Search Results for "despot"

An ode to the viruses of our day

Hong Kong, 1978. South Korean actress Choi Eun-hee is kidnapped by North Korean operatives following orders from dictator Kim Jong-il.

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A lecture-style voice over explains the concept of different scales used to determine if a community (or nation) is free or despotic. Illustrated with acted vignettes and motion graphics.

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Cheng is a young Chinese mainlander who moves in with his expatriate cousins to work at an ice factory in Thailand. He does this with a family promise never to get involved in any fights. However, when members of his family begin disappearing after meeting the management of the factory, the resulting mystery and pressures force him to break that vow and take on the villainy of the Big Boss.

A widower refuses to let his three daughters marry in order to avoid paying settlements, so they'll just have to outsmart him.

By combining actual footage with reenactments, this film offers both a documentary and fictional account of the life of Adolf Hitler, from his childhood in Vienna, through the rise of the Third Reich, to his final act of suicide in the waning days of WWII. The film also provides considerable, and often shocking, detail of the atrocities enacted by the Nazi regime under Hitler's command.

Joseph II was the Emperor of the Enlightenment. During his short term in office he changed his empire like no other. He wanted to understand the living conditions of the common people and alleviate their misery. Until his death he traveled 50,000 kilometres - more than once around the globe - through Europe, including visiting his sister Marie Antoinette in Versailles.

A horde of rampaging warriors massacre the parents of young Conan and enslave the young child for years on The Wheel of Pain. As the sole survivor of the childhood massacre, Conan is released from slavery and taught the ancient arts of fighting. Transforming himself into a killing machine, Conan travels into the wilderness to seek vengeance on Thulsa Doom, the man responsible for killing his family. In the wilderness, Conan takes up with the thieves Valeria and Subotai. The group comes upon King Osric, who wants the trio of warriors to help rescue his daughter who has joined Doom in the hills.

In an ancient time when majestic fire-breathers soared through the skies, a knight named Bowen comes face to face and heart to heart with the last dragon on Earth, Draco. Taking up arms to suppress a tyrant king, Bowen soon realizes his task will be harder than he'd imagined: If he kills the king, Draco will die as well.

A mysterious door in the basement of the Hercules house leads to the Sixth Dimension by way of a gigantic set of intestine. When lovely exchange student Frenchy slips through the door, the diminuitive King Fausto falls in love with her. The jealous Queen Doris takes Frenchy prisoner, and it is up to the Hercules family and friend Squeezit Henderson to rescue her.

In a drab, anonymous gray school governed by a strict authoritarian regime, an apparently unremarkable day is turned on its head following a seemingly ridiculous announcement. Disbelieving at first, the all male, identically uniformed pupils are informed that what they had always been taught as fact is no longer true. When the incredulous students speak out, what initially seems laughably absurd becomes desperately real as they are forced to question how far they will go to stand up for their beliefs. Two & Two is an allegory for the absurdness of dictatorship and tyranny - and the resilience of the human spirit.

A chimney sweep and his beloved shepherdess are aided by Wonderbird in their escape from a ruthless dictator

An American historian (Mr Webster) comes to Berlin to visit an old man who claims to be the real Adolf Hitler and to be 103 years old. The Hitler who died in 1945, the old man says, was just one of his six doubles - one for each weekday - while Hitler himself retired into a bunker below the S-Bahn tracks and married a second time.

Kath & Kim turn more than just heads when they go on an overseas trip and end up being the centre of their very own fairytale.

In the peaceful kingdom of Hetvia, Count Dakkar prepares two high-tech submarines to explore the ocean depths. Jealous of Hetvia's bounty and eager for war, the wicked Baron Hubert Falon attempts to steal the two submersibles for nefarious use. An undersea chase ensues, which leads the two rivals, along with Dakkar's daughter and her lover, into a secret world ruled by a race of strange aquatic creatures.

The battle-scarred hero of the Greek Revolution, Giannos "Astrapogiannos", returns home after the end of the blood-soaked War of Independence, only to find himself in a new conflict, as he locks horns with a ruthless local Kodjabashis.

Cardoza's death, a candidate for mayor of a village chief enemy and Rosauro Castro, leads to Mr. Garcia Mata to undertake an investigation. Upon arriving realizes that even the whole town, including the mayor, lives in fear by the chief and only achieved revenge end the injustices committed by Rosauro Castro.

