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Drama movies
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1950. Rural Alabama. Cotton harvest. It's a make-or-break weekend for the Honeydripper Lounge and its owner, piano player Tyrone "Pine Top" Purvis. Deep in debt to the liquor man, the chicken man, and the landlord, Tyrone is desperate to lure the young cotton pickers and local Army base recruits into his juke joint, away from Touissant's, the rival joint across the way. After laying off his regular talent, blues singer Bertha Mae, Tyrone announces to his sidekick Maceo that he has hired the famous electric guitar player, Guitar Sam, for a special one night only gig: pack em in and save the club. On the day of the show, the train arrives and Guitar Sam is no where to be found. Tyrone is forced to take drastic action. He makes a deal with Sheriff Pugh to release Sonny, the kid who hopped off a freight car here in Harmony, and turned up in the club claiming he could play the guitar as well as any Guitar Sam. Tyrone cleans Sonny up and launches a last ditch scheme to pass off the young guitar picker as Guitar Sam just long enough to cut the lights and run off with cash box. When Sonny takes the stage and launches into his first scalding electric licks, Tyrone will learn if it's lights out for the Honeydripper or if his luck has changed: he might just be another man saved by rock n' roll. Honeydripper features an all-star cast including Danny Glover, Charles S. Dutton, Lisa Gay Hamilton, Stacy Keach, Mary Steenburgen,Yaya DaCosta and Sean Patrick Thomas; as well as such notable musicians as Keb' Mo' and Dr. Mable John. It also introduces a major new talent, Gary Clark Jr. who makes his electrifying film debut as Sonny. |
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Catherine (Gwyneth Paltrow) was a young intelligent woman who would have followed in the footsteps of her father Robert (Anthony Hopkins), a brilliant mathematician, if he hadn’t begun to suffer from dementia. Catherine gave up a seemingly promising future and devoted herself to caring for her ailing father. Now, after his death, Catherine comes face to face with her fears of inheriting her father’s madness which eventually lead her to the verge of a mental breakdown. The situation becomes aggravated with the unexpected arrival of her overbearing elder sister Claire (Hope Davis) who wants to help Catherine settle their father’s estate. Moreover, Robert’s former student and now teacher Hal (Jake Gyllenhaal) turns up at her door. He worshipped Robert and now wants to search through his mentor’s notebooks in the hope of finding valuable work.
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In the 1860s, five men have been tracking a sixth across Nevada for more than two weeks. They shoot and wound him, but he gets away. They pursue, led by the dour Carver, who will pay them each $1 a day once he's captured. The hunted is Gideon, resourceful, skilled with a knife. Gideon's flight and Carver's hunt require horses, water, and bullets. The course takes them past lone settlers, a wagon train, a rail crew, settlements, and an Indian philosopher. What is the reason for the hunt; what connects Gideon and Carver? What happened at Seraphim Falls? |
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Astrid Magnussen is a 15 year old girl, living in California. Her mother, Ingrid, is a beautiful, free-spirited poet. Their life, though unusual, is satisfying until one day, a man named Barry Kolker (that her mother refers to at first as "The goat man") comes into their lives, and Ingrid falls madly in love with him, only to have her heart broken, and her life ruined. For revenge, Ingrid murders Barry with the deadly poison of her favourite flower: The White Oleander. She is sent to prison for life, and Astrid has to go through foster home after foster home. Throughout nearly a decade she experiences forbidden love, religion, near-death experiences, drugs, starvation, and how it feels to be loved. But throughout these years, she keeps in touch with her mother via letters to prison. And while Ingrid's gift is to give Astrid the power to survive, Astrid's gift is to teach her Mother about love. |
| Amistad
[1997,
USA]
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| Freedom is not given. It is our right at birth. But there are some moments when it must be taken. |
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Amistad is the name of a slave ship traveling towards the New World in 1839. It is carrying a cargo of Africans who have been captured, taken on board, and chained in the cargo hold of the ship. As the ship is crossing the Atlantic, Cinque, who was a tribal leader in Africa, leads a mutiny and takes over the ship. They continue to sail, hoping to find help when they land. Instead, when they reach the United States, they are imprisoned as runaway slaves. They don't speak a word of English, and it seems like they are doomed to die for killing their captors when an abolitionist lawyer decides to take their case, arguing that they were free citizens of another country and not slaves at all. The case finally gets to the Supreme Court, where John Quincy Adams makes an impassioned and eloquent plea for their release. |
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Nearly a decade after Cate Blanchett drew the attention of audiences and critics alike with ELIZABETH, the Oscar-winning actress returns to the role of the Virgin Queen. Though the protestant ruler has been on the throne for decades in 1585, Elizabeth I's reign is still under attack from both inside her country and from the continent. Her cousin, Mary, Queen of Scots (Samantha Morton), carries the favour of the nation's Catholics as she schemes for the throne from prison, while Spain's King Philip II (Jordi Molla) plots an invasion with the power of his famous armada. But Elizabeth is also concerned with the arrival of Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen), a charming pirate and adventurer. Unable to reconcile her feelings with her crown, she encourages Bess (Abbie Cornish), her beloved lady-in-waiting, to pursue a relationship with Raleigh.
