Film Festivals 1996
This year's line-up was dotted with award winners including Todd Solondz's Sundance winner "Welcome to the Dollhouse", Best Foriegn Film at the Academy Awards, "Antonia's Line" and winner of Cannes Best Director Award, "La Haine". Other stand-outs were Lars Von Trier's minor masterpiece "Breaking the Waves" and the Coen Brothers' "Fargo". Ken Loach didn't disappoint with "Land and Freedom" while Mike Leigh made his most accessible film yet with "Secrets and Lies". Kathryn Bigelow, director of 'Point Break', broke out with her stylish and visually stunning "Strange Days" (pictured).
Small Faces (1996)
7.1/10
Director: Gillies MacKinnon
Starring: Iain Robertson, J S Duffy, Joseph McFadden
For the three McLean Brothers (Ian Robertson, Joseph McFadden and J. S. Duffy) art and violence are the alternative escape routes out of the Glasgow s... Read more
The Confessional ( Le Confessionnal ) (1995)
7.5/10
Director: Robert Lepage
Starring: Lothaire Bluteau, Patrick Goyette, Ron Burrage
A man searches for lost relatives and missing pieces of family history, somehow linked to the making of Hitchcock's 'I Confess' in Quebec, 1953; past... Read more
Totally F***ed Up (1993)
6.1/10
Director: Gregg Araki
Starring: James Duval, Roko Belic, Susan Behshid, Jenee Gill
Gregg Araki ('The Living End') scripted, edited, photographed, co-produced and directed this number about six gay teenagers trying to keep it together... Read more
El Cid (1961)
7.3/10
Director: Anthony Mann
Starring: Charlton Heston, Gary Raymond, Genevieve Page, Herbert Lom, Hurd Hatfield, John...
Anthony Mann masterfully directs this classic tale of the 11th-century hero El Cid (Charlton Heston), who fought to unite Spain and drive out Moorish... Read more
El Cid ( Blu-ray ) (1961)
7.3/10
Director: Anthony Mann
Starring: Charlton Heston, Gary Raymond, Genevieve Page, Herbert Lom, Hurd Hatfield, John...
Anthony Mann masterfully directs this classic tale of the 11th-century hero El Cid (Charlton Heston), who fought to unite Spain and drive out Moorish... Read more
Leningrad Cowboys: Total Balalaika Show (1993)
7/10
Director: Aki Kaurismaki
Finland's Leningrad Cowboys meet the ex-Red Army Choir in this inspired documentary. The Cowboys (a comedy group) claim to be the world's worst rock a... Read more
Kicking and Screaming (1995)
7/10
Director: Noah Baumbach
Starring: Josh Hamilton, Eric Stoltz, Olivia D'abo
Another we-just-graduated-from-college-what-do-we-do-now film centering on a group of young men and their life and death crises concerning relationshi... Read more
Shanghai Triad (1995)
7.2/10
Director: Zhang Yimou
Starring: Gong Li, Li Baotian, Li Xuejian, Sun Chun
Zhang Yimou's absorbing tale of the Chinese underworld in the 1930s, focusing on a boy who's hired to be the silent servant of a pampered nightclub qu... Read more
Ashes of Time Redux (1994)
Director: Wong Kar-wai
Starring: Jacky Cheung, Leslie Cheung, Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung (Chiu Wai), Brigitte Lin,...
An all-star cast including Brigitte Lin, Leslie Cheung, Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung and Jackie Cheung star in this action-packed epic of impossible love... Read more
Shine ( Blu-ray ) (1996)
7.7/10
Director: Scott Hicks
Starring: Armin Mueller-Stahl, Noah Taylor, Geoffrey Rush, Lynn Redgrave, John Gielgud
Geoffrey Rush's upset win for the Best Actor Oscar was the jewel in the crown for this wonderful, moving little film portraying the torrid true story... Read more