8 Foreign Genre Films Worth A Look
By John
It’s no Citizen Kane. In order to appreciate Returner, you can’t expect too much. What makes the movie enjoyable is that it’s over-the-top Japanese sci-fi action at its best. So long as you don’t take it too seriously, the plot — which involves the always worthy combo of aliens and time travel — is actually pretty decent. When the last bastion of civilization is under siege by an alien invasion in Tibet, a lone girl travels back in time to prevent the invasion from occurring in the first place.
Many critics have referred to Returner as a live-action anime with overtones of film noir, and I think the description is pretty accurate. If you want to see the embodiment of Japanese sci-fi gunfight action, Returner is the movie for you.
This indie Spanish time travel thriller will leave your head spinning — in a good way. Timecrimes handles time travel rather elegantly, giving it the complexity it deserves without requiring you to vacuum your brain off the floor as the credits roll. Hector is a normal guy. He has a normal wife, lives in a normal house, and has a slightly voyeuristic tendency to stare at people through binoculars. (Okay, maybe he’s not entirely normal.)
When, after a bizarre sequence of events, his voyeurism lands him in a time machine — I hate it when that happens — Hector’s world is turned upside down and backwards. How will he handle being thrown through time multiple times? Will he prevent the horror that drove him into the time machine in the first place? Will Hector’s recklessness destroy the universe!? Tune in next week to find out! And by “tune in next week,” I mean watch the movie.
Night Watch is a movie (the first in an eventual trilogy) whose plot and concept are somewhat difficult to enunciate in short format here. At its core, the story is about the archetypal conflict between light and dark forces. In a somewhat similar vein to the Blade and Underworld movies, Night Watch presents a world where this war is carried out right under humans’ oblivious noses. Only members of the “night watch” — powerful superhuman beings charged with fighting against the forces of evil — strive to minimize spillover into the human world.
It’s stylized yet oddly grounded, and despite the similar themes comes off as less over-the-top than the aforementioned analogous American franchises. If you’re into slightly creepy fantasy-horror films, chances are good you’ll be a fan of Night Watch. And, if you do find yourself enjoying it, be sure to check out the sequel Day Watch.
Between Twilight, True Blood, and the several other upcoming vampire movies and TV shows, everybody’s on the hominis nocturna bandwagon right now. So I figured I’d better wrap up this list with what many critics consider to be the best fanged-film of the last few years. Despite critical acclaim, Let the Right One In has received relatively little attention in the US. That’s slowly changing, however, as the movie’s popularity has spread greatly via word-of-mouth since the DVD release. Let the Right One In isn’t your average vampire movie; it’s not terribly graphic, and the genre elements are actually fairly passive in most of the film. Strangely enough, it is your average preteen coming-of-age movie that just happens to feature a vampire in a leading role.
Oskar, a rather morbid 12-year-old Swedish schoolboy, befriends the new girl in his apartment complex, Eli. She’s also 12…ish (rather hard to gauge ages with the undead, you know). As their friendship grows and a concurrence of events shows them how much they need each other, you can’t help but see a strange sweetness in this twisted, twisted film. Not only does this movie hold its own when held up against other popular vampire flicks, but it’s also worth watching to see how the genre gets a slightly different (i.e. less “in your face”) treatment outside of the Hollywood studio system.
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July 9th, 2009 at 10:30 am
Night Watch is a great movie! So is the sequel, Day Watch. I think they are completing the story with a third sequel called Twilight Watch but this one isn’t out yet.
July 9th, 2009 at 10:45 am
Wow — this is an awesome list. The only films on the list I’d heard of were Solaris and Pan’s Labyrinth. I’m definitely heading to Netflix…
July 9th, 2009 at 11:06 am
I’ve seen all of these but Let The Right One In (Gonna watch it soon), Time Crimes (Never heard of it), and the original Solaris (Might watch it soon). The only thing I can POSSIBLY disagree with is Sunshine…I really don’t like that movie. Well I love 90% of it. You know what I’m getting at if you’ve seen it.
Great list though. I didn’t think anyone but me had seen Returner =D
July 9th, 2009 at 11:19 am
“Let the Right One In” is a must-see, but get the UK version. The US version uses a different, worse translation (I have no idea why.)
July 9th, 2009 at 11:28 am
I agree with you on the ones I have seen ( Children of men and Pan’s Labyrinth) So I am going to work my way through this list…. Thanks.
July 9th, 2009 at 11:44 am
Prep the Frak parties…we have a bunch of new material to cover. Great article! I am looking forward to seeing these films with the GWC crue!
July 9th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
I really enjoyed Solaris (and for those who haven’t seen it, it’s really quite good), but I have to admit, the other two on your list that I’ve seen (Children of Men and Pan’s Labyrinth) I didn’t really like. That said - Alfonso Cuaron’s also the director of the 3rd Harry Potter movie, which I love.
Also, it’s cool that these are all more or less available! Yay!
July 9th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Awesome list! Thanks for this great blog!
May I also suggest the film, 2046, written and directed by Wong Kar-wai. Not strictly sci fi but enough elements to claim the genre (there are androids, for godz sake!) It’s beautifully filmed, and haunting…but may be a little slow for action-oriented Coolerheads out there!
July 10th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Thanks for the recommendation, FrenchToast! 2046 is on the top of my queue, now. I’m a big fan of foreign cinema (not just sci-fi/fantasy), so I’m always on the lookout for new ones.
July 11th, 2009 at 2:45 am
The Night Watch (and the trilogy) are some of my favourite movies. (Weirdly enough, I actually saw Day Watch on a plane. Interesting viewing experience, that’s for sure.) Thanks for including them in the list.
2046 is somewhat interesting, but I’d say definitely not one of Wong Kar-wai’s best movies; and I agree that its only very loosely related to the sci fi genre.
July 11th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Let The Right One In is the best movie I saw in 2008, by far.
July 13th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
I truly love Night Watch. It has by far the best use of subtitles in any movie i have ever seen. They do not just appear and disappear like a normal movie. They come and go with the camera movement. They are wiped away by cars and doors opening. Also they are often colored or written differently to emphasize the words that are being spoken. For example there is a spookey vampire telpathic call calling in a victim. The words are written in red and as i reacall are not a clean font almost as if it were hand written.
Two more films that deserve to be on this list are the french films City of the Lost Children and Delicatessen. Both are dark dissutopic tales set in France. Both are also made by the same dude who made Amalie so you can anticipate amazing visuals.
Delictessen takes place in a post apocalyptic suburb of in a Deli and the Apartments above it. The residents, scarce on food, turn to hiring a handyman and eventually, when their previous meat supply runs low, eating him. It follows the story of the new handyman arriving falling in love with the shop keepers daughter and the hilarity that follows. Its a really Dark Comedy but the visuals are amazing.
City of the Lost children is the story of a young street urchin and her new friend a Circus Strong Man (played by Ron Perlman who learned french for the movie) investigating why kids are going missing in a sort of Steam punk France. Its kind if a bizarre very loose mashup of Monsters Inc., The Professional, and Annie.