Nine years haven't dulled Blanchett's ability to play this—or any other—character with an impressive range of fire and tenderness. Her chemistry with the infinitely watchable Owen is one of the film's highlights. As in ELIZABETH, director Shekhar Kapur doesn't restrict himself from using artfully constructed shots that aren't normally used in period dramas. It's a modern retelling of history, and Kapur and his director of photograpy, Remi Adefarasin, aren't content to let the film have the standard look of many films in the genre. Costume designer Alexandra Byrne follows the same logic, creating stunning dresses for Elizabeth that draw inspiration both from modernity and the time period. If Blanchett weren't such a gifted actress, the gorgeous costumes might threaten to overtake her as the star of the film. |
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At midnight on New Years Eve the S.S. Poseidon is struck by a 90' tidal wave and is capsized. The Reverend Frank Scott leads nine Survivors; an elderly couple, Manny and Belle Rosen headed to Israel to see their grandson; A New York detective and his ex-prostitute wife, Mike and Linda Rogo on their second honeymoon to Italy; A young brother and sister, Robin and Susan Shelby going to meet their parents in Greece; A haberdasher James Martin; a pop singer Nonnie Parry, and a waiter from the ship Acres. They travel from the grand ballroom struggling through, steam, fire and rising water in the up-side-down ship to reach the bottom (the propeller shaft), now the top. |
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In this engrossing mystery thriller, master sleuth Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) and his faithful assistant Dr. Watson (Nigel Bruce) are hired by Roland Carstairs (Geoffrey Steele) to escort his widowed mother Lady Margaret (Mary Forbes) on a London to Edinburgh train. Roland fears for the safety of the priceless huge diamond called the Star of Rhodesia that his mother got on her 25th wedding anniversary many years before. Aided by Inspector Lestrade (Dennis Hoey), they guard Lady Margaret's compartment, however, Roland turns up dead and the jewel is stolen. |
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A deadly collision between a train and car lead to an unlikely bond between the train engineer and a young boy who escapes the carnage. |
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Set in Victorian England, the drama chronicles adventures of Oliver Twist (Barney Clark), a 9-year-old lowly orphan born in a workhouse run by the hypocritical, cruel Mr. Bumble (Jeremy Swift). Fed up with maltreatment and poor conditions in the workhouse, Oliver ventures to escape to the streets of London where he is trapped in a den of young pickpockets and petty thieves led by the sinister old Fagin (Ben Kingsley). He tries perfidiously to draw the innocent boy into a life of crime. When Oliver is caught and mistaken for a thief who has participated in the robbery of the wealthy Mr. Brownlow (Edward Hardwicke), the kindly old gentleman decides to take the miserable boy home and give him a proper upbringing. |
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Spain. Gal has retired from the gangster life, and is sunning himself placidly beside the pool at his villa when a boulder comes crashing by, barely missing him. Soon, he and his pal Aitch, together with their wives Deedee and Jackie, are being threatened by a human boulder, Don Logan. Logan wants Gal for a high stakes vault break-in in London (masterminded by the cool and suave Teddy Bass), and he will not take no for an answer. Nevertheless, that's exactly the answer Gal keeps giving him, even as Don gets more and more threatening. Meanwhile, Gal is plagued by dreams of a menacing, hairy beast. Just how far will Don (and Gal) go in this battle of wills? And what of Enrique, the pool boy? |
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The Cooler is Bernie Lootz, and THE COOLER is a love story about the changing fortunes of this down-at-heels loser who has made a career out of spreading his virulent bad luck on the floor of Las Vegas' aging Shangri-La casino. When Bernie falls for a gorgeous cocktail waitress his bad luck is thrown into reverse. |
