The Thirteenth Wellington Film Festival 1984
List activity
5 views
• 0 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
74 titles
- DirectorRobert van AckerenStarsGudrun LandgrebeMathieu CarrièreHanns ZischlerEva, an upper-class housewife, frustratingly leaves her arrogant husband and decides to enter the call girl business. She lets Yvonne, a prostitute, teach her the basics and both set out for prey together, until Eva starts an affair with Chris, who turns out to be a call boy, as well. Consequently, she moves into his penthouse, large enough for both to offer their services separately.
- DirectorJane CampionStarsGabrielle ShorneggGeraldine HaywoodMarian KnightThe awkwardness and confusion of burgeoning sexuality in teenage girls in a twisted and repressed suburban culture.
- DirectorSam RaimiStarsBruce CampbellEllen SandweissRichard DeManincorFive friends travel to a cabin in the woods, where they unknowingly release flesh-possessing demons.
- DirectorChris MarkerStarsAmilcar CabralFlorence DelayArielle DombasleA woman narrates the contemplative writings of a seasoned world traveler, focusing on contemporary Japan.
- DirectorJacki OchsStarsMax GailRon KovicUsing striking archive and war footage in support of interviews with veterans, scientists, attorneys, the U.S. Air Force, the Veterans Administration, Dow Chemical and more; this film documents the extraordinary history of chemical warfare, agricultural herbicides, damage to the world environment, and the plight of Vietnam veterans and their families as they struggle for treatment of exposure to Agent Orange and dioxin. As soldiers return from new wars plagued by illness, disability and post-traumatic stress, as citizens question leaders decisions, as fresh environmental catastrophes evoke debate about accountability; it is critical to illuminate struggles and lessons from the past.
- DirectorChris BeaverJudy IrvingStarsJudy IrvingDocumentary about the nuclear industry.
- DirectorMiguel LittinStarsDean StockwellAlan EsquivelCarmen BunsterAlsino, a boy of 10 or 12, lives with his grandmother in a remote area of Nicaragua. He's engulfed in the war between rebels and government troops when a US advisor orders the army to open a staging area by the boy's hamlet. Alsino tries to be a child, climbing trees with a girl, looking through his grandfather's trunk of mementos and trying to fly; he goes to town to sell a saddle, has his first drink and is taken to a brothel. But the war surrounds him. The US advisor takes Alsino on a chopper flight, but he's unimpressed. The soldiers' cruelties awake rebel sympathies in Alsino, and after an army assault backfires, the lad is fully baptized into the conflict.
- DirectorLaura MulveyPeter WollenStarsMiriam MargolyesFrida KahloTina ModottiThis documentary is related to an art show directors Wollen and Mulvey organized for London's Whitechapel Gallery, attempting to pair the rather different work of two female creators, painter Frida Kahlo and photographer Tina Modotti.
- DirectorFrançois TruffautStarsFanny ArdantJean-Louis TrintignantJean-Pierre KalfonAfter he's implicated in several murders, a real estate agent hides out from the cops while his intrepid secretary does some private investigating of her own to locate the killer.
- DirectorGerald PottertonStarsMavor MooreA minister who can't say goodbye goes on a vacation.
- DirectorHans-Jürgen SyberbergStarsEdith CleverMartin SperrRobert LloydRichard Wagner's last opera has remained controversial since its first performance for its unique, and, for some, unsavory blending of religious and erotic themes and imagery. Based on one of the medieval epic romances of King Arthur and the search for the holy grail (the chalice touched by the lips of Christ at the last supper), it recounts over three long acts how a "wild child" unwittingly invades the sacred precincts of the grail, fulfilling a prophecy that only such a one can save the grail's protectors from a curse fallen upon them. Interpreters of the work have found everything from mystical revelation to proto-fascist propaganda in it. Hans-Jurgen Syberberg's production doesn't avoid either aspect, but tries synthesize them by seeking their roots in the divided soul of Wagner himself. The action unfolds on a craggy landscape which turns out to be a gigantic enlargement of the composer's death mask, among deliberately tatty theatrical devices: puppets, scale models, magic-lantern projections. The eponymous hero is sung by the specified tenor voice (Reiner Goldberg) but mimed on screen by a male and a female performer alternately, reflecting what the director takes to be the creator's own sexual conflicts. Syberberg's pacing, dictated by the majestic pace of Wagner's score, is slow, but enlivened by constant subtle shifts in point of view, and memorable performances by actress Edith Clever as the villainess/heroine Kundry (sung by Yvonne Minton), orchestra conductor Armin Jordan as the remorseful knight Amfortas (sung by Wolfgang Schoene), and Robert Lloyd (the faithful retainer Gurnemanz).
