Some (not quite new) Movies Worth Your Time, part 1

by Larry Lee

A new Planet of the Apes movie has dropped, which is the unofficial signal that the summer movie season has begun.  In prior years, Memorial Day weekend had signaled the commencement of the summer movie season, but in recent years, studios seem to want to get a jump on the season.  So before the summer craziness gets really silly — too late for that, actually, as the latest Mad Max prequel is already out (Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga) — I thought I would discuss a few worthwhile little movies you may have missed over the last few years.  Nothing on this list is anything you need to see to remain current in cultural conversations with your friends, like last year’s Barbie or Oppenheimer.  But we see movies for all kinds of reasons and, as I explain, these are all well worth seeing. 

The Lunchbox (2013, Amazon Prime rental)  I love foreign movies because of the glimpse they give me of other countries and cultures.  This film tells a seemingly simple story that is actually about so, so much more.  Saajan Fernandes, played with quietly sad  fortitude by the late, great Irrfan Khan (Slumdog Millionaire, Life of Pi, Puzzle), is facing retirement after a long—and boring—bureaucratic career.  He is also moving on after a devastating personal loss.  In short, he has reached a major transition point in his life.  There is also a young wife named Ila, played by Nimrat Kaur (Homeland), just starting out on her life as an adult.  But she is being ignored by her husband and at a loss about what to do about it, other than to entice him with home cooked meals.  In addition to these two human protagonists, there is third star of the movie:  food, glorious food.  At the heart of the story is the amazing lunch delivery system in Mumbai, India, where workers called "dabbawalas" pick up literally thousands, perhaps millions, of individual lunches prepared in the suburbs and transport them into the city, allowing city workers to enjoy a homemade hot lunch.  Amazingly, all those lunches always reach the intended worker.  But in The Lunchbox, a mistake is made, and Saajan receives the lunch Ila has lovingly prepared for her husband.  And like in a good rom-com, that unlikely mistake makes all the difference in Saajan’s and Ila’s life.  But this is not really a romantic comedy, but more of a nuanced and tender story, in which strangers who experience an emotional meeting of their minds that leads them to contemplate how much more life could offer them.  What choices will they make in response?  In Hindi. [Note: You may also want to check out Len's July 2024 review of this film.]

Vivir es Facil con Los Ojos Cerrados (Living is Easy With Eyes Closed)  (2013, Amazon Prime rental)  The winner of multiple Goya awards, i.e., the Spanish Oscars, this is a coming-of-age story, a road movie, a 1960s period piece, and tasty slice of Beatles fan fiction all rolled into one.  Here’s the set-up:  It is 1966, and John Lennon is in Almeria, Spain, filming How I Won the War, directed by Richard Lester.  (Fun fact:  It was Lennon’s only non-musical acting credit.)  Antonio, played by Javier Camara (Talk to Her, Truman), is a schoolteacher who creatively uses the lyrics from popular Beatles songs to teach his pupils English.  But the Beatles don’t include the lyrics to their songs with their albums, making his job more difficult.  So Antonio decides to drive to Almeria, meet with John Lennon, and convince him to include song lyrics with all future Beatles albums.  (Yes, it was a more innocent time, when an ordinary fan could think he could meet in person with a megastar like John Lennon.)  But it’s a long drive from Madrid to Almeria.  There were no freeways, just backroads.  As he drives south, Antonio’s expansive generosity leads him to pick up some hitchhikers along the way.  Neither the driver nor his passengers know at the time that they will never be the same after this road trip, their lives forever changed by the journey.  And although John Lennon was a hugely famous person in 1966, the film is not entirely fantasy, for it takes its starting point from a true story:  there was a real Antonio and he really did manage to meet with Lennon in Almeria.  And from then on, Beatles albums always included song lyrics.  Alert readers will notice the film’s title comes from the song “Strawberry Fields Forever.”  In Spanish.

