#120 – Touch of Evil, 1958, Orson Welles
When a car bomb explodes on the American side of the U.S./Mexico border, Mexican drug enforcement agent Miguel Vargas begins his investigation, along with American police captain Hank Quinlan. When Vargas begins to suspect that Quinlan and his shady partner, Menzies, are planting evidence to frame an innocent man, his investigations into their possible corruption quickly put himself and his new bride, Susie, in jeopardy.
JUMBO CACTUAR APPROVED FILM
#121 – Annie Hall, 1977, Woody Allen
New York comedian Alvy Singer falls in love with the ditsy Annie Hall.
#122 – The Dreamers, 2003, Bernardo Bertolucci
A young American studying in Paris in 1968 strikes up a friendship with a French brother and sister. Set against the background of the ’68 Paris student riots.
#123 – Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce 1080 Bruxelles, 1975, Chantal Akerman
A lonely widowed housewife does her daily chores, takes care of her apartment where she lives with her teenage son, and turns the occasional trick to make ends meet. Slowly, her ritualized daily routines begin to fall apart.
#124 – Humanity and Paper Balloons, (人情紙風船), 1937, Sadao Yamanaka
The story develops in the Tokugawa era of the 18th century, in a poor district of Tokyo, where impoverished samurai live from hand to mouth among equally poor people of lower social classes. One such ronin (masterless samurai) Matajuro, spends his day looking for work whilst his wife, Otaki, makes cheap paper balloons at home. One rainy night, Shinza, a barber, and equally penniless, impulsively abducts the daughter of a wealthy merchant, hiding her at Matajuros home. Their desperate plan has grave consequences when a ransom attempt backfires. The film, which starts and ends with suicide, is deeply pessimistic, insisting that life in feudal Japan was hellish and short for those at the foot of the social ladder.
#125 – The Sword of Doom, (大菩薩峠), 1966, Kihachi Okamoto
Ryunosuke, a gifted swordsman plying his trade during the turbulent final days of Shogunate rule, has no moral code and kills without remorse. It’s a way of life that leads to madness.
JUMBO CACTUAR APPROVED FILM
#126 – Infernal Affairs, (無間道), 2002, Andrew Lau & Alan Mak
Chan Wing Yan, a young police officer, has been sent undercover as a mole in the local mafia. Lau Kin Ming, a young mafia member, infiltrates the police force. Years later, their older counterparts, Chen Wing Yan and Inspector Lau Kin Ming, respectively, race against time to expose the mole within their midst.
JUMBO CACTUAR APPROVED FILM
#127 – Marriage Story, 2019, Noah Baumbach
A stage director and an actress struggle through a grueling, coast-to-coast divorce that pushes them to their personal extremes.
#128 – The Lion King,1994, Roger Allers & Rob Minkoff
A young lion prince is cast out of his pride by his cruel uncle, who claims he killed his father. While the uncle rules with an iron paw, the prince grows up beyond the Savannah, living by a philosophy: No worries for the rest of your days. But when his past comes to haunt him, the young prince must decide his fate: Will he remain an outcast or face his demons and become what he needs to be?
#129 – Twenty-Four Eyes, (二十四の瞳), 1954, Keisuke Kinoshita
Schoolteacher Hisako Oishi struggles to imbue her students with a positive view of the world and their place in it, despite the fact that she knows full well that most of them will die in the war.
Jumbo Cactuar Film Index 