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Nicaragua 1979: Star photographer Russel Price covers the civil war against president Somoza. Facing the cruel fighting - people versus army - it's often hard for him to stay neutral. When the Guerillas have him take a picture of the leader Rafael, who's believed to be dead, he gets drawn into the happenings. Together with his reporter friends Claire and Alex he has to hide from the army. |
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Set at the end of the 60's as Swaziland is about to receive Independence from Great Britain, the film follows the young Richard E Grant at 12 (Zach Fox) through his parents traumatic separation, till he's 14 (Nicholas Hoult). It is based on true events from Richard E Grant's childhood |
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Two sisters, plus a dead mother, a remarried father, and a hostile step-mother. The sisters, each in her way, have perfected the art of losing. The elder, Rose, is an attorney, responsible, lonely, with a closet full of shoes. The younger is Maggie, beautiful, selfish, and irresponsible. Her drunken behavior gets her tossed by her step-mother from her dad's house; worse behavior gets her tossed from Rose's apartment. Then, while searching in her father's desk for money to filch, Maggie finds an address; the past and the future open up to her and, with any luck, may open to her sister as well. |
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From the producers of "The Rookie", this inspiring sports movie will star Mark Wahlberg as a Philadelphia Eagles fan who has just lost his wife and his teaching job. He decides one day to show up for an open tryout for his favorite NFL team, only to see his wildest dreams come true. |
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The tranquility of a small town is marred only by sheriff Tod Shaw's unsuccessful courtship of widow Ellen Benson, a pacifist who can't abide guns and those who use them. But violence descends on Ellen's household willy-nilly when the U.S. President passes through town... and slightly psycho hired assassin John Baron finds the Benson home ideal for an ambush. |
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Elspeth McGillicuddy, an old friend of Miss Marple's, witnesses a strangulation murder in a passing train through the window of her coach compartment. When Police Inspector Slack can't find a body along the tracks and doubts the validity of the story, Miss Marple and Elspeth locate the area where the body was probably thrown from the train, the isolated manor house of an aged, cantankerous millionaire, Luther Crackenthorpe. Miss Marple's niece Lucy is recruited to apply for a job on the estate in hopes of locating the corpse. When she finds it in an ancient sarcophagus in an outbuilding housing Egyptian and Etruscan art treasures, the police and Miss Marple are brought in. Obviously someone in the large household is involved, but who? |
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Based on a true story, the gruelling drama revolves around Bobby Kent (Nick Stahl) and Marty Puccio (Brad Renfro), two teenagers who have been close friends since their childhood. They are involved in an eccentric relationship. A pathologic sadist, Bobby cruelly abuses Marty, the naïve galoot who can't stand up for himself. When it seems to Marty that his cup of bitterness is filled to the brim, he decides to put a stop to Bobby’s gruesome continuous tortures, once and for all. To take revenge, he teams up with other peers, who are also fed up with being bullied by Bobby, and plots to murder him... |
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After her divorce, Meg Altman and her daughter Sarah move into an old-fashioned house with one very modern addition: a "panic room" which is virtually impossible to break into, designed for refuge during a home invasion. In their first night in the house a trio of thieves do break in and Meg and Sarah rush into the panic room. However, the intruders are looking for something inside the panic room, and given the recent move the room's hotline to the police hasn't been hooked up yet. Worse, Sarah is diabetic and the room doesn't contain any sugar... |
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