- DirectorPeque GallagaStarsCherie GilSandy AndolongLiza LorenaTwo affluent families struggle and learn to survive during the Japanese occupation in the Philippines.
- DirectorMichelangelo AntonioniStarsTomas MilianDaniela SilverioChristine BoissonA director's wife leaves him. He pursues another woman who also departs. This inspires a movie idea about women's relationships. He searches for an actress to star in the film and his life.
- DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsGérard DepardieuWojciech PszoniakAnne AlvaroIn 1793, as the Terror begins in France, Georges Danton, a champion-of-the-people, returns to clash against Maximilien Robespierre and his extremist party.
- DirectorJimmy PickerStarsScott RecordA character closely resembling then-mayor Ed Koch sings a variation on the "Theme from 'New York, New York'" in an entirely clay-animated film depicting a variety of locations and celebrities associated with New York City.
- DirectorKároly MakkStarsJadwiga Jankowska-CieslakGrazyna SzapolowskaJozef KronerPolitical and sexual repression in Hungary, just after the revolution of 1956. In 1958, the body of Eva Szalanczky, a political journalist, is discovered near the border. Her friend Livia is in hospital with a broken neck; Livia's husband, Donci, is under arrest. In a flashback to the year before, we see what leads up to the tragedy. Eva gets a job as a writer. She meets Livia and is attracted to her. Livia feels much the same, but as a married woman, has doubts and hesitations. In their work, they (and Eva in particular) bang up against the limits of telling political truths; in private, they confront the limits of living out sexual and emotional truth.
- DirectorRainer Werner FassbinderStarsRosel ZechHilmar ThateCornelia FroboessPartially based on the life of Sybille Schmitz, who found fame under the Nazi regime, but whose career was destroyed afterward. Veronika Voss is a once prominent UFA actress, kept by her doctor, who raises suspicion in a sports journalist.
- DirectorHedda RinnebergHans SachsStarsCamilla Horn
- DirectorÉric RohmerStarsBéatrice RomandAndré DussollierFéodor AtkineSabine vows to give up married lovers, and is determined to find a good husband. Her best friend Clarisse introduces her to her cousin Edmond, a busy lawyer from Paris. Sabine pursues Edmond, with the encouragement of Clarisse, but Edmond does not seem very interested.
- DirectorManuel Gutiérrez AragónStarsÁngela MolinaAna BelénEncarna PasoIn a small Spanish village, Gloria, the imperious head of a troubled family, is devoted to her two sons. The brothers, Óscar and Juan, have frequent violent disputes. Óscar, the oldest, and his steel-willed mother run the family's grocery store called el Jardín (The Garden), which does a brisk business in the black market. Juan is the handsome, irresponsible, best-loved second son. When Oscar marries his lover Ana, Juan heads for Madrid to work for Franco. He also leaves behind his impoverished cousin, Ángela, pregnant with his son. Jump ten years. Juanito, their son, has rheumatic fever. The doctor says to pamper the boy. Years later, Óscar and Ana remain childless. Gloria wants to bring her illegitimate (and incestuous) grandson and only heir, into the family circle. As Juanito recovers, Juan returns in desperate need of cash; Juanito witnesses a theft blamed on his innocent mother. Things come to a head at a saint's-name party for father and son. Jealousies, betrayals, and a bullet converge.Demons in the Garden
- DirectorCynthia ScottStarsSusana RobledoAntonio RobledoRita BoziFor a few weeks each year, in the depths of winter, senior students at the National Ballet School of Canada are treated to a style of dance that is unlike any other - flamenco.
