Love Keeps Us Together

Appearing at first like a standard samurai movie, this Japanese film is a tragic drama with overtones from Japan's classic theaters: Kabuki and Noh. Indeed, the protagonist's unwitting self-destruction resembles that of Oedipus in Greek drama. Gengo (Katsuo Nakamura) is a ronin, a samurai-for-hire, which, according to the samurai ethic, is no kind of human being at all. He spends some time with a courtesan (a kind of countrified geisha, not a prostitute) and the courtesan and her husband rob him. In seeking retaliation, he wreaks havoc in their community, kills the courtesan, and drives her husband to suicide. But all is not as it appears to be. Gengo is a deposed nobleman, and the courtesan, unaware of his identity, was a supporter of his cause. In robbing the anonymous ronin, she was continuing her campaign to raise money to make possible the nobleman's reinstatement. In killing his supporters in this way, Gengo has violated the deepest ethics of feudal lordship.

Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega are two hitmen who are out to retrieve a suitcase stolen from their employer, mob boss Marsellus Wallace. Wallace has also asked Vincent to take his wife Mia out a few days later when Wallace himself will be out of town. Butch Coolidge is an aging boxer who is paid by Wallace to lose his next fight. The lives of these seemingly unrelated people are woven together comprising of a series of funny, bizarre and uncalled-for incidents.

The Magic School Bus is a series of children's books about science. They feature the antics of Ms. Frizzle, an elementary school teacher, and her class of eight children (in the original books, the class population was at a larger and more standard amount), who board a magical school bus which takes them on field trips into the solar system, under the Bed, into the American Flag, or to other such impossible locations. The books are written in the first person from the point of view of an unnamed student in "the Friz's" class. The class pet, Liz, an anthropomorphic lizard, accompanied the class on their field trips.
Since the Magic School Bus books present scientific facts in the form of stories in which fantastic things happen (for example, a bus turns into a spaceship, or children shrink to the size of blood cells), each book has a page at the end detailing in a humorous manner which parts of the book represented scientific fact and which were fanciful storytelling. In the books' television adaptation, this was replaced by the Producer Says segment at the end of each episode, in which the producer of the show (voiced by Malcolm-Jamal Warner of The Cosby Show fame) receives phone calls from kids complaining about how some things that happened on the show couldn't happen in real life. This allows the show to explain the specific facts in question and why they had to be disregarded to a degree because of the need for dramatic license.

Based in part on a six-volume novel by Junpei Gomikawa and, in part, on Kobayashi's own wartime experiences as a pacifist trying to survive in the Japanese army, The Human Condition is as grand in scale and scope as that other anti-war classic, Gone With the Wind. Like the South, Japan lost a war and can't stop talking about it. Every great Japanese director has a movie about the traumas of WWII under his belt, but none is as ambitious as The Human Condition.

Cedric Khan's tense Hitchcockian thriller stars Jean-Pierre Darroussin and Carole Bouquet as a couple who unwittingly embark on a dangerous and terrifying journey into the night. On the hottest day of the year Antoine and Helene hit the road destined for the south of France. But the oppressive heat and traffic gridlock take their toll on Antoine's frazzled nerves and, as he attempts to cool off with one ice cold beer after another, tensions between the bickering couple are pushed to boiling point. As night draws in Antoine stops off at yet another bar, but returns to the car to find Helene missing. Panic stricken, he embarks on a desperate search, only to find events spiralling beyond his control with horrifying consequences…

Based on his award-winning student short, George Lucas's debut feature cerebrally celebrates the possibility for individual freedom against all odds. In an underground, totalitarian society in the future, sexuality has been outlawed and constant sedation of men and women is mandatory. But THX 1138 and his female roommate LUH 3417 have been cutting back on their medications and have fallen in love, so THX 1138 is imprisoned for drug evasion and misconduct of a sexual nature. With help from an inmate, THX 1138 breaks out to find LUH3417 who is pregnant. Because the funding for fugitive pursuits are quite limited, THX 1138 will survive if he can evade the robocops, but his vehicle keeps overheating and surveillance is everywhere.

A beautiful thriller that has more elements of mystery and romance than of the thriller that revolves around an auctioneer who has an insane collection of paintings of women. Tornatore manages to portray this lonely man in a perfect manner, even a bit too exaggerated towards the extent of that loneliness as well as the overall plot is a little bit confusing in terms of how the plan is carried out at the end, and how everything gets screwed over so suddenly and so painfully. Still, this film has gorgeous work of art and a spectacular art direction, it has Geoffrey Rush giving a nice performance: strong and emotional, and it keeps your interest, even if it's 2 hours long, and that is something to applaud.

The Ancient Ones said that Jauja was a mythological land of abundance and happiness. Many expeditions tried to find the place to verify this. With time, the legend grew disproportionately. People were undoubtedly exaggerating, as they usually do. The only thing that is known for certain is that all who tried to find this earthly paradise got lost on the way.