Your Favourite Foreign Language Films

I'd forgotten the Fellini films. Why do they never have them on the telly, I wonder? A favourite film from way back which I'd love to see again is The Lacemaker.

jO5 - I can't really reel (haha a pun!) off a list of foreign language films either, although I did like Il Postino and Cinema Paradiso. Right now I'm immersed in Forbrydelsen (The Killing), so I hope that counts!

Un Homme et Une Femme - this came out when I was living in Geneva and the music from it brings it all back. Anything by Sanjit Ray. Manon and Jean la Florette of course, Lives of Others, Das Boot, Fellini films, The Red Lantern, so many and so hard to find in the local video stores. BBC and Channel 4 used to have foreign film evenings now very rare - the plebs win again.

Excellent thread, so many wonderful movies listed already!

My list:

The Lives of Others - utterly one of my favourite movies. Saw it for a second time recently and it was even better than I remembered.
Run Lola Run
Kings of the Road - this could be a very German list!!
Goodbye Lenin
Fear Eats the Soul
My Life as a Dog - very, very quirky Swedish movie about a young boy. 1st non-German movie on this list!
Let The Right One In - spooky, excellent Swedish movie. The US remake is apparently rubbish!
Fanny and Alexander
Persona
Wild Strawberries - in fact almost all Bergman's output
Kanal
Knife in the Water
Closely Observed Trains
The Fireman's Ball
Rome Open City
Wild Rice
8 1/2
La Dolce Vita
La Strada
Juliet of the Spirits
All the Spaghetti Westerns
Suspiria
The Illusionist
Le Havre
Intouchables
Ran
Tokyo Story
Departures - wonderfully odd film about a young unemployed cellist who accepts a socially unacceptable job laying out the dead before funerals.
Tokyo Olympiad
Olympia 1 & 2 (Leni Riefenstahl)
Das Boot - but the full TV version is better than the movie imho
Central Station- heartbreaking and uplifting, both at the same time
Y Tu Mamá También - sexy!
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
The Travelling Players
Of Gods and Men
Into Great Silence - almost three hours of contemplative silence, yet it's very involving!
Lagaan
Hard Boiled
Chungking Express

I made the 'plebs' comments as I'm pig sick with tv programming lately - same old garbage or continously running the same stuff year after year. For Example: Strictly,The Apprentice,X.Factor, all the cookery programmes like Master Chef - all, except for X-factor, good when they had their first two or three series - now its ALL the time. Thank goodness for a Sky dish as the PBS channel is having a series of Ken Burns documentaries that are cracking.

Is it actually possible to have a favourite book/film/ piece of music/food/ poem? Yesterday, I watched the last in the series 'Britain's Best Number One' (I think that was the title). The 'winner' was 'Bohemian Rhapsody'. What does that tell us? Is it the music or the things associated with it?

I once saw a bizarre Cuban film about a trade unionist who died and his union card was buried with him. His widow was then unable to claim a pension and the whole of the rest of the film was about attempts to dig him up again to get the card. (This outline of the plot does not do it justice.) I am damned if I can remember the title or the director's name. Did anyone else ever see that?

GrannyKnot; what do you think to the later Killing? I'm not as engrossed as I was first time round but still wouldn't miss it [it's getting a bit formulaic imo].

Let the Right One In is probably what set me off watching all the latest Scandinavia films; I couldn't believe what I was watching. isthis; I haven't bothered with the [why did they bother?] remake, although I did enjoy the American Girl With the Dragon Tattoo [albeit not as much as the original]. The worst foreign language films of recent years have been The Headless Woman and Uncle Boonmee.

Has anyone seen The untouchables? It's French and based on a true story, with the principal characters still happily alive.

I very rarely laugh at anything out loud but this was really funny - and moving and life affirming.

It is set in Paris, partly in the banlieues and partly in the plush ancestral home of one of the main characters, but it could easily have been Deptford and Kensington. It's still showing in London.

And yes, The Lives of Others is brilliant.

I don't suppose anyone else cares, but I have tracked down the title of the Cuban film. It's called La Muerte de un Burocrata (The Death of a Bureaucrat). That's such a relief because otherwise I would be worrying about it all night. You know how it is.

Thanks mice,I was trying to remember the title of the Untouchables- must see it soon.My DD1 knows I like foreign films so took me to see Dogtooth (Greek) when I was in London a couple of years ago.It's a horrible film and half the audience walked out.It still disturbs me thinking about it

Adore 'Amelie'......it always cheers me up. The 'A very long Engagement' is also rather sweet.

I had completely forgotten about Das Boot (how???) but agree with isthisallthereis that it has to be the full television version. Loved Fellini, particularly La Strada and Juliet of the Spirits. I enjoyed Il Postino and Cinema Paradiso but watched them both without subtitles so may have missed some of the finer points!

crimson I enjoyed the first series of Forbrydelsen the most. I love that word in Danish, so rich and sounds much better than "The Killing". I agree that series 2 and 3 not a patch on the first one. Perhaps because it was fresh and new! But still like it. I try and not look at the subtitles and see whether I can guess at what they are saying (drives DH mad because I say it under my breath) because it seems to be the same stem language as Dutch which in turn is the origin of Afrikaans (which I am fluent in). Come to think of it, there are some smashing Afrikaans films - do they count as foreign language films? Kringe in die Bos would be one of them.

I know I'm repeating myself here so forgive me but, now I've realised that The Killing is a like a murder mysery evening where you are thrown red herrings and given little clues, I just sit and let it wash over me. It does seem a little formulaic [repeating myself again]. Think the main difference though, is that, to me Sarah Lund wasn't the most important character in the first series; all the main characters were interesting in their own right [and quite charismatic] but in this one it's all about her. There's a funny thing on utube that I'll try to find.

Oh yes, 'Fear eats the soul' - loved it, especially as the older woman really looks like an older woman, not like the stretched plastic Hollywood version of an older woman.

A lot of Western cinema stole stories from Japanese cinema, for example, The Magnificent 7 from The 7 Samurai. One neglected Japanese film chronicled the life of a schoolmaster in a private school. Sayonara, Noodle San - a classic!

And the Americans steal from English cinema. Their 'Italian Job' was an insult to the Michael Caine/Noel Coward original imho.

Thank you Grans for all these ideas!

My recent favourite was a German film "Three Quarter Moon" about a grumpy, racist taxi driver who ends up having to look after a six-year-old Turkish girl who speaks only Turkish.

Claude Chabrol's film "Le Boucher" (The Butcher) is my favourite, with his then-wife Stephane Audran starring as the school teacher in the small Dordogne village where the action is set. It's moody and strange with some wonderful shots of the surrounding scenery. I've watched it many times, and have also visited the village where it was filmed - strange to see the Mairie (town hall) and the school attached to it, where a lot of the action takes place.

what about studio ghibli cartoons-Kiki and Totoro and the one about the world of cats-i buy them whenever I can on dvd and the first 2 are GCs favorites

I find them a bit weird, but do have a fascination with all things Japanese. I've watched Spirited Away a few times. Such a different culture.

Not a great fan BUT
I've Loved You so Long - with Kristin Scott Thomas (acting in French)
Volver with Penelope Cruz.
Both brilliant and not to be missed.

Echo loads of others favourites... anyone seen Cous Cous? That was a lovely film...sad but lovely!