Alfred “Boogie” Chin is a basketball phenom living in Queens, New York, who dreams of one day playing in the NBA. While his parents pressure him to focus on earning a scholarship to an elite college, Boogie must find a way to navigate a new girlfriend, high school, on-court rivals and the burden of expectation.

This documentary feature pulls back the curtain on the world of ‘working class’ rappers. The film spotlights independent artists struggling to find a balance between making a living and pursuing their art alongside the never-ending saga of age and relevance. Weaved together through a series of 30 plus interviews that are devoid of the ego so common in the business of music, especially hip-hop, the film traverses the country (USA) to explore the myths and misconceptions of life as a full-time rapper.

Ivan, a young Croatian autonomist whose brother left the country due to political persecution, falls in love with Marina, the duaghter of a staunch communist police chief. Their forbidden whirlwind romance takes place against the backdrop of early 1980s Zagreb's everchanging sociopolitical background following the death of Yugoslavia's president Josip Broz Tito.

Drama set in a small provincial town in post-war Croatia about 20 locals who try to understand why one of their neighbors killed himself.

An obscure actor is hired by the police to get a confession out of a dying mafioso.

While World War One is coming to an end, the Social Democrat Friedrich Ebert is trying to maintain political stability in Berlin. In the haughty Prince Max of Baden he finds an ally who offers him government participation under his chancellorship. In the meantime, discontent with the monarchy is steadily increasing in the last days of the war, but Emperor Wilhelm II remains steadfast in his throne.

For two friends there is only one secret to happiness, that is easy to understand, but, perhaps, difficult to accept.

Sitting in a restaurant representing the waiting room to the other world, a tired old man watches the patrons who represent him and his immediate family during the important moments of his life. Moments that have impacted him and the family, and have turned him into a man he was at the end of his life. The old man is forced to look these events in an objective way, observe them from the sidelines, as the judge and jury of a tragic life filled with regret, bitterness, and bad decisions. At a certain point, it becomes clear that the old man has actually died and is watching his own life.

Exhausted by the relentless pace of the construction site, Vali, a worker pushed to his limits, walks away from everything and begins digging a hole in the middle of a field. As he descends, reality shifts around him, carrying him through a series of spaces. Each place he passes through reflects his exhaustion, his fear, and his need for release.

In a peaceful, impenetrable forest, a mother and son live harmoniously until one day a mysterious snake enters their lives and disrupts their peace. The snake transforms into a beautiful maiden and seduces the foolish son, who loses all sense for her. The mother heads into the forest in search of the forest god Stribor to plead to him for help. However, when she finally finds him, things take an unexpected turn, and the mother must gather all her courage and strength to save her son. This merry interpretation of Ivana Brlić-Mažuranić's story plays with tradition and reshapes the original tale with a dark, yet humorous twist.

6 years after a nuclear war in 2034, somebody knocks on the door of a shelter built by a single father, Nenad, who wants to protect his daughter Nevena.

Ten-year-old Jovan was born with partial cerebral palsy. Shy, self-conscious and without many friends, he often escapes in his imagination to a place where he is a crime-fighting superhero not limited by his own body. His world shifts when a new girl arrives in his class. Milica, not intimidated by much, chooses the seat next to Jovan and immediately enlists him to help her free her father from his girlfriend, whom she is convinced is a witch who has placed her father under a spell.

For her fourteenth birthday, Iva recieves a small digital camera, which she decides to use to document the occasion, recording a continous string of petty squables that become more absurd and agressive as the day turns into night.

Young social worker falls in love with a delinquent girl on the run.

Valent is a night shift worker who can barely feed his family. To add the insult to injury, every night he must pass near the butcher's shop with meat products he can't afford. But one night the shop is a scene of a gangland shooting. Valent picks up the bag full of money and a gun, and his life changes.

Tennis player turned coach Tashi has taken her husband, Art, and transformed him into a world-famous Major champion. To jolt him out of his recent losing streak, she signs him up for a "Challenger" event — close to the lowest level of pro tournament — where he finds himself standing across the net from his former best friend and Tashi's former boyfriend.

Jerry Maguire used to be a typical sports agent: willing to do just about anything he could to get the biggest possible contracts for his clients, plus a nice commission for himself. Then, one day, he suddenly has second thoughts about what he's really doing. When he voices these doubts, he ends up losing his job and all of his clients, save Rod Tidwell, an egomaniacal football player.