Key of Life (2012, Kanopy, Amazon Prime rental)  It’s so hard to recommend a comedy because people have such different senses of humor, and there are so many kinds of comedy.  But this farcical romp is a gem.  As in many comedies, it begins with a crazy, unlikely mistake.  Takes is a failed actor, out of work, out of money, and out of hope.  He is, in fact, suicidal but somehow manages to change places with Kondo, a hit man, played by veteran Japanese actor Teruyuki Kagawa.  But who is this hitman, really?  Even he doesn’t know, having been conked on the head, causing amnesia.  Watching the amnesiac hitman try to pick up his life (which, he believes, is that of a penniless, out-of-work actor) is quite funny.  Parallel to this story, an overly organized young woman, played by the delightful Ryoko Hirosue (Departures), has decided on a rigid schedule to find and marry a husband.  These stories intersect in funny and unpredictable ways, but somehow it all works out in the end.  You won’t be able to predict how the protagonists escape their seemingly impossible situations, but it’s extremely entertaining.  In Japanese. 

Gloomy Sunday (1999, Kanopy)  Sometimes one tires of all the avant garde art films, the symbolism and metaphors, the edgy stories, and the weird subcultures, and want to just see an old fashioned movie.  Here is one:  a tale from the eve of World War II in Hungary, with a love triangle of a type we today would call “polyamory.”  There is an extraordinarily beautiful woman, a tortured artist, a very melancholy song and, of course, Nazis.  Interestingly, the song, like the movie entitled “Gloomy Sunday,” really existed.  It was informally known as the “Hungarian Suicide Song” and is so sad that, according to urban legend, led numerous, despairing people to end their lives while listening to the record.  But even if you were not so desperately depressed, you can’t beat the Gestapo, especially if you are Jewish in Budapest during WWII.  But maybe there is a longer game to be played.  Lovely and very entertaining.   In German, Hungarian, and English.

Woman at War (2018, Amazon Prime rental)  Alongside 2020’s My Donkey, My Lover & I with Laure Calamy, Woman at War is probably the movie I have most often recommended to friends and family.  To my knowledge, no one has been disappointed with the choice.  A quirky yet suspenseful eco-thriller, this Icelandic movie has a strong female protagonist who is committed to taking down an industrial plant that she (and others) believe will destroy her country’s environmental paradise.  And she is a powerful woman, unlike the slim, undersized female FBI agents in 2015’s Sicario played by Emily Blunt) or 2017’s Wind River (Elizabeth Olsen).  When Halla, played by Halldora Geirharosdottir, dashes across the tundra to escape a surveillance helicopter, or brings down an electrical grid with a bow and arrow, you really believe it.  Her thrilling one-woman war against powerful governmental forces will have you rooting for her to succeed.  One quirk in the movie, the occasional appearance of a type of Greek chorus played by Ukranian musicians, has gained added poignancy after Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.  In Icelandic.

Headhunters (2011, Hoopla, Paramount+, Amazon Prime rental)  Who doesn’t like a good suspense/thriller?  Here’s one from Norway:  Roger has a good thing going.  A lucrative job as a corporate headhunter, a beautiful house, an impossibly gorgeous wife.  He also has a little side hustle: he is an art thief.  He has the brilliant insight that people stop really looking at their art after it’s been hanging on their wall for a while, so (with the help of an accomplice who works for a home security company), he disables their alarms, enters their homes, steals their art, and replaces it with a high quality ink jet reproduction.  Most people don’t even realize they have been victimized until months have passed.  What a brilliant scheme!  What could possibly go wrong?  Well, I’m here to tell you:  Lots and lots.  Have a cup of coffee before you watch this because you will need to concentrate to follow all the twists and turns but, in the end, it will all hang together.  I promise.  Warning:  Although it is not overly gruesome, it gets a little bloody and, well, poopy.  (You’ll see.)  In Norwegian, Danish, Russian, English. 

Aya (2012, Kanopy, Amazon Prime rental)  This 40-minute short film was nominated for an Oscar in the live-action short film category.  It also won several international awards.  Once again we see strangers coming together in an unlikely (but kind of believable) way, causing them—just a tiny bit—to consider making a change, to contemplate their life and the choices they have made.  If you’re looking for an emotionally complex yet nuanced story and don’t have a lot of time, this touching short film is for you.  In English and Hebrew.