the heroic horsemen who faced off against Nazi tanks. It follows the trajectory of an off-white horse which passes among various military officials until it breaks a leg and is shot. Next is writer-director Tadeusz Konwicki's The Last Day of Summer (1958, 66 mins.), featuring Jan Machulski and Irena Laskowska as a young man and a mature woman who steals his heart. Lastly, Janusz Morgenstern's Good Bye, Till Tomorrow (1960, 88 mins.), or See You Tomorrow, is another romance with a twist. Zbigniew Cybulski plays a young thespian who falls for the daughter (Teresa Tuszynska) of a French diplomat. When she rebuffs
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50 YEARS POLISH FILM SCHOOL 2
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Our Price: $99.95
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After World War II, Poland's socialist government centralized filmmaking in the Lodz Film School. By 1956, the first wave of Polish School filmmakers set out to make films that would put Poland on the world's screen. Five such examples are included here. Andrzej Munk's Eroica (1957, 83 mins.) is a fine example of the Polish myth of romantic heroism. The Warsaw Uprising is looked at through the eyes of a drunken black marketeer; in the second "movement," Polish prisoners in a German camp fanatically believe in the heroism of their comrade, which, in fact, is a farce. Also from Munk, Bad Luck (1960, 105 mins.) follows the odyssey of a man through Poland from 1930 to 1950. We watch him from his childhood to his first love, from his unwilling involvement in Fascist politics to his arrest and imprisonment in a POW camp. A peer of Wajda and Kawalerowicz, Kazimierz Kutz left Lodz and made his directorial debut with Cross of Valor (1959, 84 mins.), based on three Jozef Hen stories about the end of the war. Kutz followed this with Nobody's Calling (1960, 86 mins.), another adaptation of Jozef Hen's writings about the hardships postwar Poland faced. We end with Night Train (Baltic Express, 1959, 102 mins.), a classic award-winning film from Jerzy Kawalerowicz. This is a powerful psychological thriller in which a young woman, suffering an inner crisis, buys a ticket from a stranger for
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ADELHEID
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Our Price: $29.95
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In this powerful drama from Frantisek Vlacil (Marketa Lazarova), a former Czech soldier falls in love with Adelheid, a German, in the aftermath of WWII.
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ADOPTION
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Our Price: $29.95
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The breakthrough film for Marta Meszaros (Diary for All My Children) is a unique mixture of documentary and fictional techniques.
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ADRIATIC SEA OF FIRE (FLAMMES SUR L'ADRIATQUE)
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Our Price: $24.98
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In this WWII action movie based on real events, two sailors in the Yugoslav Royal Navy disobey orders to abandon their battleship after an attack by Axis powers. Instead of giving up the Zagreb, they plot to use the warship one last time or destroy it. Starring Gerard Barray, Antonio Passalia and Claudine Auger (Thunderball's Domino),
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AFTER THE REVOLUTION
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Our Price: $19.95
In Stock
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In this experimental interpretation of life in post-communist Hungary, a writer lives a meager existence with his cat as he struggles to complete a novel.
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AGENT #1
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Our Price: $29.95
In Stock
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The adventures of real-life Polish spy and war hero Jerzy Szajnowicz-Iwanow are brought to the big screen in this gripping action drama from renowned screenwriter Aleksander Scibor-Rylski (Man of Iron) and director Zbigniew Kuzminski (On the Banks of the Niemen). One of the few films to chronicle the history of Polish soldiers fighting in WWII, Agent #1 follows the trail of Szajnowicz-Iwanow in German-occupied Greece. In Polish Zbigniew Kuzminski---Poland---1972---94 mins.
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AGNIESZKA HOLLAND (MASTERPIECES OF POLISH CINEMA)
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Our Price: $149.99
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Before being persecuted to the point of fleeing Poland, Angnieska Holland completed four features, all of which are included here: Screen Test, Provincial Actors, Fever and A Lonely Woman.
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AGONY ( KLIMOV )
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Our Price: $29.95
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One of the famous long-banned Soviet films, Elem Klimov's Agony is a brutal look at the self-proclaimed prophet (played by Alexei Petrenko) who reveled in decadence, lust and power, and altered the face of the 20th century. Rasputin's madness brought Russia to its feet and sparked the revolution that toppled the throne. Klimov intercuts vintage newsreels into the dramatic sequences. "Frenzied semi-delirium...This film's existence has been a legend for nearly a decade." (J. Hoberman, The Village Voice). Elem Klimov---USSR---1975---142 mins.
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AGONY (KLIMOV) AKA RASPUTIN
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Our Price: $49.95
Out of Stock
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One of the famous long-banned Soviet films, Elem Klimov's Agony is a brutal look at the self-proclaimed prophet (played by Alexei Petrenko) who reveled in decadence, lust and power, and altered the face of the 20th century. Rasputin's madness brought Russia to its feet and sparked the revolution that toppled the throne. Klimov intercuts vintage newsreels into the dramatic sequences. "Frenzied semi-delirium...This film's existence has been a legend for nearly a decade." (J. Hoberman, The Village Voice). Elem Klimov---USSR---1975---142 mins.
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ALEXANDER BLOK
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Our Price: $19.99
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The greatest of the Russian Symbolists, poet and dramatist Alexander Blok was responsible for works like Verses About the Lady (1904) and The Twelve (1918).
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ALEXANDER PUSHKIN
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Our Price: $19.99
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Pushkin, Romantic poet and founder of modern Russian literature, is known for works like The Captive of the Caucasus and The Contemporary.
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