Howard Langston, a salesman for a mattress company, is constantly kept busy at his job, disappointing his son. After he misses his son's karate exposition, Howard vows to make it up to him by buying an action figure of his son's favorite television hero for Christmas. Unfortunately for Howard, it is Christmas Eve, and every store is sold out of Turbo Man. Now, Howard must travel all over town and compete with everybody else to find a Turbo Man action figure.

A Jewish couple and a homosexual doctor fall to prejudice and scandal in 1938 Italy.

In a pre-revolutionary Russia, a poor Jewish milkman struggles with the challenges of a changing world as his daughters fall in love and antisemitism grows.

It is 1943, and the German army—ravaged and demoralised—is hastily retreating from the Russian front. In the midst of the madness, conflict brews between the aristocratic yet ultimately pusillanimous Captain Stransky and the courageous Corporal Steiner. Stransky is the only man who believes that the Third Reich is still vastly superior to the Russian army. However, within his pompous persona lies a quivering coward who longs for the Iron Cross so that he can return to Berlin a hero. Steiner, on the other hand is cynical, defiantly non-conformist and more concerned with the safety of his own men rather than the horde of military decorations offered to him by his superiors.

A young student Braca is trying to seduce a beautiful model Iris. Although they are from two different worlds, they both try not to show it. In another story, Šomi and Duje anxiously follow the football match between Manchester and Eastwich. They bet on Eastwich, because their childhood friend Kengur is their goalkeeper. The plot of the third story takes place on the roof of the solitaire, where Avaks and Hibrid are wasting time in anticipation of something happening.

Year 1993, the bleakest time of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. A group of actors from Belgrade, utterly unaware of what they're setting themselves up for, embark on a search for quick earnings - on a "tour" around the Serbian Krajina. However, there they are thrust into the heart of war and begin to wander from war front to war front, from one army to the next.

A British Special Boat Service commando tracks down an international terrorist cell.

After losing a family member to a violent crime, a shattered rideshare driver picks up a passenger that forces him to confront his grief.

The night is falling and Montreal is under the snow. People line up at the lost and found office of the city’s transit company. They all have lost something, which, upon reflection, becomes the symbol of a deeper loss. Prayer for a Lost Mitten is a creative documentary by turns melancholic and festive, yet ever compassionate. A film that helps us get through the winter.

We watch from behind as a person with a sling bag walks through the night, before melting among her peers in a refuge, in Mexico, welcoming those women and men who are fleeing a political situation, an economic impasse enriching organised crime. It is of little matter where these migrants come from, as it is, above all, a matter of staying alive and avoiding the gangs that keep an eye on the long path to exile. However, everyone knows the goal: to get into the north of the continent, the United States or Canada, at all costs, aboard goods trains, which they hang onto dangerously. In complete immersion, Hubert Caron-Guay filmed this last chance voyage in which waiting contends with anguish, even though solidarity is tangible at times, like in the sequence where a man enjoins his companions in misfortune to “run at the same speed as the train”, otherwise, death is certain.

A mysterious forest in early fall echoes with birdsong and the sound of a river. Fallen leaves speckle gold on the blue stones. Two weary travellers make their way on foot – the painter Meng Huang and writer Ma Jian. When, as if after a long journey, they finally reach a cabin, they eat and drink, but the mood is not one of contentment. Their gaze is dark, haunted by memories of the China they have fled: persecution, resistance and the treatment meted out to those who fight for human rights. With the forest arousing painful thoughts and existential considerations, they talk about art. For the two artists, whose world view has been upended by the Tiananmen Square massacre, creation offers an answer to oppression and lies. But what kind of life remains for the exiles?

Two veterans of the Bosnian War, one American, one Serbian, clash in the remote Smoky Mountain wilderness.

When terrorists threaten nuclear catastrophe at Chernobyl, the world's only hope is to reactivate decommissioned Universal Soldier Luc Deveraux. Rearmed and reprogrammed, Deveraux must take on his nemesis from the original Universal Soldier and a next-generation "UniSol" that seems almost unstoppable.

Five years after a zombie outbreak, the men and women of R-Division hunt down and destroy the undead. When they see signs of a second outbreak, they fear humanity may not survive.

“The Factory Must Not Stop!” is a documentary film about a former giant of the Yugoslav chemical industry and the memories of its workers. A discovered archive — tens of thousands of slides and negatives — becomes an entry point into a world that no longer exists. Through images and testimonies, a representative of a new generation, Aleksandar Kostić, explores the boundary between lived experience and collective nostalgia, trying to understand why the factory continues to live on in people’s stories — as myth, trauma, or a lost ideal.