- DirectorMargarethe von TrottaStarsHanna SchygullaAngela WinklerPeter StriebeckOlga and Ruth become friends. Olga is independent, separated from her husband, living with an immigrant pianist, and teaching feminist literature. Ruth is withdrawn, a painter, possibly mentally ill. Ruth dreams in black and white, sometimes of her suicide. Olga lectures on a 19th-century writer, von Günderrode, a suicide after the breakup of her intense friendship with Bettina Brentano. Ruth's husband Franz encourages the women's friendship, then, as Olga draws Ruth out and the friendship deepens, he becomes jealous. After the women travel to Egypt, Franz has a tirade. Ruth seems crushed between her husband and her friend, and how she responds is the film's climax.A Labour of Love
- DirectorNorman McLarenStarsJean-Louis MorinSylvie KinalSylvain LafortuneA balletic interpretation of the Greek myth in which dancers enact the tragedy of the beautiful youth who condemns himself to a trapped existence through excessive self-love.
- DirectorPeter WellsA boy's awakening recognition of his (homo)sexuality and the 1954 royal visit coincide in this complex memoir of national under-development and solitary personal growth.
- DirectorEdward BennettStarsJulie CovingtonIan CharlesonJohn PhillipsConnie is a member of the British landowning "Ascendancy" in Ireland after WWI. Through a chance friendship with a British soldier, she learns how sheltered she has been, and chooses to ally herself, in her own way, with the struggle for Irish independence.
- DirectorRobert BressonStarsChristian PateySylvie Van den ElsenMichel BriguetA counterfeit bill that starts off as a schoolboy prank leads to incarceration and violence.
- DirectorGail SingerStarsParaskeva ClarkGermaine GreerParaskeva Clark, artist, socialist, feminist, is her own woman at her own cost. This film is a cameo of an irascible and oftentimes touching artist whose work has won her a place in exhibitions and private collections. Born in Russia in 1898, she eventually married a Canadian and moved to Toronto. Because her canvases reflect a strong social conscience, she had to struggle hard to earn a place in the nation's ultra-conservative galleries.
- DirectorAaron LipstadtStarsKlaus KinskiDon Keith OpperBrie HowardA strange doctor secretly experiments with androids on his space station. His assistant is Max, a curious android who wants to see the world and meet a girl. Criminals hide on their station and soon violence erupts.
- DirectorMarv NewlandStarsMark RobmanMaxwell BecraftAn animated music video of I'm Mad by blues singer Willie Mabon by Marv Newland (of Bambi Meets Godzilla fame) featuring a man pulling a cactus on a red wagon, a piano playing beast and a dog sitting with a drink while the camera goes back and forth.
- DirectorPeter GreenawayStarsAnthony HigginsJanet SuzmanAnne-Louise LambertA young artist is commissioned by the wife of a wealthy landowner to make a series of drawings of the estate while her husband is away.
- DirectorEmily HubleyThis animated psychedelic short portrays the stream-of-consciousness adventures of a young woman, including an encounter with her dead father, her mother's struggle with cancer, and open-heart surgery at the hands of the doctor who birthed her (the "Delivery Man" of the title).
- DirectorLes BlankStarsDick PillarWalter SzczypulaJimmy Sturr & His OrchestraA portrait of the life, culture and food surrounding the lovers of Polka music. The title is taken from an old Polka standard. Stars of the Polka world are highlighted.
- DirectorJim BrownStarsLee HaysPete SeegerRonnie GilbertDocumentary about the blacklisted folk group, "The Weavers," and the events leading up to their triumphant return to Carnegie Hall.
- DirectorSusan LambertStarsAlice AnsaraMartha AnsaraMystery CarnageFour women team up to sabotage a supercomputer belonging to a disreputable biotechnology firm.
- DirectorLizzie BordenStarsHoneyAdele BerteiJean SatterfieldSet ten years after the most peaceful revolution in United States history, it presents a dystopia in which the issues of many groups - minorities, liberals, gay rights organizations, feminists - are dealt with by the government.
- DirectorNick MayDocumentary that covers John Cooper-Clarke's tour with reggae poet Linton Kwesi Johnson.
- DirectorHaydn KeenanStarsTracy MannVera PlevnikJulie BarryFour Australian girls decide to give their best friend a night she'll never forget before she heads to New York and their group breaks up.
- DirectorÉric RohmerStarsAmanda LangletArielle DombaslePascal GreggoryMarion is about to divorce from her husband and takes her 15-year-old niece Pauline on a vacation to Granville. She meets an old love...
- DirectorHerbert AchternbuschStarsHerbert AchternbuschAnnamirl BierbichlerWerner SchroeterThe life-size figure of Christ at 42 travels with the cross on a mission through Bavaria.
- DirectorRichard LowensteinStarsChris HaywoodCarol BurnsHugh Keays-ByrneThe dramatised story of a coal-miners' strike in 1930s Australia, in the small south Gippsland town of Korumburra. The story is told through the struggles of Agnes and Wattie Doig, two Scottish immigrants, who were real people.
- DirectorGodfrey ReggioStarsEdward AsnerPat BenatarJerry BrownA collection of expertly photographed phenomena with no conventional plot. The footage focuses on the relationship between nature, humanity, and technology.
- DirectorGeorge CukorStarsJudy GarlandJames MasonJack CarsonA film star helps a young singer and actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career on a downward spiral.
- DirectorJacques RivetteStarsBulle OgierPascale OgierPierre ClémentiYoung unhinged female ex-con with a motorcycle helps a sickly young homeless woman in red discover what the map of Paris she took from her gangster boyfriend leads to.
- DirectorÁgúst GuðmundssonStarsArnar JónssonRagnheiður SteindórsdóttirBenedikt SigurðarsonFrom an authentic Viking saga, Outlaw tells the story of a family blood feud, set in 10th century Iceland.
- DirectorElaine BassSaul BassStarsJohn AbbottNoah HathawayDavid ComfortA child has only an 8 day life-span to complete a mysterious journey from the dim cave-dwelling society where he is born to a final gateway, the object of folklore. The abstract learning-games taught to the child bear an eerie resemblance to mammoth tasks and obstacles that hinder him in his journey. Can he complete the quest before his 8 days are up, and what lies at the end of this arcane sunless world? The gray, stagnating civilization place all their hope in a future they cannot comprehend and learned tasks whose meaning they no longer understand.
- DirectorElem KlimovStarsAleksey PetrenkoAnatoliy RomashinVelta LineDetails the life of the Russian monk Rasputin. The film shows his rise to power and how it corrupted him. His sexual perversions and madness ultimatly leads to his gruesome assasination.Agonia
- DirectorDaniel VigneStarsGérard DepardieuNathalie BayeMaurice BarrierIn medieval France, some villagers challenge a man's claim of identity when he (as he says) returns home from some time in the army.
- DirectorAl Sens
- DirectorJohn WilsonAnimation inspired by and set to the Bob Dylan song.
- DirectorJohn SaylesStarsLinda GriffithsJane HallarenJon DeVriesA happily married woman comes to realize herself of being a repressed lesbian after she has an affair with a female college professor, and then tries to come to terms with her newfound lifestyle.
- DirectorWim WendersStarsAllen GarfieldSamuel FullerIsabelle WeingartenThe crew is running out of money to finish their film.
- DirectorWim WendersStarsFrancis Ford CoppolaIsabelle WeingartenWim WendersWim Wenders's atmospheric testimony about the problems he encountered while working on Hammett (1982) with Francis Ford Coppola, and the differences between the film-making process in Europe and the States.
- DirectorYigong WuStarsJie ShenMin ZhangFengyi ZhangYingzi is a young, impressionable girl living on the southern side of Beijing in the late 1920s. Encountering people in the city, she tries to understand how people are really like inside through her own eyes.
- DirectorFrancesco RosiStarsPhilippe NoiretMichele PlacidoVittorio MezzogiornoThree men face their mother's death.
- DirectorLes BlankCece ConwayAlice GerrardStarsTommy JarrellJulie Jarrell LyonsTogie McGeeA documentary about Tommy Jarrell, a fiddler from North Carolina. This films shows a bit of his current life and those around him and includes a lot of his Appalachian Old-Time music.
- DirectorPál SándorStarsPéter RudolfSándor ZsótérKatalin SzerbIn December 1956 there is a chaotic situation in Hungary. The revolution is put down by the Soviet army. People leave the country in large numbers for fear of revenge. A young soldier (György Angeli) who also took a part in the revolution, takes a train to Vienna together with his friend (Dániel Szerencsés).
- DirectorLance BirdTom JohnsonStarsMartin SheenPart of PBS series Matters of Life and Death, this being about the bomb-shelter craze of the 1950's.
- DirectorEttore ScolaStarsJean-Louis BarraultMarcello MastroianniHanna SchygullaDuring the French Revolution, a surprising company shares a coach, trying to catch up something - the time itself, perhaps.
- DirectorNikita MikhalkovStarsIrina KupchenkoMikhail UlyanovEduard ArtemyevWithout Witness is an unflinchingly intimate and wickedly plotted two-actor tour de force pitting a divorced couple against each other and themselves.
- DirectorFyodor KhitrukA film-parable about how an envious and treacherous jackal quarreled between two friends - the Lion and the Bull.
- DirectorRichard EyreStarsJonathan PryceWilliam MaxwellPaul JessonJames Penfield (Jonathan Pryce) has made a career out of journalism. Now bankrupt, he finds himself with a group of other writers in the middle of the dispute-ridden British homeland at the time of the Falklands War.
- DirectorPaul CoxStarsNorman KayeAlyson BestChris HaywoodAn eccentric elderly man tries to enjoy the three things in life that he considers real beauty: collecting art, collecting flowers, and watching pretty women undress.
- DirectorPierre RissientStarsFéodor AtkineEiko MatsudaGloria DiazIvan is a writer who can not tear himself away from the city of Manila. He likes to hang out melancholy and flirt with pretty women. One day, he meets Mari.
- DirectorAndré DelvauxStarsFanny ArdantVittorio GassmanFrançoise FabianA passionate affair set against the intense encounter between a film-maker and a novelist. The story begins with young scriptwriter François tracking down the author of a once-scandalous novel. His aim is to adapt the work for the screen but several elements of the novel he finds difficult to comprehend. The author, Jeanne, is initially cautious of relaying information, insisting the presumably autobiographical book in no way relates to her personal life. However, eventually she takes the man into confidence to tell the background of Benvenuta. She paints the picture of a musical virtuoso who against her better judgment becomes involved with an Italian magistrate. It's a no-holds-barred passion of hot temperaments doomed to a miserable conclusion.
- DirectorChantal AkermanStarsAischa BenteboucheKatherine BestFrançois BeukelaersThis is a making of a musical, with Chantal Ackerman behind and in front of the camera. It is mostly a collection of clips, talks, directions, and lectures, with the camera capturing the whole adventure.The Golden Eighties
- DirectorFranz AntelStarsKarl MerkatzAlfred BöhmHans HoltA politically naïve Viennese butcher (Bockerer) manages to survive the unification of Germany and Austria and the Second World War.The Stubborn Mule
- DirectorSheila Graber
- DirectorPeter LordDavid SproxtonA probationer wants to miss a meeting to go and see his brother, but must negotiate with his officer
- DirectorTed BafaloukosStarsLeroy 'Horsemouth' WallaceRichard 'Dirty Harry' HallMonica CraigHorsemouth sets himself up in business selling records but when gangsters steal his bike things start to turn nasty. As tensions build, Horsemouth and friends plot to end the gangsters reign of terror and restore justice to the people of Kingston.
- DirectorPierre Hébert
- DirectorLuchino ViscontiStarsBurt LancasterAlain DelonClaudia CardinaleThe Prince of Salina, a noble aristocrat of impeccable integrity, tries to preserve his family and class amid the tumultuous social upheavals of 1860s Sicily.
- DirectorFranco di ChieraStarsPeter EastJames PorterA young man attempts to pick up another man in a Sydney railway station.